Our illustrious people

Louis Théodore Gouvy (1819-1898): born in Sarre, this musician spent a significant part of his life in the house of his brother Alexandre, ironmaster, in Hombourg-Haut: the Villa Gouvy. Known, recognized and honored during his lifetime, both in France (Member of the Institute) and in Germany (Member of the Royal Academy of Arts in Berlin), he fell into oblivion after his death. He died in Leipzig on April 21, 1898. He is buried in Hombourg-Haut, in the cemetery behind the Saint-Etienne Collegiate Church, in the heart of the historic town of the city.

Rediscovered recently, especially thanks to the action carried out on site in Hombourg-Haut, by the Théodore Gouvy Institute but also thanks to remarkable discographic recordings, he gradually regains the place that was his. A classical romantic, his conception of music is close to that of Schumann, Mendelssohn and Brahms.

Jacques de Lorraine: Bishop of Metz and Lord of the Châtellenie Hombourg/Saint-Avold from 1239 to 1260

Founder of the town of Hombourg, he gave it his letters of franchise in 1248. He created a chapter there, crowned the hill with a grandiose fortified castle and installed a mill and a common oven. Jacques offered the new town his communal forest.

Simon Batz (Homburg 1420 – Lübeck 1464), Simon Batz known as Simon Von Homburg (around 1420-1464): trained at the chapter school of his hometown, he undertook an exemplary academic career by joining the prestigious law university of Erfurt. Commonly called “Meister Simon von Homburg”, the renowned professor obtained his doctorate in both civil and canon law and was rector of his university, then legal and diplomatic advisor to Lübeck. One of the elementary schools in Hombourg-Haut today bears his name.