When he was just 16 Burkhard Gotthelf Struve enrolled at the University of Jena where he learned about philosophy, politics, history and jurisprudence. His teachers included , and , although sources stress that he had been a bibliophile from an early age, and where he did not agree with his teachers he would undertake his own research, so that in many matters he was self-educated even in respect of his time at university. After Jena he spent a period at Helmstedt, learning from the charismatic Heinrich Meibom. Subsequently, he studied briefly at the Viadrina University at Frankfurt, before returning to Jena in 1690.
