Elise Meitner was born on 7 November 1878 into a Jewish upper-middle-class family at the family home in 27 Kaiser Josefstraße in the Leopoldstadt district of Vienna, the third of eight children of chess master Philipp Meitner and his wife Hedwig. The birth register of Vienna's Jewish community lists her as being born on 17 November 1878, but all other documents list her date of birth as 7 November, which is what she used. Her father was one of the first Jewish lawyers admitted to practice in Austria. She had two older siblings, Gisela and Auguste (Gusti), and four younger: Moriz (Fritz), Carola (Lola), Frida and Walter; all ultimately pursued an advanced education. Her father was a freethinker, and she was brought up as such. As an adult, she converted to Christianity, following Lutheranism, and was baptised in 1908; her sisters Gisela and Lola converted to Catholicism that same year. She also adopted the shortened name "Lise".