Friedrich Wilhelm - Charlottenburg, DE - Equestrian Statues on Waymarking.com

This statue of Friedrich Wilhelm depicts him riding his horse with its right front leg raised. It appears to be about double life-sized. He holds the reins in his left hand in front of him, while holding a tubular object (maybe a scope?) out to his side with his right hand. He has a stern expression while looking forward and slightly to the left. He has long wavy hair and no facial hair. He appears to be in battle dress over which he wears a cape that wraps around the front. On his left side he wears his sword at the hip. The oblong shaped white stone plinth is quite large with many decorative facets to it. There are four figures surrounding the plinth that symbolize the four temperaments.

"Statue of the Great Elector

At the entrance of the palace stands a large equestrian statue of the Great Elector. It was designed in 1698 by Andreas Schlüter and commissioned by king Friedrich I, the elector's son. At the base of the statue are four chained warriors, symbolizing the four temperaments (which stem from the Antiquity where they were used to describe personalities). The statue was originally located in front of the Stadtschloss at the Museum Island, but during the Second World War the statue was submerged to the bottom of the Tegeler See, a large lake in Berlin. The statue was recovered in 1952 and after a restoration it was moved to the Charlottenburg Palace." SOURCE

"Frederick William (German: Friedrich Wilhelm) (16 February 1620 – 29 April 1688) was Elector of Brandenburg and Duke of Prussia – and thus ruler of Brandenburg-Prussia – from 1640 until his death. A member of the House of Hohenzollern, he is popularly known as "The Great Elector" (German: Der Große Kurfürst) because of his military and political prowess. Frederick William was a staunch pillar of the Calvinist faith, associated with the rising commercial class. He saw the importance of trade and promoted it vigorously. His shrewd domestic reforms gave Prussia a strong position in the post-Westphalia political order of north-central Europe, setting Prussia up for elevation from duchy to kingdom, achieved under his son and successor.

Elector Frederick William was born in Berlin to George William, Elector of Brandenburg, and Elisabeth Charlotte of the Palatinate. His inheritance consisted of the Margraviate of Brandenburg, the Duchy of Cleves, the County of Mark, and the Duchy of Prussia.

During the Thirty Years' War, George William strove to maintain, with a minimal army, a delicate balance between the Protestant and Catholic forces fighting throughout the Holy Roman Empire. Out of these meagre beginnings Frederick William managed to rebuild his war-ravaged territories. In contrast to the religious disputes that distrupted the internal affairs of other European states, Brandenburg-Prussia benefited from the policy of religious tolerance adopted by Frederick William. With the help of French subsidies, he built up an army to defend the country. In the Second Northern War, he was forced to accept Swedish vassalage for the Duchy of Prussia according to the terms of the Treaty of Königsberg (1656), but as the war progressed he succeeded in gaining full sovereignty for the Prussian duchy in the treaties of Labiau, Wehlau, Bromberg and Oliva, leaving the Holy Roman Emperor as his only liege for his imperial holdings.

In the conflict for Pomerania inheritance, Frederick William had to accept two setbacks, one in the Northern War and one in the Scanian War. Though militarily successful in Swedish Pomerania, he had to bow to France's demands and return his gains to Sweden in the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (1679).

Frederick William is notable for raising an army of 40,000 soldiers by 1678, through the General War Commissariat presided over by Joachim Friedrich von Blumenthal. He was an advocate of mercantilism, monopolies, subsidies, tariffs, and internal improvements. Following Louis XIV's revocation of the Edict of Nantes, Frederick William encouraged skilled French and Walloon Huguenots to emigrate to Brandenburg-Prussia with the Edict of Potsdam, bolstering the country's technical and industrial base. On Blumenthal's advice he agreed to exempt the nobility from taxes and in return they agreed to dissolve the Estates-General. He also simplified travel in Brandenburg and the Duchy of Prussia by connecting riverways with canals, a system that was expanded by later Prussian architects, such as Georg Steenke; the system is still in use today." SOURCE