KONRAD DIPPEL

Real Name: Johann Konrad Dippel (see comments)

Identity/Class: Human magic-user;
    citizen of the Holy Roman Empire (but close enough to be included under Germans in my book);
    17^th and 18^th century A.D.;

Occupation: Theologian, physician, alchemist, necromancer (see comments);
    former physician to the Swedish Court

Group Membership: The von Frankenstein Family (not a team, but a grouping);
    at least formerly the Lutheran Orthodox church

Affiliations: Ernest Ludwig, the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt;
    Johann Jacob Diesbach, Hofmeister, King Frederick I, Otto Georg, Queen of Norway (presumably Anne Sophie Reventlow);
    formerly Emmanuel Swedenborg

Enemies: Conrad Broeske, Domenico Manuel Cajetano, Emmanuel Swedenborg

Known Relatives: Anna Eleonora Munchmeyer (mother, deceased), Johann Philip Dippel (father, deceased);

    Anna Catharina Muller (wife, deceased);

    Ernst von Frankenstein, Victor von Frankenstein, William von Frankenstein (grandsons, deceased); Elizabeth von Frankenstein (granddaughter-in-law);
    Vincent von Frankenstein (great-great-great-grandson, deceased), Lenore von Frankenstein (great-granddaughter-in-law), Victoria von Frankenstein (apparent great-great-great-granddaughter; see comments)
    Basil Frankenstein (great-great-great-great-grandson, deceased);
    Ludwig von Frankenstein (great-great-great-great-great-grandson);
    Veronica von Frankenstein (great-great-great-great-great-great-granddaughter);
    Jason von Frankenstein (uncertain relationship, deceased);
    Maximilian Frankenstein (Maximilian von Katzenelnbogen, distant relative);
    other Frankensteins

Aliases: Baron von Frankenstein;
    middle name alternatively spelled "Conrad";
    possibly Christianus Demócritus, Franckensteinensis and Franckensteina-Strataemontanus

Base of Operations: Unrevealed (given his activities, Hell is a likely possibility);
    presumably perished in Castle Wittgenstein, near Berleberg, in what would be modern Germany;
    formerly the (apparently) original Castle Frankenstein, on the northern edge of the Magnet mountain on the banks of the river Rhine, in the territory of Hesse/Hessengau (now apparently Darmstadt, Germany);
    formerly Stockholm, Sweden;
    formerly Christiania, Norway;
    formerly a prison on Bornholm island, Denmark;
    formerly the University of Leiden, Netherlands;
    formerly Berlin;
    formerly the University of Strasbourg, Grand Est, France;
    formerly University of Giessen, Gliessen, Hesse, (in what is now) Germany;
    formerly Darmstadt Gymnasium;
    born in Castle Frankenstein;

Education: M.D. from Leiden University;
    masters? degree in theology from University of Giessen;
    unspecified degree from University of Strasbourg (or perhaps he just lectured there?)

First Appearance: August 10, 1673 (birthdate in the real world);
    (Marvel) Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (January, 1992)

Powers/Abilities: Konrad Dippel was an experienced theologian, preacher, physician (given the knowledge available at the time), chemist, alchemist, palmistrist, and necromancer.

    He had an unrevealed level of magical skill and in reanimating dead bodies and/or transferring spirits from one body to another.

    He created/discovered the pigment Prussian Blue, as well as Dippel's oil (which he considered to be an elixir vitae (elixir of life)) and the Arcanum Chymicum. 

History:
(Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb)) <1673 A.D.> - Anna Munchmeyer and Lutheran minister Johann Dippel  -- both refugees from the armies of the French King Louis XIV -- birthed a son, whom they christened Konrad.

(Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org) - Konrad was born at Castle Frankenstein.

    Pastor Dippel planned that Johann Konrad should become the fifth preacher in the family and to that end he undertook the boy's earlier education himself.

     Later young Dippel went to Darmstadt Gymnasium (Rector Otto Georg) where his name is first on the roll of distinguished old boys. There, at the age of nine, he began to express doubts about the Catechism.

    At the age of seventeen and a half, in I69I, Dippel entered the Faculty of Theology at Giessen. With his flair for disputation he soon established a reputation for brilliance, which in its turn brought adulation from fellow-students and from tutors. That Dippel was no ordinary student is evident from his choice of a title for his M.A. thesis, De Nihilo (1693).

    After graduating, Dippel left Giessen for Wittenberg and Strasbourg where he preached, practiced palmistry, and expounded his philosophy. He had not yet given any time to the serious study of alchemy, but this did not deter him from lecturing on that subject also.

    The Strasbourg period lasted only two years; having killed an opponent in a duel, Dippel was forced to flee the district and returned to Giessen, this time as house tutor at the ducal court.

    The Lutheran Church was at that time divided into two camps, the Orthodoxists who required conformity to the Lutheran creeds in belief and to the Lutheran liturgy in worship, and the Pietists who held that the good life was of more importance than intellectual assent to a creed. In his student days, Dippel had supported the Orthodoxists but during his court tutor period he became, nominally at least, a Pietist.
    On the other hand, one of the tenets of the Pietists, laid down in Spener's Pia Desiderata was that opponents should be met with charity and understanding rather than with acrimony and violence, a requirement which Dippel was temperamentally incapable of meeting.

(Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org and Encyclopedia Brittanica) - Controversy was essential to Dippel's nature,  as his two first works, published under the name “Christianus Democritus,” Orthodoxia Orthodoxorum (1697) and Papismus vapulans Protestantium (1698), he assailed the fundamental positions of the Lutheran theology. He held that religion consisted not in dogma but exclusively in love and self-sacrifice.

(Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org) - With at least the latter publication he took up that position of perpetual critic and accuser which he never relinquished.

(Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org) - With the death of Pastor Dippel in I 704, Johann Konrad ceased to hope for either university or Church appointments, and removed himself to Berlin to follow an alchemical career.

(Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb)) - Konrad Dippel became one of the most notorious alchemists of his time -- a man obsessed with the secret of immortal life.

(Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org) - In Berlin, in company with J. G. Rosenbach, he set up a laboratory for gold-making, said to have been a palatial establishment.

    In 1705, Domenico Manuel Cajetano, a Neapolitan peasant who had earned his lving as a goldsmith and as a conjurer, and who now posed as a count, was summoned to demonstrate transmutation before King Frederick I. Dippel was chosen to be one of the referees, showing how quickly he must have gained the King's confidence. Cajetano's conjuring trick was quickly unmasked by Dippel.

    In 1704, a  manufacturer of colours named Johann Diesbach, who usually prepared a lake of cochineal by mixing a decoction of this substance with alum and some green vitriol, and by precipitating the mixture with a fixed alkali. Being one day in need of fixed alkali, Diesbach borrowed from Dippel, in whose laboratory he worked, some salt of tartar from which that chemist had several times distilled his animal oil, and observed that the lake precipitated by means of this alkali instead of being red was a fine blue color. Dippel, to whom he related the appearance, knew that it must have been caused by his alkali, and attempted to produce the same effect by giving the same quality to fixed alkali by an easier process. In this he succeeded.

    In 1707 Dippel left Berlin for Holland and began to study medicine at Leyden. When Dippel graduated M.D. at Leyden (I 711), the Professor of Medicine there, who presumably saw his thesis, was celebrated physician Hermann Boerhaave.

    It now seemed that a period ofsettled respectability might begin, as Dippel bought a house outside Amsterdam and began to practise medicine. Alas, the old propensity for acrimony asserted itself once more, and three years later he was again absorbed in a series of political escapades culminating in seven years imprisonment on the Danish island of Bornholm.

    On Dippel's release (at the request of the Queen of Denmark (presumably Anne Sophie Reventlow)) he went first to Christiania, as the guest of the wealthy merchant Hofmeister (in I726), and later in I 727 to Stockholm as physician to the Swedish court. Although he was received there with great ceremony, his powers of judgment seem to have begun to decline. A number of small gold figures had been excavated, on Bornholm, and shown by Jacob de Melle to be old Scandinavian idols. Dippel published a refutation of this, claiming the figures to be of Ancient Egyptian origin!

(Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb)) - In 1732, Konrad sold an "Arcanum Chymicum" -- a lesser type of "Philosopher's Stone," which made only low-grade gold -- to the Landgrave of Hesse, Ernest Ludwig.

    For this minor boon, he received the title to Castle Frankenstein (which had been sold to the state by the previous von Frankensteins in 1682), thus founding a new dynasty of von Frankensteins.

(Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org) - The remainder of the old philosopher's life was lived out in comparative obscurity in Sweden and North Germany. As a guest of the Duke of Wittgenstein-Gutzow, he was provided with a laboratory at Wittgenstein Castle near Berleburg.

    Konrad Dippel predicted that he would live until 1808.

(Real world history) <April 25, 1734> - A few months later, Konrad Dippel was found dead in bed at Wittgenstein Castle.

(Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb)) - In 1734, Konrad, the new Baron von Frankenstein was found dead of unidentified causes in a castle chamber locked from the inside.

(Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org / Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb)) - While some believed he died of a stroke or had poisoned himself, many who knew him believed that he had been poisoned; others hinted at an even darker end.

(Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb) - BTS) - Fearing the fabled curse of the Rock of the Franks, Konrad's family of two brothers and five sisters (see comments) fled to Switzerland, taking with them Konrad's infant son, Alphonse.

    In Geneva, they began a new life.

(Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb)) - BTS) - Victor Frankenstein (one of Alphonse's three sones) grew to manhood unaware that he was the grandson of the notorious alchemist and necromancer Konrad Dippel. Yet blood -- most especially blood accursed -- will tell...and so young Victor was inexorably drawn to the same subject of study as his infamous ancestor: Eternal life.

Comments: Created by his parents (as he was a real world person);
    apparently connected to Victor Frankenstein by Radu Florescu in In Search of Frankenstein;
    adapted to the Marvel Universe and into the Frankenstein lineage by Jean-Marc Lofficier, Roy & Dan Thomas, and Geof Isherwood.

    Konrad died at age 60, leaving behind an infant son. With "infant" generally meaning unable to walk or talk and being less than a year of age (although some will include children closer to 2-years-old), Konrad had to be 58-59 years old when he conceived Alphonse.

    In the real world, Dippel was a theologian and a chemist, but a bit of crazy person, which got worse with age, and he delved into alchemy and mysticism, without any proof of success.
    In the Marvel Universe, he was an both a successful alchemist and a necromancer.
    In "In Search of Frankenstein," Radu Florescu postulated that Dippel was the inspiration for Victor Frankenstein and detailed how Mary Shelley may have known about Dippel.
    Jean-Marc Lofficier (JML) established Dippel as the grandfather of Victor Frankenstein in Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37, as detailed in the Book of the Vishanti.
       Given the latter information, it is extremely likely that Dippel's means and methods influenced and facilitated the work of Victor Frankenstein in the Marvel Universe.
       There is relatively little we know about Konrad Dippel-616 (only the few regular text entries in the history). I would think that most of the real world history for Konrad would fit, and I included as much as seemed appropriate. 
       The real world Dippel did not own Castle Frankenstein, was not the Baron of Frankenstein, and did not have magical powers. He was an alchemist, but there is not proof he could do any of the things he claimed he could do.

Johann Dippel: Real World, Internet, and in popular culture

    The real world history information included in the profile history is from www.cambridge.org. The article is seven pages of great detail, and I highly recommend it for anyone interested in learning the real world history of Konrad Dippel. I was considering pasting the whole thing into this document, but it lost all formatting, and so it was a waste. I included a substantial amount of it in italics. The link in this paragraph is to this specific document. Hopefully the page is maintained, but, if it breaks down, check it out on the Wayback machine, as it was in good working order as of 5/25/2023.

    Coda on Konrad Dippel from the cambridge.org entry:

    Death was probably caused by a stroke, but many who knew him declared him to have been poisoned: this indicates, if nothing more, the conditions under which he lived and the dangers which threatened him throughout his life.

    Dippel wrote over seventy works, most of them under the pseudonym of Christianus Democritus, and all of them are rare.

• Giessen, his first University, has preserved only two and these of minor importance.
  
• Strasbourg has twenty-five, including the Art of Distillation (Analysis cramatis harmonici hyper-metaphysicologico-mathematica, das ist, Chymischen Versuch zu distilliren per decensum, per ascensum per latus . . . I729) and the Egyptian Figures (Erofnete Muthmassungen und merckwurdige Gedancken uber Herrn Jacobs von Melle Commentatiuneulam... Hamburg, I725).
  
• Leyden has only the M.D. thesis, while Amsterdam has six works, including the Art of Distillation.
  
• In Britain, the chemical and medical works are available in the Ferguson and Young collections at Glasgow.
  

Professor Johann Lorenz von Mosheim had at least a pair of notable quotations regarding Dippel:

At least it may be said that, unlike the Vicar of Bray, Dippel rarely gained any material advantage from his changes of theological and political color.

CONSTITUENTS OF DIPPEL'S ANIMAL OIL

• Major Constituents: Butyronitrile, Valeronitrile, Hexonitrile, Isohexonitrile, Deconitrile, Palmitonitrile, Stearonitrile, Pyrrole, Methylpyrrole, Dimethylpyrrole, Hydrocarbons: C₉H₄, C₁₀H₁₆, C₁₁H₁₈
• Minor Constituents  Methylamine, Ethylamine, Aniline, Pyridine, Picolines, Lutidines, Quinoline, Phenol, Propionitrile, Valeramide, Toluene, Ethylbenzene, Naphthalene

    Courtesy of ancestors.familysearch.org., I found three brothers and four sisters (as well as the name of his wife and daughter)...but perhaps his family was different in Reality-616 than the real world. Certainly the internet and its ease of data-searching was not around during the time of the Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 story!

    A University of Pennsylvania site -- http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/People/dippel.html -- offers this:

    Little is known certainly of Dippel, whose life is shrouded in mystery and legend. His interest in alchemy led him to search for the elixir vitae and the philosopher's stone, and he is said to have been interested in creating artificial life. He was also alleged to practice grave-robbing. Dippel's Oil, a concoction of bones, blood, and other bodily fluids distilled in iron tubes and other alchemical equipment, was intended as the elixir vitae, but served only as a stimulant. Dippel offered his next formula, which he claimed was the true elixir of life, to the Landgrave of Hesse in exchange for Castle Frankenstein. It is said that Dippel signed his name "Frankenstein" after his place of residence.

    The connection between Dippel and the Castle of Frankenstein on the Rhine near Darmstadt has led some critics to suggest Dippel as the original of Mary Shelley's Victor Frankenstein. But the paucity of material about his actual life leaves much room for doubt, and many of the traits attributed to him may postdate Mary Shelley's novel. There is also considerable doubt about whether Mary Shelley could have known about Dippel's life.

    And, then, from the harder-to-trust Wikipedia (but included because a lot of the information is interesting and may be true for Dippel-616; and because there is an extensive discussion on Dippel's association with the Frankensteins in other stories):

    He studied theology, philosophy and alchemy at the University of Giessen, obtaining a master's degree in theology in 1693. He published many theological works under the name Christianus Demócritus, and most of them are still preserved. Circa 1700, he turned to Hermetic studies and alchemy as a key to nature. Between 1700 and 1702, he engaged in a bitter dispute with the Reformed Court Preacher Conrad Broeske in Offenbach, with whom he shared millenarian hopes for soon-coming renewal in Christendom. He accused Broeske of compromise and collusion with the authorities after Broeske refused to publish Dippel's "The Scourging Papacy of the Protestants" on the Offenbach press.

    Dippel's reputation as a controversial theologian earned him both defenders and enemies throughout all of Europe. Emanuel Swedenborg was probably both his most notable supporter and, later, staunch critic: Swedenborg began as a disciple of Dippel, but eventually dismissed him as a "most vile devil ... who attempted wicked things." Swedenborg clarified that he was at first enamored by Dippel's emotionally charged writings and agreed with his attempts to dissolve traditional churches for a more personal faith and rejection of the Bible as the literal Word of God; however, he eventually criticized Dippel as "bound to no principles, but was in general opposed to all, whoever they may be, of whatever principle or faith ... becoming angry with any one for contradicting him." Swedenborg went so far as to suggest that Dippel was merely a cultish opportunist who used his theological charisma for his own financial gain and social influence, actively leading people away from traditional faith in order to "take away all their intelligence of truth and good, and leaving them in a kind of delirium."

    Dippel led an adventurous life, often getting into trouble because of his disputed opinions and his problems with managing money. He was eventually imprisoned for heresy, where he served a seven-year sentence. He created an animal oil known as "Dippel's oil", which was supposed to be the equivalent to the alchemists' dream of the "elixir of life". At one point, Dippel attempted to purchase Castle Frankenstein in exchange for his elixir formula, which he claimed he had recently discovered; the offer was turned down.

    According to Stahl, Dippel and the pigment maker Diesbach used potassium carbonate contaminated with this oil in producing red dyes. To their surprise, they obtained a blue pigment "Berliner Blau", also called "Preussisch Blau" or "Prussian blue".

    There are claims that during his stay at Castle Frankenstein, he practiced alchemy and anatomy. He was allegedly working with nitroglycerin, which led to the destruction of a tower at the Castle Frankenstein.

• But this seems to be a modern myth, for it is an anachronism. Nitroglycerin hadn't been discovered in Dippel's time.
  
• And although the history of the castle during Dippel's lifetime is well documented, the destruction of a tower – though surely a remarkable event – is nowhere mentioned.

    Other rumors about Dippel appear to be modern inventions, too.

• For example, that which said he performed experiments with cadavers, in which he attempted to transfer the soul of one cadaver into another. Soul-transference with cadavers was a common experiment among alchemists at the time and was a theory that Dippel supported in his writings, thus making it possible that Dippel pursued similar objectives, but there is no direct evidence to link him to these specific acts.
  
• There is also no evidence to the rumor that he was driven out of town when word of his activities reached the ears of the townspeople — though he was often banned from countries, notably Sweden and Russia, for his controversial theological positions.
  

    Dippel did, however, experiment quite frequently with dead animals, of which he was an "avid dissector". In his dissertation Maladies and Remedies of the Life of the Flesh, Dippel claims to have discovered both the elixir of life and the means to exorcize demons through potions that he concocted from boiled animal bones and flesh. This is the same essay in which Dippel claimed to believe that souls could be transferred from one corpse to another by using a funnel.

    Some of Dippel's contemporaries, notably Johann Heinrich Jung, believed that toward the end of his life, Dippel lost his faith altogether after years of bitter disputes with other Christian leaders. Calling Christ "an indifferent being", Dippel shifted all of his energy exclusively on his alchemical experiments. He set up a lab near Wittgenstein (which was eventually converted into a pub named after him, Dippelshof), and at this point in his life historical records are vague on his activities and thus grew folkloric in nature.

    During this time, at least one local minister apparently accused Dippel of grave-robbing, experimenting on cadavers, and keeping company with the Devil. For the most part, Dippel kept to himself and his work; he perhaps even actively perpetuated the rumors that he had sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for secret knowledge, as relying on his reputation as a dark sorcerer better enabled him to find audiences with those willing to pay for his knowledge of the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life.

    He died at Castle Wittgenstein near Bad Laasphe (and Berleburg, about 95 miles (or 150 kilometers) from Castle Frankenstein), probably from a stroke, though some contemporaries suspected poisoning.

    A year before his death, he wrote a pamphlet in which he claimed to have discovered an elixir that would keep him alive until the age of 135.

    Dippel's connection to the Castle Frankenstein gave rise to the theory that he was a model for Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, although that idea remains controversial. This hypothesis was probably first suggested by Radu Florescu in his book In Search of Frankenstein (1975), which speculated that Shelley (then Mary Wollstonecraft) visited the castle during her travels on the Rhine with Percy Shelley, where they might have heard local stories about Dippel, which by then would have grown legendary and notorious. Florescu also notes that the Shelleys reference a brief interaction while touring the countryside around Castle Frankenstein with students of the University of Strasbourg, of which Dippel was once a student; these students could have told them stories about the infamous alumnus. In addition, the Shelleys knew several members of the so-called "Kreis der Empfindsamen", a literary circle that met in Darmstadt from 1769 to 1773; Castle Frankenstein was frequently used as a location for their public readings, thus making it possible that Dippel's legends could have come up during conversations between those in the circle and the Shelleys.

    A local historian, Walter Scheele, believes that the legends told in the villages surrounding the castle were transmitted by Jacob Grimm to Mary Jane Clairmont, translator of Grimm's fairy tales and stepmother of Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin. Scheele also claims that, in 1814, Mary, her stepsister Claire Clairmont, and Percy Bysshe Shelley are said to have visited Castle Frankenstein, on their way to Lake Geneva. Other historians, whether their field of research is Grimm, Shelley, or the Castle Frankenstein, do not see any evidence for this. Scheele's claimed letter of Grimm is nowhere to be found. And no evidence can be found that Clairmont was considered the translator for Grimm's Fairy Tales.

    Several nonfiction books on the life of Mary Shelley also confirm Dippel as a possible influence. In particular, Miranda Seymour finds it curious that Mary speaks of "gods [making entirely] new men" in her journal so soon after her travels through the regions surrounding Castle Frankenstein; if rumors indeed existed throughout the area that Dippel experimented on cadavers in an attempt to create life, Seymour argues, Mary's phrasing could be more than merely coincidental. In his book Frankenstein: The First 200 Years, Christopher Frayling refers to a passage in Mary's diaries later in her life in which she expresses a desire to return to the region surrounding Castle Frankenstein to take in more of its folklore — implying that she is already familiar with at least some of the local legends.
    For now, however, the connection remains a subject of an ongoing debate.

Later Dippel–Frankenstein connections:

    Regardless of the historical validity of the connection, however, Dippel's status as Frankenstein's prototype seems assured in current popular culture (similar to Count Dracula's equally controversial interchangeability with the historical Vlad the Impaler).

    In addition to Florescu's speculative work, the Dippel/Frankenstein merging has appeared in several works of fiction: 

• Robert Anton Wilson's fantasy novel The Earth Will Shake features Dippel as a monster-making, globe-hopping magician who calls himself Frankenstein
• The science fiction novel The Frankenstein Murders portrays Dippel as an assistant to Victor Frankenstein
  
• Topps' three-part comic book miniseries The Frankenstein-Dracula War lists Dippel as one of Dr. Frankenstein's chief inspirations
• Warren Ellis's graphic novel Frankenstein's Womb hypothesizes that Shelley indeed visited Castle Frankenstein and heard of Dippel before writing her famous work
• Christopher Farnsworth's debut novel Blood Oath features a vampire trying to stop an immortal Dippel (who had once worked for Adolf Hitler) from creating a Frankenstein-like army
  
• G.M.S. Altman's novel Dippel's Oil features a kindhearted Dippel living in modern times, bemused at his influence on the Frankenstein myth
• Larry Correia's novel Monster Hunter Vendetta makes reference to Dippel as the creator of an enigmatic character, 'Agent Franks'
• Kenneth Oppel's 2011 novel This Dark Endeavor: The Apprenticeship of Victor Frankenstein includes several homages to Shelley's influences, including the naming of Victor Frankenstein's twin brother Konrad, after the alchemist
• Stan Major's novel Rimms of Khaos features Dippel as an immortal criminal mastermind, forced to make Frankensteinian monsters for a master vampire bent on world domination
• Johann Dippel is mad-doctor Lord Hervey's hero in the Frankenstein Chronicles TV series, and Dippel's reanimated son becomes Hervey's partner in crime.
  
• Jeanette Winterson's 2019 novel Frankissstein dramatizes the Shelleys' visit to Castle Frankenstein, where they hear the story of Conrad Dippel's determination to learn the secret of life in order to reanimated his beloved deceased wife

• Johann Dippel is mentioned as the teacher of one of the characters in the episode "Lost and Found" of the TV series The Frankenstein Chronicles (2015). In season 2, Laurence Fox plays Dippel's son, who is involved in resurrections, but he is not mentioned as having met the Shelleys.
• Dippel appears as a minor character in Larry Correia's Monster Hunter series of novels as Konrad Dippel. He is credited with the creation of the Frankenstein monster, and contrary to Mary Shelley's novel, he is credited with teaching the monster human mannerisms and the German language.
• Dutch symphonic black metal band Carach Angren released a concept album inspired by Dippel, titled Franckensteina Strataemontanus, in 2020.

    Thanks to Loki for helping confirm the status of 17th and 18th century "Germany."

    Special thanks to Jean-Marc Lofficier, the man who brought Konrad Dippel into the Frankenstein family in the Marvel Universe, for reviewing this profile and confirming multiple facts, as well as clarifying new information, such as Ernest Ludwig (sometimes anglicized as Ernst Louis)as the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt who granted Konrad the barony to Castle Frankenstein. Thanks to Markus Raymond for his research, as well!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Louis,_Landgrave_of_Hesse-Darmstadt

    The modern day Victoria Frankenstein has stated on multiple occasions that she is the great-granddaughter of Victor, although the Book of the Vishanti, as reviewed by Dr. Strange, identifies her as Veronica's older sister (rather than second cousin, thrice-removed, as she would be as Victor's great-granddaughter). I'll discuss the matter further in Victoria's profile as I update it.

Profile by Snood.

CLARIFICATIONS:
Konrad Dippel should be distinguished from:

• other "Konrad," "Conrad," or "Dippel" characters, groups, items, events, or beings

(Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org) - Johann Philip Dippel, schoolmaster and pastor at Niederramstadt, was the fourth generation of Lutheran clergy in the Dippel family.      About I 670, religious persecution caused him to uproot his home and seek refuge at Frankenstein, and here Johann Konrad was born at the castle on August 10, 1673. (Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb)) <1673 A.D.> - Anna Munchmeyer and Lutheran minister Johann Dippel  -- both refugees from the armies of the French King Louis XIV -- birthed a son, whom they christened Konrad. (Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org) - Johann was 37-years-old and Anna was 33 when Konrad was born (Real World History, courtesy of Cambridge.org) - Pastor Dippel planned that Johann Konrad should become the fifth preacher in the family and to that end he undertook the boy's earlier education himself.      With the death of Pastor Dippel in 1704, Johann Konrad ceased to hope for either university or Church appointments, and removed himself to Berlin to follow an alchemical career. (Real World History, courtesy of ancestors.familysearch.org) - Anna died in 1710. --Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 Note: Real world history from the Cambridge.org site also noted: In spite of its romantic name, Frankenstein Castle is an unexciting ruin about one mile south of Darmstadt, overlooking the Odenwald.      Additional relative information is courtesy of ancestors.familysearch.org.

. . (Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (fb)) - In 1732, Konrad sold an "Arcanum Chymicum" -- a lesser type of "Philosopher's Stone," which made only low-grade gold -- to the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, Ernest Louis. .     For this minor boon, he received the tile to Castle Frankenstein (which had been sold to the state by the previous von Frankensteins in 1682), thus founding a new dynasty of von Frankensteins. . --Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37

Appearances:
In Search of Frankenstein (1975) - Radu Florescu (writer)
Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme#37 (January, 1992) - Jean-Marc Lofficier, Roy & Dan Thomas (writers), Geof Isherwood (artist), Mike Rockwitz (editor)

First posted: 05/24/2023
Last updated: 05/30/2023

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

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