A Mozart Forgery

In the April 1956 issue of the Österreichische Musikzeitschrift (11. Jahrgang, Heft 4, 146f.), Erich Hermann Mueller von Asow published a short article, entitled "Mozart als Zeuge" ('Mozart as witness'). The article presented a document from 1789, held by the Musik- och teaterbiblioteket in Stockholm. It is a receipt, signed by a certain Elisabeth Rothmann, which allegedly bears Mozart's signature. Mueller von Asow's article begins with the following short introduction.

In its collection of autographs, the Royal Swedish Academy of Music in Stockholm holds a document signed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart as a witness, concerning a payment made by Martin Rothmann to his sister-in-law Elisabeth Rothmann, widowed Born. The document, of which the librarian Ph. Lic. Gösta Morin has kindly given us a photocopy, reads as follows.

Mueller von Asow sent a research request to the Vienna Municipal Archives (whose original could not be found in the holdings of the Magistratsabteilung 438). His commentary (Österreichische Musikzeitschrift 1956, 147) reads as follows.

 

[translation:]

Nothing can be found about Elisabeth Rothmann (Rottmann?) in the Municipal Archives of Vienna, despite reviewing the probate files of the Schotten and the Vienna magistrate from between 1791 and 1820 (For the arduous search, the author gives thanks to the head of the archive Dr. Geyer, and Dr. Kratochwill).
According to the Hof- und Staats-Schematismus der Residenzstadt Wien from 1791, the following people can be documented: Philipp Rottman, living at Rauhensteingasse 1352 (a new building designed by the civil master mason Franz Jäger), who was an accessist at the department of clerical foundations which was a part of the Royal Hungarian and Transylvanian accounting department, and the council protocolist Ignaz von Rottmann who resided at Preßgasse 464, a house which belonged to a certain Joseph von Weinbrenner. He was born around 1768 in Pilsen, later became privy councilor and president of the Landrechte Court in Lemberg, and died on 26 April 1815 in Venice, leaving behind a daughter Therese who had been born around 1811 (Monatsblatt Adler, vol. XII, 1935, p. 108). It couldn't be cleared up yet if these aforementioned persons had any family relations to Elisabeth Rothmann. The address in Rauhensteingasse could point to a relation to Mozart. On the other hand, that Elisabeth Rothmann signed as "widowed J. A. Born", might suggest that the witnesses von Kunnersdorff and von Spaugk were members of the same Masonic Lodge as Mozart and the well-known geologist and mineralogist Ignaz von Born (1742-1791).
It is to be hoped that the local Viennese historians will be able to uncover more details about the persons that appear in the document and to clarify the reasons for the payment.

Because this receipt was included in the Dokumente (Deutsch 1961, 304f.), a translation of the document was published in the English edition of Mozart documents (Deutsch 1965, 348).

Like those of many other documents in Deutsch's Documentary Biography, the above translation is flawed. For unknown reasons Mozart's name is turned into "Mozard", "Spaugk" became "Spaug", and the abbreviation "K." (meaning "Imperial") is mistranslated as "R." ("Royal"). Furthermore, the "mp." (manu propria) after Mozart's name is missing.

When about 20 years ago, I first became aware of Mueller von Asow's article and read the ominous receipt, it made a strange impression on me right away. What particularly aroused my suspicion back then, were the names "von Kunnersdorff" and "von Spaugk". Noble families by these names never existed. Apart from the lack of clarity in the text of this supposedly significant receipt, several inaccuracies in Mueller von Asow's commentary also caught my attention. First, his research request to the Vienna City Archives had been incomplete. He should have asked the archivists to find documentary traces of the demise of Elisabeth Rothmann's "much-loved" brother-in-law Martin Rothmann who – according to the receipt – must have died in 1789. Mueller von Asow seems not to have realized this crucial circumstance. Second, it is not clear why Geyer and Kratochwill limited their search for Elisabeth Rothmann in the indexes of the registers to 1791–1820. Such a search must always start with the date of the last known trace of life which, in this case, is the date of the receipt. Mueller von Asow's guesses about Mrs. Rothmann's possible family relation to Philipp Rottmann and Ignaz von Rottmann added no relevant information at all.

When in September 2019, at a flea market, I bought the original issue of the 1956 Österreichische Musikzeitschrift (which contains the first publication of the 1789 receipt), my interest was awakened again. I asked the library of the Musik- och teaterbiblioteket in Stockholm to send me a scan of the original document. What I received from Sweden exceeded my wildest expectations.

Elisabeth Rothmann's receipt, allegedly signed by Mozart (S-Skma, Brev B8:14)

Almost nothing about this document makes any sense. The issue at hand is not whether this receipt is a forgery. It is the question who in God's name would have the audacity to produce such a clumsy piece of work, and how it was ever possible to make anybody believe that this is a genuine Mozart document. The written text – in character as well as in content – is rife with ahistorical (or rather pseudohistorical) details that have no place in a handwritten document from Mozart's time. Some details are reminiscent of the legendary forger Josef Kuderna (1886–1952) whose written forgeries were so clumsy that at one of his trials the prosecutor expressed pity with the defendant. With the exception of Mozart, none of the persons appearing in this document ever existed. With the help of archival registers and catalogs, as well as today's vast digital databases, such as genteam, anno, and matricula, it is actually possible to determine if a person lived in 18th-century Vienna. "Kunnersdorf" and "Cunersdorf" are names of several European towns and villages, but not of a noble family. The same goes for the name "von Spaugk" (or, according to a later transcription, "Spaugh") which is completely fictitious.

The two Rottmanns, whom Mueller von Asow introduced in his commentary, had no provable relation to any Elisabeth Rothmann. The first one, the state official Philipp Rottmann, was born in 1758 in Wiener Neustadt, son of the merchant Philipp Rottmann. On 8 May 1787, at the Franziskanerpfarre, he married Maria Anna Melzer (1768–1819) with whom he had three children (of whom only one was still alive in 1819). The couple separated in 1796, when Maria Rottmann began a lifelong relationship with the writer Joseph Schreyvogel with whom she had an illegitimate daughter named Carolina Wölf (1797–1866). Maria Rottmann could afford to leave her husband, because she had inherited a share of the house Stadt 186 from her wealthy father. Her daughter from her marriage, Theresia Rottmann (1788–1855), on 23 September 1810, became the wife of the publisher and art dealer Pietro Mechetti. As witness to the wedding officiated Joseph Schreyvogel whose signature appears in Mechetti's marriage contract (A-Wsa, Serie 2.3.2.A3, Fasz. 3, 1. Reihe, M 104). At the time of his estranged wife's death, Philipp Rottmann was living in St. Pölten (A-Wsa, Mag. ZG, A2, 2781/1819). A Magdalena Rottmann living in St. Pölten is listed as heir of a 50 fl annuity in the 1853 will of Theresia Mechetti, née Rottmann (A-Wsa, Handelsgericht, A51, 36/1856). The second Rottmann, brought up by Mueller von Asow, the president of the Lemberg Landrechte court, Ignaz von Rottmann also had no provable relation to an Elisabeth Rothmann. His first wife, whom he married in Kraków, was Barbara Haller (1767–1805). On 21 July 1810, in Vienna (A-Wd, Tom 82a, fol. 260), Rottmann married again. His second wife was Theresia von Rainer (b. 18 June 1786, in Vienna) who on 5 September 1812, in Lemberg (Slezak, 67), gave birth to a daughter Therese (whom Mueller von Asow mentions in his commentary). Therese von Rottmann married a Count Bobrowski von Bobrówka and died in 1888. Ignaz von Rottmann's probate file (AT-OeStA/AVA Inneres NÖLR Allgemein A 54.5) is currently not accessible due to damage from the 1927 fire at the Vienna palace of justice. Ignaz's brother Vinzenz von Rottmann had died a bachelor on 29 May 1792, in Vienna. The name of their only sister was Josepha (A-Wsa, Akt 3.3.10.FA.791, Haansche Regesten).

Let us consider the legal scenario that is presented in the receipt. A certain Mr. Martin Rothmann has died and (as will be shown below) has left his sister-in-law Elisabeth Rothmann 6,000 gulden which are being paid out by the executors of his will in three installments of 2,000 gulden. Since Mrs. Rothmann must be the wife of Martin Rothmann's brother, it is not clear why she signs as "widowed J. A Born". After all, since she is the widow of a Mr. J. A Born (not "von" Born!), she cannot legally sign as Elisabeth Rothmann. Equally unclear is why her husband – Martin Rothmann's brother – who should be his brother's main heir, does not take over the inherited money from the civil court. Or has he died as well? No Martin Rothmann is documented to have died in Vienna between 1785 and 1789. That the alleged executors of Martin Rothmann's will paid out the money to his sister-in-law, is highly unusual. The law demanded that such high amounts of money should remain in the safekeeping of the court. It was far too risky to leave such assets in the hands of private individuals. The use of three witnesses is also at odds with the customary legal practice at the time. Mrs. Rothmann was the legal heir of her brother-in-law's bequest. The simple process of receiving this bequest did not require three witnesses. Multiple witnesses were only needed for contracts that contained important legal agreements, such as business, purchase of real estate, and wedding contracts.

It comes as no surprise that there is also no member of the Born family that could serve as a candidate of Elisabeth Rothmann's allegedly deceased husband. Ignaz von Born, the famous mineralogist, died but in 1791. His widow, whose maiden name had been Magdalena von Montag, died on 3 April 1818. Ignaz's younger brother Franz Xaver von Born died on 2 April 1821 at the age of 77. The name of his wife, whom he had married in 1768, was Josepha von Bolza. She died on 9 December 1825. The third Born sibling, a captain in the infantry regiment No. 56 of the I. & R. Austrian Army, on 22 August 1767, in Brunn am Gebirge, married Antonia von Rieger, daughter of an I. & R. court councilor. No relation can be established between the von Born family and a person named Elisabeth Rothmann. It is quite obvious that the name "Born" was only put on the receipt to add a touch of Mozart's social environment.

Several passages in the document show a gross ignorance of basic historical and genealogical facts. The use of a single "K." before the names, instead of the usual "K.K." (meaning "Kaiserlich Königlich") is highly unusual. The amount of money in a receipt was always written in numbers, and, if necessary, in additional words. Never in words alone. The term "Floriner harten Geldes" ("Florins in hard cash") did not exist in Mozart's Vienna, because at that time there was no gulden coin. In 1789 Vienna hard cash consisted of Spezies- and Konventionstaler, various types of ducats, and kreuzer whose silver twenty coin was the most frequently used piece of currency. A sum of two thousand gulden would most likely have been paid out in ducats. The word "gegeben" before the date of a document was not used in Vienna; at least I have never seen it being used this way in any of the thousands of historical documents that I have scrutinized.

The constant inclination of the letters, together with the very characteristic and desperately made to look old-fashioned letter "g" are telltale signs that the whole document was written by one single person. The descriptive line "Madame Rothmannins quittierung [...]" at the top, with the ludicrously fake-historical word "fyr" (which actually reads "fgr") already shows the hand of the person that signed as Mrs. Rothmann, and also produced all the signatures of the alleged three witnesses. The letter "g" in "Ignatz" gives away the scribe. The "Mozart" signature was done with a stronger effort of disguise, but to no avail. Not only had the forger obviously never seen a genuine Mozart signature, he also had no idea what the "mp" (manu propria) sign after a signature was supposed to look like. Hence he produced the following curiosity, with an "mp" that looks like a capital "A" enclosed in a "C". The hook of the "z" and the inclination of the letters again give away the same hand.

To illustrate the absurdity of the above forgery, let us look at a genuine Mozart signature from Mozart's letter to Sebastian Winter from 30 September 1786: the "mp" is only a zigzag line below the name, the "ca" at the end of the signature is Mozart's characteristic shortening of the attribute Cavaliere.

Mozart's closing formula in his letter to Sebastian Winter (D-KA, Don Mus. Autogr. 45)

During the 1770s, Mozart's typical "Ca" token was much more distinct. Here is another example, at the end of his signature in the letter of 3 July 1778 to Abbé Bullinger.

Mozart's return address and closing formula in his letter of 3 July 1778 from Paris to Abbé Bullinger in Salzburg (current owner unknown)

The signatures of the witnesses Johann Carl Cetto von Kronstorff, Franz Gilowsky De Urazowa, and Johann Thorwart on Mozart's 1782 marriage contract nicely show how genuine "mp" signs were supposed to look like.

The seals and signatures on Mozart's marriage contract (GB-Lbl, Zweig MS 69). This document once was an integral part of Mozart's Sperrs-Relation (probate file, Magistratisches Zivilgericht, Fasz. 2, 3703/1791) where it had the legal function of Mozart's will (vis testamenti). At some time between 1856, when the Landesgerichts-Directionsadjunkt Joseph Laimegger (1814-1895) made a copy for Otto Jahn, and the death of its first private owner Franz Hauser in 1870, this contract must have been stolen from the archive of the Vienna Landesgericht. That the text and the storage place of the contract on 19 December 1857 were published in the newspaper Die Presse, certainly did not increase the safety of the document. To disguise the criminal origin of the contract, already in the catalog of the 1905 auction, the sellers created a false narrative of "two different versions of the contract, one for Mozart and one for the bride" (Boerner, 1905, 17). Such discrepancies between two contracts, however, would have been against the law. The note in Mozart's Sperrs-Relation proves that there was only one copy of the contract. The dissimilarities between Jahn's edition (Jahn 1856, 474f.) and the original were caused by Laimegger's transcription errors. In 1905, the contract was bought by Edward Speyer from whose collection it went to Stefan Zweig in 1935.

When in 1991 Cliff Eisen's collection New Mozart Documents: A Supplement to O.E. Deutsch's Documentary Biography was published, it became known that there is another copy of Elisabeth Rothmann's receipt. Sven Hansson, a Swedish collector, to whom Eisen gave thanks in his preface (Eisen 1991, XVI), owns the receipt for payment No. 3 to Elisabeth Rothmann, dated 10 August 1789. Eisen's edition of this receipt shows two differences from Müller von Asow's transcription: "Spaugk" is now spelled "Spaugh" and the "mp" after Mozart's name is again missing. The fact that one month later Frau Rothmann had exactly the same three witnesses at hand is yet another quite suspicious circumstance.

The first publication of Sven Hansson's copy of Mrs. Rothmann's receipt (Eisen 1991, 62)

Curiously enough, the German edition of the privately held receipt, which was published in 1997, shows even more discrepancies from Eisen's English edition and the previously published earlier copy of the receipt. "Kunnersdorf" is now again "Kunnersdorff", the name Ignatz is abbreviated to "Ign.", the names Mozart and Spaugh have an "mp" again, and the "J. A." before the name Born is missing. The most significant difference appears in the phrase "a sum of two thousand florins hard cash" which is now "eine summe von zweÿtausend florinern baares[sic] geld", a wording that is also at odds with the text of the receipt published in 1956. Given that meticulous accuracy can be expected from a scholarly edition of primary sources, these discrepancies are astonishing.

The first publication of the original text of Sven Hansson's copy of the receipt (Eisen 1997, 63)

Since this receipt is marked "N° 3", and the one from July 1789 bears the number 2, it can be presumed that there must be a third copy which confirms the first payment of 2,000 gulden in June 1789. This copy, if it exists, has yet to surface.

Since Mueller von Asow had a photocopy of the original receipt and undoubtedly knew what real Mozart signatures look like, he bears the main responsibility for the erroneous attribution of these two documents. The whole matter, as curious as it appears today, should serve as a reminder that we must always remain suspicious. Who knows how many Mozart documents, that have been published in print, also have nothing to do with Mozart?

---

Bibliography

Boerner, C.G. (ed.). 1905. Katalog der Bibliothek Hauser Karlsruhe, Leipzig.

Deutsch, Otto Erich. 1961. Mozart Die Dokumente seines Lebens. Mozart. Neue Ausgabe sämtlicher Werke, Serie X: Supplement, Werkgruppe 34. Kassel. Bärenreiter.

Deutsch, Otto Erich. 1965. Mozart: A Documentary Biography. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

Eisen, Cliff. 1991. New Mozart Documents: A Supplement to O.E. Deutsch's Documentary Biography. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

–––––––. 1997. Mozart. Die Dokumente seines Lebens. Addenda, Neue Folge. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Neue Ausgabe sämtlicher Werke, Serie X, Werkgruppe 31, vol. 2. Kassel: Bärenreiter.

Mueller von Asow, Erich Hermann. 1956. "Mozart als Zeuge", Österreichische Musikzeitschrift, 11. Jahrgang, Heft 4.

Slezak, Friedrich. 1987. Beethovens Wiener Originalverleger, Forschungen und Beiträge zur Wiener Stadtgeschichte 17, Vienna: Deuticke.

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© Dr. Michael Lorenz 2020. All rights reserved.

Updated: 15 June 2022

An Unknown Incident in Mozart’s Life in 1791

Mozart: New Documents is pleased to announce the posting of two documents that bring to light a previously unknown incident in Mozart’s life in 1791, and to welcome Michael Lorenz as a guest contributor.

At some point during that year, the playwright Johann Friedrich Jünger (Hoftheaterdichter to the Viennese court theaters) and actor Johann Franz Hieronymus Brockmann (the director of the theaters) asked Mozart to write a piano piece for Jünger's new comedy Er mengt sich in Alles, which would be premiered in the Burgtheater on 23 August 1791. It remains uncertain whether Mozart eventually composed anything for them, but all early sources for Jünger’s play (including the original prompter's copy and the earliest editions) retain a reference to Mozart. In Act 5, scene 2, one of  the characters asks his daughter to play his "favorite sonata." When she feigns not to remember which one he means, he responds: "The one by Mozart that I like so much. You’ve played it for me a hundred times." This is followed by a stage direction indicating that she should play something on the piano at that point (although exactly what is left unspecified).

Er mengt sich in Alles was performed six times in all in the Burgtheater before the end of the season 1791/92, and it was performed twice in Prague during the festivities surrounding the coronation of Leopold II in late summer 1791. The play was quickly taken into the repertories of German ­language theater companies elsewhere, and it went on to become one of Jünger’s most popular and frequently performed plays. Er mengt sich in Alles remained in the repertory of the Burgtheater until 1853, and performances elsewhere are documented as late as 1875.

The reference to Mozart in Er mengt sich in Alles was discovered by Dexter Edge, and the reference to Mozart in Jünger's letter was discovered by Michael Lorenz. Edge and Lorenz are coauthors of the commentaries, which are written by Edge, incorporating additional archival research by Lorenz. The commentaries are accessible on the website Mozart: New Documents.

1791 (between 12 March and 23 August) Johann Friedrich Jünger asks Mozart for a keyboard piece

In an undated letter to Brockmann, Jünger writes that he has been to see Mozart repeatedly with a request that he write a short new piano piece for the planned production of Er mengt sich in Alles. Our commentary discusses in detail the dating of the letter, and shows how contextual clues suggest that it may have been written as early as the middle of March 1791, several months before the play’s premiere. We then consider whether any of the four known piano pieces by Mozart that certainly date from 1791 (K. 613 and the fragment K. 357) or may possibly date from that year (the fragment K. 312 and the minuet K. 355) could have anything to do with Jünger and Brockmann’s request.

Folios 1v and 2r of Jünger's undated letter to Brockmann from 1791 in which Jünger refers to his request that Mozart write a short piano movement for the play Er mengt sich in Alles. The passage quoted below begins with the new paragraph on the left page (A-Wst, H.I.N. 1207).

Johann Friedrich Jünger to Johann Franz Hieronymus Brockmann, undated letter (1791), Vienna, Wienbibliothek, H. I. N. 1207

[1v]

[...]

       Der Vorwurf den du mir machst, ich habe die Aufführung von
"Er mengt sich in Alles" selbst durch meine Nachlässigkeit verzögert,
ist ungegründet. Dein Gedächtniß hat dir da vermuthlich einen
Streich gespielt, und du hast vergessen, daß ich das Stück von
dir gehohlt, selbst zu Mozart getragen, und es ihn lesen lassen, und
ihn um Composition eines kleinen Sazzes gebethen habe: So
wie auch, daß ich dir einmahl geklagt habe, ich seÿ zu ver=
schiedenen Mahlen ohne Erfolg beÿ M. geweßen, mit der aus=
drücklichen Bitte, du möchtest selbst an ihn schicken, und das
qua Theaterdirektor von ihm verlangen, was ich als Autor
nicht erlangen konnte. Diese Bitte habe ich absichtlich nicht wieder=
hohlt, weil ich auch den allergeringsten Schein vermeide, als woll=
te ich die Aufführung meiner Stücke durch mein Zuthun be=
fördern. Uebrigens glaube ich nach näherer Prüfung, daß diese
Composition gar füglich wegbleiben, und an ihrer Statt das
erste beste liedchen gespielt werden kann, weil mir eine Mu=
sik in welcher sich die Schauspielerin als Flügelspielerin zeigt,
da nicht recht an ihrer Stelle zu seÿn scheint, da die Aufmerk=
samkeit der Zuschauer auf den Ausgang des Stücks gespannt ist.

[2r]

Uebrigens bitte ich dich recht herzlich, künftig nichts von allem dem zu glau=
ben, was dir von mir und über mich gesagt wird. Ich wenigstens habe
mir fest vorgenommen, mich gegen keine einzige Klätschereÿ mehr
zu vertheidigen, weil ich das unter der Würde des Mannes finde. [...]

[translation:]

[...]

Your charge against me, that I myself have delayed the
performance of Er mengt sich in Alles through my neglect, is
unfounded. Your memory has probably played a trick on you
here, and you’ve forgotten that I fetched the play from you to take
to Mozart myself, and to have him read it, and asked him to
compose a short movement: how I also once complained to you
that I had been to M[ozart] several times without success,
with the express request that you yourself might send a note
to him, and as Director of the Theater demand from him what
I as Author could not obtain. I intentionally did not repeat this
request, because I also avoid the very least appearance that
I would want to promote the performance of my play through my
own action. Besides, I think on closer examination that this
composition can even be omitted with justification, and in its
stead any little song can be played; because it seems to me that
a musical piece in which the actress shows herself off as
a keyboard player is not right for this scene, as the attention
of the spectator is in suspense over the outcome of the play.

[2r]

In addition, I ask you quite sincerely in the future not to believe
everything that is said of me and about me. I at least have
firmly resolved to myself not to defend myself against any
gossip at all, because I find that beneath a man’s dignity [...]

The actor Johann Franz Hieronymus Brockmann with his dog (probably "Petiterl"). Portrait by Joseph Lange (Wien Museum, I.N. 33075)

23 August 1791 A piano sonata by Mozart in Jünger's Er mengt sich in Alles

Jünger's Er mengt sich in Alles is a thoroughly reworked adaptation of Susanna Centlivre’s 1709 play The Busie Body, with the action transplanted to Vienna. Our commentary summarizes the plot of Jünger’s play, and places in context the scene referring to Mozart. We then discuss the cast of the premiere and the play’s reception, and we consider what music might have been played on stage in the early performances. We also explore whether Mozart might have attended any of the performances that took place while he was still alive. The main commentary is followed by a new biographical sketch of Jünger, incorporating many newly discovered sources on his life.

Johann Friedrich Jünger, mezzotint by A. O. Lállée from 1795 after a painting by Johann Heinrich Ramberg (A-Wn, PORT_00091591_01)

Jünger's seal and signature on his will dated 5 December 1792 (A-Wsa, Mag. ZG, A10, 118/1797)

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© Dexter Edge.& Michael Lorenz 2017. All rights reserved.

Eva Gesine Baur Does Archival Research

In May 2014, the German publishing house C.H. Beck published Eva Gesine Baur's new Mozart biography Mozart Genius und Eros. Although I have recently been commissioned to review this book for a German music journal, I have to address this publication already on my blog, because it is endlessly fascinating as far as the problems in current Mozart literature are concerned.

Baur has learned a lesson from her flawed Schikaneder book and has delved deeply into the Mozart literature. And yet again, it is not enough. In many cases Baur's accumulated knowledge turns out to be almost worthless, because she is not in a position to evaluate the significance and quality of her secondary sources. She has sucked up huge amounts of information and throws good and bad material together. Her book is proof that knowledge cannot be acquired through reading alone, and the topic of Mozart's life is a field where the validity of this paradigm becomes especially apparent. Baur's problem is the problem of most recent publications dealing with Mozart's biography: to write a really good book about the composer, one would have to devote at least ten years into research, and these studies should of course not be limited to Mozart. Since such a long preparation is financially not viable, this book is not being written. And the Mozart scholars who do research in the archives – because they are only interested in exploring the unknown – have no interest (and often no means) to write such a book.

I will not deal with the whole smorgasbord of mistakes, misunderstandings, and misinformation that is presented in this book, because this would really go beyond the limits of a blogpost. Some of the flaws can be attributed to the secondary literature which was mostly copied uncritically, some of them were caused by the author's continuous overestimation of her own knowledge and the incessant urge to display a peagantry of knowledge that only too often turns out to be hollow cardboard decoration. We learn from this book that between literature and scholarship, there is an endless desert landscape where an author has a lot of roving room, without ever coming into contact with the surrounding area. Since Baur provides a 127 page footnote apparatus, the book cannot be considered a piece of fiction (or what German journalists call "musikhistorischer Roman"). On the other hand, Baur's prose, which uses the historical present tense throughout, is so awkward and wooden that any possible claim to literary value can be ruled out completely. The book is rife with such loveless iciness that the reader wonders whether the author actually liked her topic. The most essential qualities that make a book – even a biography of a historical figure – entertaining and readable are completely missing: humor, humility, and a certain relaxed distance from the topic. Baur makes us realize what great writers Wolfgang Hildesheimer and Alfred Einstein really were. In the blurb she is referred to as musicologist, but nowhere does this show in the book. Mozart's music is dealt with on a disappointingly low, almost journalistic level, and the reader is left with the impression that this book was only written, because the author wanted to show off with her new "genius and eros" concept, and to finally get rid of her acquired knowledge. One can see the author pondering about her approach before she began writing: "Yet another book about Mozart? I need to present the composer in a completely new light, like nobody has ever done it before. How about »Mozart the trickster and liar«? Let's give it a go!" One of the absolutely best examples of Baur's merciless smarty-pants style of writing is the following passage from p. 77 where she describes Leopold Mozart's and his son's visit to the Sistine Chapel in 1770. We are faced with a truly stunning mixture of arrogance and ignorance.

Exhausted from the strains of a trip in bad weather, with miserable food and disgusting lodgings, right after their arrival on Holy Thursday, Wolfgang is being dragged[sic!] to the Sistine Chapel by his father. There he must[sic!] listen to Gregorio Allegri's Miserere. An a capella setting of the 50th Psalm which is allowed to be performed only by the Papal Chapel. The singers are strictly forbidden to take the music outside the chapel and copy it. It is said that any violation of this rule is punished by excommunication. This is what makes this insignificant[sic!] piece interesting and provokes Leopold to stage a coup. After having listened to the Miserere twice, his son presents a full score of the piece, a proof of his learnedness. People in the Vatican are impressed.

It is, of course, very funny to visualize Leopold Mozart, dragging his son against his will to the Sistine Chapel (with Mozart exclaiming: "Herr Papa, bitte nicht in die Kapelle!"). But what kind of strange mindset could make an author of a Mozart book come up with such a scenario? Instead of passing embarrassing judgement ("belangloses Stück") on Allegri's famous masterpiece, an author, who actually loves her topic and has delved deeply enough into the matter, could address the fact that by 1770, three unembellished versions of Allegri's Miserere had already become accessible to the public. Following the footsteps of Neal Zaslaw ("Noble Heart", The American Journal of Medicine, 2001), this author could raise the question as to how extraordinary Mozart's musical feat actually was (owing to long plainsong passages it is overrated). She could avoid the mistake of claiming that the Mozarts' first visit to the Sistine Chapel took place on Holy Thursday, because it already took place one day earlier, on Wednesday, April 11, 1770. She could refer to the memoirs of the poet (and accomplished musician) Franz Grillparzer, who on 8 April 1819, also visited the Sistine Chapel, attended a performance of the Miserere, and described this heavenly experience as follows: "The wonderful Miserere by Allegri, performed by the most glorious voices, where with theatrical artistry everybody waits for the moment when the Sistine Chapel with Michelangelo's masterpieces is plunged into darkness, and now, from the solely lighted choir, the music begins, as if sent from heaven." Grillparzer considered Allegri's Miserere more beautiful than Beethoven's symphonies. And finally, Baur could avoid the nonsensical claim that Leopold Mozart showed the score around to impress people inside the Vatican ("Im Vatikan ist man beeindruckt."). This, for obvious reasons, is exactly what Leopold Mozart did not do!

A clip from Grillparzer's letter to Caroline Pichler, written in Rome on 9 April 1819: "Ich war in der Sixtinischen Kapelle und habe die Lamentazion sammt dem Miserere gehört, welchem Letztern nichts beikommt, was ich gehört habe bis jetzt, selbst Beethovens Symphonien nicht, mein Fräulein Lottchen!" (Wienbibliothek, H.I.N. 1201)

Baur has read all my published work on Mozart and she refers to my publications many times. One particular case is especially symptomatic (knowledge cannot be acquired through reading!), because she was unable to understand what I wrote and turned the meaning of a passage in one of my articles into the exact opposite. In a footnote on p. 455 of her book, she writes: "Michael Lorenz vermutet, dass Mozart bei diesem Salzburg-Aufenthalt den bedrängten Freund Franz Jakob Freystädtler ermuntert hat, nach Wien umzuziehen (»Franz Jakob Freystädtler Neue Forschungsergebnisse«, S. 89 Fußnote 28)." This is completely wrong. I never suggested anything like that. Baur failed to actually read what I wrote in the main text of my 1997 article in Acta Mozartiana where I expressedly pointed out that Freystädtler left Salzburg already in 1782, and that he did not meet Mozart in 1783 in Salzburg:

[Freystädtlers] "unbestimmter Urlaub" von Salzburg muß schon 1782 begonnen, und sein Aufenthalt in München vier Jahre gedauert haben. Das Gespräch zwischen Freystädtler und Mozart anläßlich der Salzburger Aufführung der c-moll-Messe 1783, das sich Hamann ausmalt, hat ebensowenig stattgefunden wie Freystädtlers Mitwirkung als Organist bei der Aufführung dieser Messe.

Freystädtler's "unspecified vacation" from Salzburg must already have begun in 1782 and his stay in Munich must have lasted four years. The conversation between Freystädtler and Mozart, on the occasion of the performance of the c minor mass in 1783 in Salzburg that Hamann imagines, never took place and neither did Freystädtler take part as organist in the performance of this mass.

What Baur mistook for my text in footnote 28 of my article, is actually a quotation (in quotation marks!) from a mistaken presumption that in 1962 Heinz Wolfgang Hamann put foward in an article. This is only one of several examples of Baur misunderstanding the literature. But the best of all her efforts to acquire knowledge (which basically are quite laudable) is the one instance where she actually decided to do some archival research of her own and look at a document from a Vienna archive.

In a review of Günther G. Bauer's book Mozart. Geld, Ruhm und Ehre, which I published on the Internet in 2012, I addressed the fact that Bauer could only estimate the annual income of Mozart's fellow Freemason and one-time creditor Franz Hofdemel, because Bauer's prominent collaborators had obviously been unwilling to advance into this area of archival research. Hofdemel has by now acquired a certain notoriety, because in 1789 he lent Mozart money and his wife allegedly took piano lessons from Mozart. On 6 December 1791, in a fit of insanity, Hofdemel attacked his pregnant wife with a razor blade and then committed suicide, an incident which lead to all kinds of completely unfounded speculations concerning a possible love affair between Mozart and Hofdemel's wife. In my review of Bauer's book I wrote: "Das Einkommen Franz Hofdemels als Kanzlist der Obersten Justizstelle, das Bauer nur schätzen kann, ist natürlich Hofdemels Sperrs-Relation (WStLA, Mag. ZG, A2, 3730/1791) zu entnehmen, doch Bauers »wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter« wollten offensichtlich in diese archivalischen Gründe nicht vordringen." Eva Gesine Baur jumped at the shelfmark of Hofdemel's probate file that I had published (quite superfluously) in my review, because she obviously hoped to shed some light on the question whether Hofdemel's wife had really been Mozart's piano pupil. Baur decided to do archival research herself. She ordered scans of Hofdemel's Sperrs-Relation from the Vienna Municipal and Provincial Archives and used the document for her book which is proved by her proudly referring three times to its shelfmark in her footnotes. What was designed to greatly impress her readers, however, led to an amusingly embarrassing episode which could serve as a valuable lesson for future amateur researchers.

Baur was unable to settle for one correct shelfmark of this document and provides the reader with three different readings. The most original is the following garbled version on p. 521 of her book which was obviously caused by a misreading of a handwritten note (the letters "ZG" [Zivilgericht] having been turned into "26", followed by a wrong number):

Baur could barely read anything in Franz Hofdemel's probate records. A major part of this document was written by the Sperrskommissär Johann Florian Lovin (1727–1797) whose handwriting in the past has eluded quite a number of hopeful amateur researchers, a fact that I already pointed out in my review of a failed research project conducted by the Vienna Mozart Society. In her quest to find a piano in Hofdemel's probate file, Baur had to rely on the work of Gustav Gugitz, who in 1956, in the Österreichische Musikzeitschrift, published an article entitled "Von W. A. Mozarts kuriosen Schülerinnen" (republished in 1963 in a compilation titled Mozartiana), in which he also dealt with the Hofdemel case and Hofdemel's Sperrs-Relation. Gugitz's Mozart articles are notoriously flawed and unreliable. For instance, Gugitz was not even able to correctly identify Baroness Martha Elisabeth von Waldstätten, née Schäffer and her husband Hugo Joseph von Waldstätten, and mixed them up with Maria Barbara, née von Rossi, and her husband Joseph Carl von Waldstätten, thus attributing the so-called "Grechtler affair" to the completely wrong couple (an error that Baur duly copied, because she did not even read Maynard Solomon's Mozart biography). How was Baur to know that Gugitz is not to be trusted? Concerning Franz Hofdemel, Gugitz writes:

Auch musikalisch scheint er gewesen zu sein, denn in seinem Nachlaß fanden sich zwei Geigen, ein Bassethorn[sic!] und Musikalien im Werte von 92 fl. 42 kr. Verheiratet war er überdies mit der Tochter eines Brünner Kapellmeisters, mit Magdalena, geb. Pokorny. Ihr erteilte nun Mozart Musikunterricht. Vielleicht sollte damit ein Teil der Schulden abgezahlt werden. Nach der Verlassenschaftsabhandlung ist aber kein Klavier vorhanden gewesen, in was soll also Mozart der Hofdemel Musikunterricht gegeben haben? Geige ist wohl für eine Frau ungewöhnlich, bliebe also nur der Gesang.

He [Hofdemel] seems to have been musical as well, for in his estate, two violins, a basset horn and music, estimated ​​at 92 gulden 42 kreuzer were found. He was married to the daughter of a capellmeister from Brno, Magdalena, née Pokorny. It was her who received music lessons from Mozart which were probably supposed to pay off part of the debt. But no piano is listed in the probate records, in what should Mozart therefore have given music lessons to Mrs. Hofdemel? Violin is probably unusual for a woman, that would only leave singing lessons.

Accordingly, Baur in her book (p. 499) repeats Gugitz's information (even including the fictitious basset horn and the violin lessons):

On p. 500 of her book, Baur repeats her claim: "Laut Sperrs-Relation befand sich in Franz Hofdemels Nachlass kein Klavier. (WStLA, Mag. ZG, A2, 3730/1791)." ("According to the probate file, there was no piano in Franz Hofdemel's estate."). In the main text, Baur even goes one better – and her arrogant "I know it all better than generations before me" style of writing in the following passage is symptomatic for the whole book. To grandiosely "eradicate" old errors in Mozart research (which actually have been dispelled ages ago by the likes of Otto Erich Deutsch and Alfred Einstein) is one of the most tiresome attitudes of recent Mozart biographers. On p. 384 this method culminates in the following passage:

This paragraph might as well be translated as follows:

Generations will fall into the trap [which I was clever enough to avoid!] and make themselves believe that Hofdemel wanted to kill his wife, because she was Mozart's lover and the child in her womb was Mozart's. They will see the fact that Magdalena's son, who is born in May of the following year in Brno and is baptized Johann, as reference to Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart. And they will overlook the fact [attention, this is a fact!] that the godfather bore all the forenames under which Magdalena's child was entered into the baptismal register. They will also fail to read [which I was clever enough not to do!] what a neighbor told a newspaper immediately after the crime: that Hofdemel was regularly vomitting blood, knew that he was terminally ill and that after a bad spitting of blood he drew the consequences. And because they fall into the trap [which I again was clever enough to avoid!], they will turn Magdalena Hofdemel into a piano pupil of Mozart's, in spite of the fact that her husband's estate did not contain a piano. [and, by the way, I'm so much smarter than generations of authors before me!]

Let us begin with Baur's argument that Franz Hofdemel's posthumous son got all his forenames from his godfather, a *fact* that (according to Baur) has been overlooked "by generations" which led to their "falling into a trap". Hofdemel's Sperrs-Relation contains a baptismal certificate of this child which in June 1792 was issued by the parish priest of the Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul in Brno as proof that this boy was really his father's legitimate heir. This document, which is part of the file that Baur had scanned and repeatedly refers to in her book, shows that Baur's argument regarding the child's names is not based on facts, but on fantasy.

I the undersigned testify that in the parish of the Royal Cathedral of the Prince Apostles St. Peter and Paul at No. 27 on the Petersberg in the year one-thousand, seven-hundred and ninety-two on the tenth day of May by the honorable reverend Johann Nepomuck Slowack, first vicar, a child was baptized Johann von Nepomuck, Alexander, Franziskus, a baby boy, legitimately born after the death of his father Franz Hofdemel, clerk at the I. & R. Supreme Department of Justice, of Catholic faith, and the mother Mrs. Magdalena, née Pokorni. Whereby as godparents officiated Alexander Fidel Holderer, clerk with the I. & R. Moravian-Silesian Appellation Court, and Mrs. Viktoria Kofler, widow of a merchant. The midwife was Barbara Hilbert, living at Grosse Bäckengasse No. 28. With the sign of the Royal Capital, Brno 12 June 1792. [L. S.] Karl Freÿherr von Tauber Parish priest at the Cathedral

This certificate, of course, corresponds with the original entry in the baptismal records of the parish of the Brno Cathedral (Moravský zemský archiv Brno, Brno sv. Petr a Pavel [na dómě] 16942, fol. 414).

The child's paron saint Johann Nepomuk is quite a different Johann than Mozart's Johann Chrysostomus. Contrary to Baur's claim, the godfather did not "bear all the forenames under which Magdalena's child was entered into the baptismal register". The names of the godfather were not "Johann Nepomuk Alexander Franz", but "Alexander Fidelis". And the existence of the godmother completely escaped the attention of Dr. Baur whose inflated expertise suddenly collapses when measured with the primary sources. The child Johann Nepumuk Hofdemel already died on 13 May 1794, of "Kartharfieber" (Moravský zemský archiv Brno, Brno sv. Petr a Pavel [na dómě] 16959, p. 163). After the boy's death, his share of the modest paternal inheritance of 1350 gulden 4 1/2 kreuzer was divided between his mother and sister (A-Wsa, Mag. ZG, A2 3294/1794).

What about the piano that "is not listed in Hofdemel's probate records"? Hofdemel's Sperrs-Relation contains five different lists of assets: 1) The "Inventur und Schätzung" of all of Hofdemel's belongings, 2) the Catalogus Librorum Hofdemlianorum (the catalog of Hofdemel's books) in two parts, because of 171 books only 73 were sold at an auction, 3) the "Schätzungs und Lizitationsausweisung" (the results of the auction of Hofdemel's belongings), 4) the "Ausweisung uiber die eingehandelten 6 öffentlichen Fonds Obligationen" (the result of the sale of Hofdemel's public bonds), and 6) the so-called "Theillibell", the exact distribution of Hofdemel's net assets among his two children (a balance that proves that the value of Hofdemel's estate given by Gugitz is completely false). The first list, drawn up by the municipal Sperrskommissär Lovin on 11 January 1792, contains an item that proves Baur's reasoning utterly wrong.

schnallen und Kleinigkeiten                                    1  30
1 Passetl 2 Geigen und Musi=
kallien und Musikanten Stellen                              20.    ––
das wenig=eisen, erden und
höltzerne Kuchelgeschirr                                        2.    ––          
folgende 3 Posten sollen der
Fr: Witwe zugehörig seyn
die sammentl[iche] Hauswäsch        30 f ––
1 harter Schubladkasten 2 Reis
Kouffer                                              10 f ––
1 Fortepiano                                      30:      
                                                          70 f: ––

 

buckles and trifles
one small bass, 2 violins, music
and music stands
the few pieces of iron, earthen and
wooden kitchenware
the following three items are said
to belong to the widow
the entire linen
one hardwood chest with drawers two travel
cases
one fortepiano

There it is: Magdalena Hofdemel's piano which (according to Baur) "is not listed in her husband's probate records" which (according to Baur) proves that "generations fell into a trap by erroneously believing that she was Mozart's piano pupil". The existence of the piano, of course, does not prove that Hofdemel's wife was Mozart's pupil. Some authors (like Baur who erroneously claims that Magdalena von Kurzböck was a pupil of Mozart) seem unable to accept that there were actually female pianists in Mozart's time who were acquainted with the composer without taking lessons from him. Especially amusing is the fact that Baur (like Gugitz) still thinks that a "Passetl" is a basset horn, although I have explained the meaning of this word in a review that is listed in Baur's bibliography. But as I said above: knowledge cannot be acquired by reading. To round off her fantasies, Baur offers yet another explanation for Hofdemel's suicide (p. 521): "Möglicherweise war Hofdemels Problem Folge von Alkoholmissbrauch. In seinem Nachlass finden sich beachtliche Vorräte." ("Hofdemel's problem may have been the result of alcohol abuse. Considerable supplies can be found in his estate.") It comes as no surprise that these supposed huge amounts of wine do not appear in Hofdemel's Sperrs-Relation. It would surely be fascinating to figure out the origin of Baur's error, but in this case I shall follow Goethe's advice that inscrutable mysteries should rather be revered than explained.

There are of course still some unanswered questions concerning Franz Hofdemel, but who his wife's piano teacher was is really not the most pressing among them. Where was Hofdemel born? Where and when did he and Magdalena Pokorny (b. 27 June 1766 in Brno) get married? Although his wedding is not registered in the records of the Brno Cathedral, this issue could easily be cleared up with an internet access and the necessary amount of diligence. Baur's musings concerning the possible date of birth of Hofdemel's daughter Theresia (p. 499) are moot, because in the age of digitized church records it takes less than five minutes to figure out that this child was born on 6 January 1791.

The entry concerning the baptism of Theresia Cäcilia Hofdemel on 6 January 1791 (A-Wd, Tom. 100, fol. 61)

Up-to-date research methods seem difficult to master for an author who – as far as basic research is concerned – let herself become too distracted by the protagonists of Socrates's speech at Platon's Symposium.

How are the two different dates of Hofdemel's death in the records to be explained? The Totenbeschauprotokoll has 6 December, and yet, 10 December 1791 is given on his Sperrs-Relation and in the Wiener Zeitung.

6 December 1791, given as Hofdemel's date of death in the Totenbeschauprotokoll: "Xbris 791 Den 6ten Hofdemel Franz Kanzellist bey der Obrister Justitzstelle, welcher sich selbst, in seiner Wohnung, im Rolleterischen H:[aus] N° 1360 in der Grünangergaße ermordet, und in allg: Krankenhaus gerichtlich b[e]s[chau]t worden, alt 36 Jr: Sartori Chyrurg.[us] Prim.[us". (A-Wsa, Totenbeschreibamt 95, lit. H, fol. 80r)

"10 Xb: 791" given as Hofdemel's date of death in his Sperrs-Relation. This date is referred to as factual in the whole file.

The announcement of Hofdemel's death "Den 10 December" in the Wiener Zeitung (Wiener Zeitung, 17 December1791, p. 3225)

The autopsy, which was conducted at the Allgemeines Krankenhaus, took some time, but this does not explain a discrepancy of four days. The entry in the death records was copied from the surgeon's note which proves that the autopsy had already been done. The confusion is not reduced by the entry in the records of Vienna's General Hospital concerning Hofdemel's burial which gives December 7th as his date of death and December 9th as the date of his burial. In this entry, Hofdemel is referred to as "Hofdümel N. gew. Kanzelist bey der Oberst Justitz Stelle" with the cause of death given as "sich selbst ermordet".

The entry concerning Franz Hofdemel's burial on 9 December 1791 (Alservorstadtkrankenhaus, Tom. 4, fol. 48)

Hofdemel was buried in the "Gottesacker ausser der Währinger Linie" (i.e. the Währinger Allgemeiner Friedhof).

The "Rohlederisches Haus", Stadt 1360 (built in 1784, today Grünangergasse 10), where in 1791, Franz Hofdemel committed suicide. The owner of the house, Friedrich Wilhelm Rohleder, was the retired manager of the Theresianum and a close friend of the writer Maria Anna Sager and her husband. In this house Grillparzer's father died in 1809.

Especially annoying is the fact that Baur seems to think that by repeatedly referring to my work in her book, she has gained the right to present some results of my research as her own wisdom. She also seems to assume that by acknowledging the existence of my publications she has inoculated herself against my criticism. What follows are a few examples of Baur presenting information that she has taken right out of one of my articles without giving her source:

• The information concerning the size of the concert hall in the Trattnerhof on p. 218 was copied from my 2013 blogpost Mozart in the Trattnerhof without providing a source.
• The information concerning the Trattnerhof on p. 395 was also copied from my 2013 blogpost Mozart in the Trattnerhof which is not referred to in the bibliography on p. 394 or in a footnote.
• The shelfmark of the 1788 tax register as source for Mozart's rent in the Camesina-Haus is taken from my 2009 article Mozart's Apartment on the Alsergrund. By giving a shelfmark in parentheses in the text Baur is dishonestly pretending to have personally consulted this archival source.
• The information as to how the chapel in the Trattnerhof was converted into a hall (p. 456, fn 5) is lifted unsourced from my 2013 blogpost Mozart in the Trattnerhof.
• The explanation of Barbara Ployer's family relation to Gottfried Ignaz von Ployer (p. 460, fn 17) is taken from my article "Gottfried Ignaz von Ployers Haus in Döbling. Eine vergessene Mozartstätte", Acta Mozartiana 47, vol. 1-2, (June 2000), which is not given as source.
• The smart-aleck comment on Helmut Kretschmer's wrong date of Cavalieri's date of birth with the reference to Pisarowitz (p. 468, fn 7) is lifted from my review of Melanie Unseld's book Mozarts Frauen. Begegnungen in Musik und Liebe which was published in the Mozart-Jahrbuch 2007/08. The embarrassing fact of course being that Baur does not know that Kretschmer copied the wrong date from the commentary in Gugitz's 1924 edition of Da Ponte's memoirs (a book that is listed in Baur's bibliography).
• The explanatory comment on the Deiner issue (p. 475, fn 3) with the information on the "former fruit dealer" Josef Preisinger is lifted from my 2012 review of Günther Bauer's book.
• The information concerning the different value of the Gulden currency in Salzburg and Vienna (p. 481, fn 33) is also taken without reference from my review of Günther Bauer's book. That my name appears in the following sentence in connection with another issue cannot hide the fact that Baur is presenting my knowledge as her own.
• The source for Mozart's lowest possible rental expense of 300 gulden in the house Stadt 245 in  1789 (p. 493, fn 4) is not Brauneis's 2013 article "Mozart: In und vor der Stadt", but my 2009 article Mozart's Apartment on the Alsergrund from which Brauneis plagiarized this information.
• The explanatory note concerning the two Closset brothers (p. 500, fn 45) is based on research that was published in my review Das Forschungsprojekt "W. A. Mozart und sein Wiener Umfeld". Again Baur is proudly waving a lamp that I have lighted a long time ago.
• Ignaz von Seyfried's five forenames (p. 508, fn 5) are copied from my review of Günther Bauer's book. Baur does not feel embarrassed by showing off with the results of my research in the 1776 baptismal records of St. Stephen's Cathedral.
• Baur's knowledge that "there is no proof that on 4 March 1791 Mozart performed the concerto K. 595" (p. 508, fn 6) is lifted from the same review.
• The information concerning "the notes of Aloys Fuchs" which give an amount of 100 ducats as Mozart's fee for Die Zauberflöte (p. 511, fn 14) is also lifted from my review. Baur could never name the exact source for "the notes of Aloys Fuchs".
• The information that beginning in November 1790 Franz Xaver Süßmayr was working as substitute at the Burgtheater and was paid 26 fl for "extra service", a job that he probably got with the help of Salieri (p. 513, fn 29), is taken from my article "Süßmayr und die Lichterputzer: von gefundenen und erfundenen Quellen", in the Mozart-Jahrbuch 2006, (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 2008), pp. 425-38. Baur does not provide a source and thus dishonestly presents my research as her own.
• That Joseph Bonno (whom Baur mistakenly calls "Giuseppe"), like Mozart, was buried for 8 fl 56 x, although he had died without debts (p. 523, fn 66), is lifted from my review of Günther Bauer's book. The information that in the late eighteenth century 99% of the Vienna populace received third-class burials is also copied from this review without providing a source.

Seal and signature of Joseph Bonno whom ignoramuses will forever call "Giuseppe" (A-Wsa, Haydn-Verein A1/2d)

Baur's book never underwent a thorough proofreading process which gives rise to the assumption that her publisher already laid off the entire editorial staff some time ago. A simple spell check could have avoided gross mistakes such as "Portät", "Solo-Sopran-Partieen" and "Hauseinsegung". According to Baur, Mozart's Der Schauspieldirektor was premiered on "7 February 1886", the clarinetist Anton Stadler was born "in 1793", and Babette von Natorp's biographical dates are "1769-1744“. We encounter flawed German phrases such as "um den 25. September 1764 herum", "Zu der Frau von Mesmers Stiefsohn", "Mozart schreckt auf". And three musicologists with botched names make an amusing appearance: "Karl Pfannhaus", "Daniel Ende", and "Hermann Albert". These are just the bloopers caused by sloppiness and lack of decent editing. Keep in mind that I have not even touched the vast number of factual mistakes that appear on almost every page of this abysmally weak book.

Ernst Hilmar, a musicologist of dubious reputation, but undeniable scholarly merits, once said to me (responding to my critical remarks about his shallow printed output): "Kritisieren ist leicht. Wann werden Sie einmal etwas vorlegen?" ("Criticizing is easy. When will you present something?" – the term "something" of course referring to a book). This points right at the core of my point of view: I do not want to "present something". As a matter of fact, I also do not want to see others "present something". I am strictly against the continuous publication of thick but flawed books that sycophant journalists describe as "meticulously researched", and admirers of the author call "One of the best books about Mozart ever written".

© Dr. Michael Lorenz 2014. All rights reserved.

Updated: 8 September 2025

Agnes Selby: Constanze, Mozart's Beloved (Wien: Hollitzer Wissenschaftsverlag 2013)

Why the Hollitzer Wissenschaftsverlag published a second edition of this smorgasbord of howlers, whose first edition, in 1999, had already been the laughing stock of Mozart scholarship, is a total mystery. Agnes Selby is completely ignorant of the recent Mozart literature. She has to quote Mozart's letters from Emily Anderson's out-dated edition and simply repeats all the old popular nonsense that has been debunked ages ago. This book literally runs over with hogwash and could be turned into a successful comedy program, easily providing endless laughter for attendees of a meeting of musicologists.

A piece of popular literature like this does really not deserve a detailed review. But because this opus has been republished and contains passages that are outrageously funny, I want to quote some of them and point out some of the most glaring mistakes it contains. Selby has an uncanny ability to create what I call "Selbyisms": statements that sparkle with so much nonsense that they are irresistibly funny. For example (from p. 96): 

Mozart had more immediate problems. He was known to be a Freemason and the French revolution had been fostered by French Freemasons who were in contact with their Viennese brethren. King[sic!] Leopold's secret police were well informed about the Lodges in Vienna and soon those connected with Freemasonry were discharged from their government posts.

Where to begin in the face of such ignorance? After the unification of the Lodges by Joseph II in 1785, the Freemasons had to register by name. They were completely harmless and under control. Hence, they posed no threat at all to the Court, and nobody was discharged from a government post. Even professors at the Vienna University (such as Franz Schubert's patron Heinrich Watteroth) were Freemasons. The French Revolution had not "been fostered by the French Freemasons" (it is immensely funny to imagine those French Freemasons beating down the Bastille with their trowels and to visualize all the suddenly unemployed noblemen wandering the streets of Vienna). Mozart's Vienna is presented as a kind of fairytale paradise. That nonsense like this is being published in 2013 by a publishing house that calls itself a Wissenschaftsverlag is truly amazing:

The Vienna that Constanze encountered was unlike any other city in Europe. The population was so homogeneously united that only the epithet 'Viennese' fits its description. There was no question of 'nationality' as such among the inhabitants of Vienna, where Magyars, Bohemians, Slovaks and Slovenes, Germans, Italians and Poles rubbed shoulders in good humour. (p. 23)

This description of the eighteenth-century Viennese population is completely false and obviously caused by Selby's mistaken concept that the Ringstraßenzeit of the late 1900s – when huge numbers of people from all parts of the monarchy moved to Vienna – took place one hundred years earlier. Mozart's Vienna was not "unlike any other city in Europe", and, at that time, only an extremely small part of the city's population were foreigners.

The modest sum of 31 kreutzer would purchase a meal consisting of two meat dishes, soup, vegetables and unlimited bread with a litre[!] of wine. Because people were generous, even industrious citizens accepted the fact that some individuals might prefer begging to working, extreme poverty was practically nonexistent and those who made begging their profession often profited handsomely by it. (p. 23)

Of course, the price of 31 kreuzer for such a meal is based on pure fantasy. And extreme poverty could be found everywhere in Mozart's Vienna. Here is another classic (from p. 32): 

In an amazing display of ill-will Leopold Mozart accused Constanze of being a slut.

Of course, Leopold Mozart did no such thing, and this insult cannot be found anywhere in the Mozart letters. Selby's slanderous claim (which she has repeatedly presented on various Mozart websites and internet forums) is based on her deep hatred of Leopold Mozart and her pathological jealousy of all people, who, in her opinion, were not fond enough of Constanze. There are more of these priceless statements (p. 71):

Mozart had many opportunities to gamble. Mozart's concerts at the Mehlgrube Casino were always followed by gambling tables being set up to allow the aristocracy to participate in their favorite sport. [...] Gambling was also endemic in Salzburg.

There was no public gambling in Joseph II's Vienna, because gambling (except for the state lottery) was illegal. It was also illegal in deeply Catholic Salzburg. That "men would gamble at street corners" in Salzburg (as claimed by Selby) is pure nonsense. All through her book, Selby mistakenly thinks that the word "Casino" refers to a gambling venue. The word Casino, in eighteenth-century Vienna, referred to a venue for social gatherings and events. The book's low scholarly flight level becomes apparent in Selby's imagining Mozart in Prague, losing money to Casanova in a series of card games: 

Casanova was an inveterate gambler who could never resist tempting his friends with a game of cards and it would not be inconceivable that Mozart lost considerable sums to him." (p. 85)

One can only wonder: where was Constanze and why could Mozart's guardian angel not forestall her husband's nightly activities? Emperor Franz II – one of the most hardworking monarchs of all time – is described by Selby in the following inimitable way:

Franz II lived through this period as though in a dream, occupying himself with gardening, attending to his family and walking through the streets of Vienna dressed as just another burgher enjoying a bit of window shopping.

Some of the most glaring nonsense to be found in this book is already well-known from Selby's longstanding and relentless self-praising activities on the Internet. The problem is that all these sparkling bloopers should really not be republished in 2013. Here are some of the most impressive examples (and this list is far from complete):

• That Joseph Lange signed a document "which bound him to grant his widowed mother-in-law an annual income of 700 ducats" (p. 23) is, of course, false. Lange promised to pay Cäcilia Weber 700 gulden which is less than a quarter of the sum given by Selby. That at the time of her wedding, Aloysia Weber was already pregnant is still an unproven assumption.
• That Gottfried van Swieten was "dismissed from the Imperial Service on suspicion of participating in the Freemasons' conspiracy of 1791" (p. 35) is a piece of gross misinformation that Robbins Landon presented in his book Mozart: The Golden Years. There was no "Freemasons' conspiracy of 1791". Van Swieten was dismissed by the Emperor "in good grace", because of their differing views concerning the universities' role in science and the freedom of education which was part of van Swieten's political concept.
• Like many amateur Mozart researchers, Selby mixes up the family of Adam Isaac Arnsteiner (1721–1785) with that of his daughter-in-law Fanny Arnstein. Fanny Arnstein did not "occupy the house at Graben No. 1175" (p. 35), her father-in-law Arnsteiner lived there as subtenant on the second floor.
• "Johann Thorwart was an altogether unpleasant and unsavory character". We have absolutely no documentary information concerning Thorwart's character. Selby is just jealous of him and picks her negative judgement out of thin air.
• Selby is unable to let go of the story regarding the music supposedly performed at Mozart's wedding dinner: "During the dinner Constanze was surprised by the unexpected performance of Mozart's Serenade in B-flat (K. 361)." (p. 40). This alleged performance is a myth which may have been caused by a sentence that was willfully added into one of Mozart's letters in Nissen's Mozart biography. There is absolutely no documentary evidence to support it.
• On p. 50 Selby claims that, on the occasion of the christening of Mozart's first child Raimund Leopold, on 17 June 1783, "Baron Wetzlar could not be present due to the death of his father". What looks like very educated information, is based on pure fantasy. Wetzlar's father Karl Abraham Wetzlar von Plankenstern only died on 3 September 1799 (Wiener Zeitung, 11 September 1799, p. 3063). 
• The information that "Neustift suburb No. 250 is now Lerchenfelder Straße[sic!] No. 65" (p. 52) is false. As Hans Rotter published in 1925, and as I have explained on this blog, it is Mariahilfer Straße 94.
• That Mozart "composed the two duets for violin and viola for Michael Haydn [...] who was ill (supposedly due to heavy drinking)" (p. 53) is a fairy tale that has been debunked by Mozart scholarship a long time ago. It should really not reappear in a book released by a publishing house that calls itself Wissenschaftsverlag.
• Maynard Solomon's estimates concerning Mozart's income, which Selby copied into her book, are based on speculation. They have absolutely no basis in archival sources.
• "The banns for their marriage were read at the Theatines Chappel." (p. 39) No, they were not. Everybody who has seen Mozart's marriage entry knows that he and Constanze were exempt from the three readings of the banns. Furthermore, no banns were ever read at this chapel, because it was not a parish church. Mozart and his bride visited this chapel to go to confession and to get the "Beichtzettel" (certificates of confession) which they needed for the wedding.

A typical Viennese "Beichtzettel" of the composer Joseph Eybler (A-Wkhm, Archiv der Burgpfarre)

• "After Lodge meetings, Mozart would join his brother Freemasons at the Cafe Jüngling, whose owner, Johann Jüngling belonged to the Lodge 'Zur neugekrönten Hoffnung'. There the men would sit down to dinner after which they gambled well into the early morning." (p. 63). There was no "Cafe Jüngling" in 1785, because Johann Jüngling (1762–1835) became the owner of this coffee house only in 1791. There was also no gambling at this Cafe. The whole scenario of this supposed "Freemasons' Casino" is the product of one of Selby's countless brain bubbles, obviously triggered by abysmally flawed secondary literature.
• The "ballet story" concerning Le nozze di Figaro is nice, but it has been shown ages ago that it is purely fictional. There is no documentary confirmation that dancers were hired for the complete production of Figaro in 1786.
• Franz de Paula Hofer's annual salary in 1788 at St. Stephen's Cathedral was 25 gulden, but (just like another writer, who in her new book calls Hofer a "penniless violinist") Selby is unaware of the fact that Hofer was a court musician and held several well-paid jobs simultaneously. Why should Josepha Weber have married a poor church mouse? At the time of his death, Hofer was making 360 gulden a year at the Court and 100 gulden at St. Stephen's, and he had additional jobs in other churches. Selby's claim (p. 142) that he "left Josepha and their daughter burdened with enormous debts" is simply false. Franz Hofer's debts were managable, because, unlike Mozart, he had actually joined the Tonkünstler-Sozietät to secure the livelihood of his widow and child. Between the death of her first husband on 14 June 1796, and her second marriage on 23 December 1797, Josepha Hofer was paid a pension from the Tonkünstler-Sozietät which, according to § 15 of the society's regulations, in 1797 was passed on to her daughter who received it until 1813, the year she married Karl Hönig.

An unpublished document, issued on 21 July 1788, by the "Stadtwiener Conscriptions Amt", stating that Franz Hofer "is 31 years of age, Catholic, was born in Vienna, is employed as K.K. Hof-Capell Musicus, has been living at Stadt 587 for twelve years", and that "the conscription office does not object to his marriage". The information in the Dokumente that Hofer only became a court musician in 1789 is false.

• Landstraße No. 224 was not "a large house". It was rather small. The Danish actor Joachim Daniel Preisler did not visit the Mozarts in 1787 at Landstraße No. 224, but in 1788 at Alsergrund No. 135.

A groundplan of the front section of the house Landstraße No. 224 where Mozart lived in 1787 (A-Wsa, Unterkammeramt, Baukonsens 87/1833)

• Nannerl Mozart did not "retain all the valuable gifts given to the young Mozart". The list, which was drawn up on the occasion of the auction of Leopold Mozart's belongings, proves that those gifts had been sold by Leopold many years earlier. Selby's description of the distribution of Leopold Mozart's estate is based on Solomon's erroneous speculation and is therefore completely false. Nannerl did not "receive 6,000 to 10,000 florins from her father". As I explained in detail in 2012, Solomon's theory is based on a miscalculation of Nannerl's heritage from her husband, who not only bequeathed to his widow an annual pension of 300 gulden from the interests of her children's share, but also the main share of his estate of 22,000 gulden. Selby's descripton of the events after Leopold's death is rife with unfounded speculation and – as always – driven by hatred against all of Constanze's "less well-meaning" contemporaries. That Mozart "received punishment through Leopold's will" is a classic "Selbyism". Selby is ignorant of the sources and the literature dealing with Leopold's estate.
• Gluck did not receive "a lavish funeral." As a matter of fact, this funeral was performed "in der Stille" (without music) and only cost 28 gulden 49 kreuzer (of which 12 gulden were paid for the carriage with four horses to the Matzleinsdorf Cemetery).

The entry concerning Gluck's modest obsequies on 17 November 1787 at Vienna's Paulanerkirche: "NB: Ist in der Stille Eingesegnet worden" (A-Wd, Bahrleihbuch 1787, fol. 408v)

• In 1787, Mozart did not earn "1,700 florins in Prague". This estimate is based on Maynard Solomon's flawed presumption.
• Selby writes: "On December 7, Mozart was appointed to Gluck's vacated position as Chamber Music Composer to the Viennese Court" (p. 86). No, he was not. a) Gluck's position was not that of a "Chamber Music Composer to the Viennese Court". Gluck held an honorary position as a supernumerary which also explains his high annual salary of 2,000 gulden. b) Mozart was not appointed "Chamber Music Composer", but "k.k. Kammermusikus" which is a huge difference and explains the modest annual salary of 800 gulden that came with that position.
• That Mozart's begging letters to Puchberg are proof for his poverty in 1788 is an out-dated point of view. At this time, Mozart was living in a 300m2 apartment for which he paid an annual rent of 250 gulden. He also owned a horse and a carriage. Of course, he shamelessly took advantage of a well-to-do brother Mason. The suggestion that Mozart's begging letters were mostly theatrical scrounging efforts (which I first published in 2012 in my review of Günther Bauer's book Mozart. Geld, Ruhm und Ehre) has been echoed by Nikolaus Harnoncourt in a 2014 interview, who (not surprisingly) disingenuously presented my concept as his own brilliant idea.
• Selby's account of the origin of Così fan tutte is based on the out-dated popular literature and is therefore worthless.
• "Theresia von Trattner stood godmother for the little girl and the christening took place in St. Peter's Church". As I have shown in 2009, Theresia Mozart's christening did not take place in St. Peter's Church, but in Mozart's apartment.
• Prince Lichnowsky's 1791 lawsuit against Mozart had nothing to do with gambling. As a matter of fact, gambling debts were classified as "Naturalobligationen" (so-called imperfect debt relations) and therefore their payment could not be claimed in a court of law. Debts incurred from illegal gambling, on the other hand, were legally void, i.e. they did not exist at all in the eyes of the law. Hence, they could not be considered "Naturalobligationen". On 20 February 1753, Maria Theresia had issued a Patent die hohen Spiele und Wetten betreffend, ruling that "von niemanden, was er auf Borg verspielet, es mag wenig oder viel seyn, dem Gewinner, wenn selbser schon derentwegen eine schriftliche Recognition in Händen hätte, etwas bezahlet, noch der Verspieler von einer Obrigkeit hierzu angehalten werden soll" ("Nobody, who has gambled away money, be it little or much, should be forced by the authorities to pay the winner, even if this person is in possession of a written recognition."). The only gambling contracts that were legally valid were those concluded in connection with legal gambling, such as the official state lottery. Selby's repeated description of Mozart's debts as having been caused by gambling is comparable to the plot of Groundhog Day transferred into late eighteenth-century Vienna.
• Walther Brauneis did not come across information "in a Logbook of the Special Courts of Aristocrats" (Selby will never understand the correct name of this source). The entry that Otto Mraz found (and Brauneis then mistranscribed and published with a wrong date) is located in the 1791 Cameralprotocoll (FHKA NHK Kaale Ö Bücher 94) of the I. & R. Court Chamber (today's Finanz- und Hofkammerachiv of the Austrian State Archives).
• The address "Schulerstraße 816" is wrong. Johann Michael Auernhammer was neither a nobleman, nor a wealthy merchant. Gottfried Ignaz von Ployer was not "a high official of the court". He was a minor "Hof-Agent" who, at the time of his death in 1797, was totally broke. Babette Ployer was not a "von Ployer".

The seal of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta and the signature of its Viennese administrator Johann Michael Auernhammer (A-Wsa, Patrimoniale Herrschaften, Johanniter A12/1, 134/1747)

Seal and signature of Gottried Ignaz von Ployer from 1774 (A-Whh, OMaA 641-20)

• That in 1789 "the priest of the Church am Hof was able to administer an emergency baptism to Anna Mozart" is false. Selby does not know the sources, the literature, or any other documents related to this child's birth. Mozart's daughter Anna was baptized by the midwife.
• The idea that Mozart's mass K. 317 was performed at the 1790 coronation in Prague (as Selby claims on p. 97) has been soundly debunked by Mozart scholarship years ago.
• That Die Zauberflöte "embraced the philosophy of Freemasonry" (p. 101) is a popular misconception that has been refuted in several recent scholarly publications. Die Zauberflöte is not a cryptogram of Freemasonry, but a classic fairy tale opera. Its supposed relation to Freemasonry (which nobody ever noticed back in Mozart's days) is a creation of fanciful twentieth-century writers.
• In summer 1791, in Baden, Constanze was not – as claimed by Selby – "again housed on the first floor above the butcher's". This error is one of the most ancient "Selbyisms", mostly because for years Selby has relentlessly been repeating it on several online forums. In his letter to Anton Stoll of May 1791, Mozart expressedly referred to Joseph Goldhann's former apartment on the ground floor: "das nothwendigste aber ist; daß es zu ebener Erde seye [...] zu ebener Erde, beym Fleischhacker". Because of her bad feet, Constanze could not live "on the first floor above the butcher's", but had to use the apartment beside the butcher's. 
• The estimation (copied from Solomon) that "Mozart in 1791 earned 5,000 florins" is of course pure hogwash. The rent for Mozart's apartment at the Camesina house was not "320 gulden for six months" (p. 63). It was 450 gulden for one year. 
• The claims that "Süssmayr had a gift for composing in the style of famous composers" and that "Süssmayr composed numerous ballets which often lasted for three hours and were performed by the monks" (p. 106) are two other priceless "Selbyisms". That Franz Xaver Süßmayr "died of alcoholism" – as Selby impudently states – is nothing but slanderous malarkey. All surviving documents prove that Süßmayr died of tuberculosis.

The previously unpublished entry concerning Süßmayr's burial in the St. Marx cemetery ("An Lungensucht besch[aut] word[en]"). Note that owing to inflation, this third-class burial cost even less than Mozart's 22 years earlier (A-Wd, Bahrleihbuch 1802-03, fol. 304r).

• Selby claims that "for La Clemenza di Tito Mozart was paid 1,150 gulden[!], including expenses" (p. 107). This alleged fee is an old myth, based on Mozart's claim in 1789, that he was offered "200 Dukaten und 50 Dukaten Reisegeld" for an opera. But there is absolutely no proof that Guardasoni ever made that offer in 1789, and even less that Mozart actually received this amount in 1791.
• "Many of Mozart's Zettel were found among Süssmayr's papers in the Hungarian National Library." (p. 162). No, they were not.
• Not "Jakob Haibel's father had been a tenor in the Schikaneder Company", Haibel himself had been that tenor.
• Like countless amateur Mozart writers, Selby is unaware of the fact that the name of Mozart's last child was not "Franz Xaver", but Wolfgang. The names "Franz Xaver" only appear in the baptismal register and were never used by the parents. Mozart's last child was always called Wolfgang or "Wowi" by his parents and the claim (appearing all over the popular literature) that Constanze "later changed his Christian names" (p. 34, 163, 250 and 253) is simply false. Selby's claim that "Franz Xaver[sic!] inherited from his father his malformed left[sic!] ear" is just too funny to be commented on.
• On 4 December 1791, Dr. Closset (which one of the brothers, Nikolaus or Thomas?) was of course not "enthralled by Die Zauberflöte that he refused to come". Closset came from the Burgtheater where Die Zauberflöte was not performed.
• Mozart's belongings were not "catalogued and assessed for taxation purposes", but to secure the assets for the claims of the creditors. Mozart's debts with Lichnovsky, Puchberg, and Lackenbacher were not included in the official records, because "Constanze did not include them in her list prepared for the public records" (as Selby claims on p. 118), but because these creditors did not come forward to file their claims with the Vienna municipal civil court. A widow had no right to determine what the Sperrskommissär put on the list of passiva of her deceased husband.
• There was no such name as "Walsegg von Stuppach". The correct name is "von Walsegg". Walsegg did not commission "Johann Martin Fischer to create a tomb". He commissioned the sculptor Benedikt Hainrizi to do this.

The design for the tomb of Countess Anna von Walsegg by Benedikt Hainrizi (1749–1799) (Vienna, Albertina)

• Selby's bizarre presentation of Franz Schubert as "poor, lonely young man who had struggled in a Vienna barely aware of his existence [...]", and who "had died young and of syphilis[sic!]" (p. 119) makes us very glad that Selby has refrained from writing books about other famous dead people.
• Selby's claim that Constanze "was listed in the Vienna Archives[sic!] as living in the Palais Liechtenstein in the Dorotheergasse which was near the Michaelerplatz" (p. 147) is just a conglobation of errors. There is no "Palais Liechtenstein" in the Dorotheergasse. Selby seems to have mixed it up with the Palais Dietrichstein, where Constanze also never lived. Constanze resided in the Palais Eskeles which is not located near the Michaelerplatz. Wetzlar von Plankenstern's villa in Meidling was not located "on the Grünberg", but at the bottom of this hill, above the so-called "Steurer Mühl Fahrtweg".
• The spelling "Friedrich Sebastian Mayer" is wrong. This singer and his wife always signed their names Meier.

Friedrich Sebastian Meier's seal and signature in 1812

 Josepha Meier's signature in 1800

• Constanze Mozart and her second husband did not get married in Pressburg, because she and Nissen fled from Napoleon's army or wanted to "wait for the storm to blow out". As a matter of fact, in 1809, Pressburg was bombed by Napoleon's army. They went to Hungary, because only there could they get the permission for an interfaith marriage.

In the chapter "Constanze's Second Widowhood" Selby falls into a well-known trap that regularly claims victims among all kinds of enthusiastic amateur Mozartologists: she actually thinks that Leopold Mozart, Euphrosina Pertl, and Genoveva Weber were all buried in the family grave in the cemetery of St. Sebastian in Salzburg. And yet, it has been known for decades – based on the Berchtold von Sonnenburg family papers in Brno – that Leopold Mozart (just like "Theophrastus Paracelsus" as Selby hilariously misnames this historical figure) was not buried in the churchyard, but in the communal crypt of St. Sebastian. The "Mozart family grave" in this cemetery is an artificial site, created by Johann Evangelist Engl for reasons of nostalgia. There were no family graves in today's sense in the eighteenth century. The whole defensive rant, brought forward by Selby against "attacks by Mozartean writers accusing Constanze of desecrating Leopold Mozart's grave by having her aunt Genoveva buried there" is based on ignorance of the literature.

To defend Constanze's absence from her husband's burial, Selby resorts to Philippe Ariès's book Images of Man and Death, but her discussion is completely beside the point. The main issue was not "the wife's place in her home and not at the burial", but the customs related to Josephinism. Constanze was not "forbidden to attend Mozart's burial", she did not even consider to attend it, because it was not customary. At that time, the act of burying a body was no part of the Christian rite as it is today. People bid goodbye to their loved ones at the church and not in the cemetery, a custom that only began to change in the course of the Napoleonic Wars. Selby's musings about "the United States changing western attitudes toward death in the 20th century" (p. 114) have nothing to do with the relevant issues of eighteenth-century cultural life in Vienna. Because Selby is totally ignorant of the intricacies of the Josephinian burial regulations and their partial repeal in 1785, she rehashes all the nonsense about "Mozart having been sewn into a linen sack and having been buried with a reusable coffin". These old misunderstandings have all been refuted and should certainly not resurface in a 2013 publication. Not "eighty-five percent of Vienna's citizenry" received a third-class burial, but ninety-nine percent. Selby extrapolates from a small section of the St. Stephen's burial records which does not represent the situation in all of Vienna's parishes. First-class burials were not (as Selby presumes on p. 117) "reserved for the nobility", but for anybody who was willing to pay for them (this old misunderstanding seems ineradicable). Because Selby's description of the funeral classes is copied from the worst secondary literature (such as Brendan Cormican), it is totally flawed.

Selby repeats her old story about Süßmayr's supposed trip to Kremsmünster Abbey in December 1791, and that after Mozart's death, "Süssmayr was nowhere to be found" (p. 128). Over thirteen years ago, Selby already posed as omniscient archival researcher on public internet forums as follows:

I would like to add that I have serious doubts about Sussmayr working on the Magic Flute which Constanze sold for 100 ducats 23 days after Mozart's death. While working on my book, "Constanze. Mozart's Beloved", I came across Archival evidence at the Vienna National Library, in the archives of Kremsmunster Abbey wherein Sussmayr arrived at the Abbey on 17 December, 1791 in the company of Pater Pasterwitz. It had been Sussmayr's custom to spend Christmas at Kremsmunster where he organised the Christmas festivities. It is also the reason why Constanze could not find him, when pressured for the completion of the Requiem by Count Walsegg's representative and why the Requiem was first handed over to Joseph Eybler who signed for it on 21 December, 1791. Eybler found himself incapable of completing the Requiem and it was then given to Sussmayr on his return from Kremsmunster. I have not been able to find in the archives his departure date from the Abbey. [...] Some further information to iron out one more wrinkle posed by both Carr and Gartner[sic!], Constanze was NOT MAD AT SUSSMAYR when she could not find him after Mozart's death. She was looking for him to complete the Requiem and NOT TO MARRY HER. She could not find Sussmayr because he was at Kremsmunster Abbey making preparations for Christmas festivities which he did every year. Again Kremsmunster archives can be found at the National Library in Vienna. (Agnes Selby on www.openmozart.net, 28 December 2000)

There are no "Kremsmunster archives" at the National Library in Vienna. Apart from that, my on-site research at Kremsmünster Abbey in July 2002 showed that there is no documentary proof that Süßmayr went there in late 1791. The whole story about this Christmas trip is a figment of Selby's imagination. All Viennese sources related to Süßmayr's employment at the Court show that at the end of December 1791 he was working in Vienna at the Burgtheater. Selby has a notorious reputation for fabricating her sources. On 12 June 2001, and on 26 and 27 November 2002, she posted the following statements on the (long defunct) online forum www.openmozart.net.

My studies in the Vienna archives where all Baden records about the comings and goings to and from Baden record that on every occasion Sussmayr was in Baden he travelled with Pater Pasterwitz and not with Constanze. Sussmayr and Pater Pasterwitz were registered at a hotel, the name of which escapes me but if anyone is interested, I would be happy to go through my files. This is very important to understand in order not to perpetuate the lies created by Francis Carr and Heinz Gartner[sic!]. Neither of these two gentleman seems to have taken time for proper research. [...] I checked the Baden records at the Viennese National Library[sic!]. These are records of people coming and leaving Baden. I took as my point of departure the dates of Constanze's presence in Baden. [...] Sussmayr seems to have led a good life, e.g. his trips to Baden. These may have been paid for by Pater Pasterwitz in whose company he travelled. (List of Arrivals and Departures. Baden police file in Archives, Austrian National Library, Vienna). 

There are, of course, no records "about the comings and goings to and from Baden" in the Vienna National Library. None of the archival documents Selby referred to in the above statements do exist, and neither did Selby ever intend to "happily go through her files". Such documents are also not held by the Austrian State Archives. When asked for the location of these mysterious sources, Selby replied: "Records pertaining to this are in Vienna. I am sorry, I do not remember the section in the archives as my research concerned Constanze and the biography I was writing about her." According to Selby, other researchers could not find these sources, "because they lacked the necessary »Sitzfleisch«".

After Dan Leeson, in 2006, had somebody search in vain for these sensational "police records", Selby simply relocated their alleged place of discovery to the Baden City Archives.

Police files from Baden indicate the arrival of Pasterwitz and Sussmayr on at least three occasions and staying together at a hotel in the township. These files are available to researchers in the Baden city archives. (Agnes Selby, 23 November 2006)

The Baden archivist Dr. Rudolf Maurer has assured me personally that these files do not exist. Neither do the Austrian State Archives hold any Baden police files from 1791. The Baden police station was only established in 1809. When Selby was told about Dr. Maurer's statement, she immediately returned to her initial narrative and relocated the fictitious police files back to the Austrian National Library (after all, where else would one expect to find police files?).

As for the Police Files, I know, Mr. Lorenz has had a field day telling me that they do not exist and that they were burnt in a fire. Mr. Lorenz, you know perfectly well that this is not true and the files do exist. Somewhere you have got all this mixed up as the police files rest comfortably in the archives of the Austrian National Library. (Agnes Selby, 17 August 2008)

Needless to say, I had never claimed that "the Baden police files burnt in a fire". Whenever Selby was caught in a lie, she tried to defend herself by producing yet another lie. In 2007, Selby tried to convince the members of an online forum that Alfred Einstein, in his biography of Mozart, had "described the Weber family as useless vagabonds", and "had placed Constanze's sisters as parading in front of Vienna military barracks to catch husbands." (Selby, 11 November 2007). When she was asked to provide an exact quote and a page number to prove these gross accusations, she claimed that she had no access to Einstein's book, because "she had lent it to her daughter Kathryn".

Agnes Selby's fictional sources are not limited to Süßmayr's life. Concerning Mozart's commemorative service, which Emanuel Schikaneder organized on 10 December 1791, she claimed to have received a letter from St. Michael's Church in Vienna.

I wrote to St. Michael's Church and received a polite reply informing me that the singers were listed in the Church records as well as the payment they received from Schikaneder who had organised this Commemorative Service. Although it has often been stated that parts of Mozart's Requiem were performed, I was told that there is no record as to the music performed. (Agnes Selby, 14 August 2008)

This "list of singers in the Church records" does not exist in the parish archive of St. Michael's. It is yet another flimsy figment of Mrs. Selby's imagination. She never corresponded with the staff at St. Michael's who do not know her name. Selby even claimed to have corresponded with Professor Neal Zaslaw and Robert Levin (or "Levine" as she called him) regarding this issue.

I wrote to St. Michael's Church and was told that although a list of performers exists in the archives of the Church and even how much they were paid, whose Requiem was performed had not been noted. I sent this letter to Dr. Zaslaw who had the same information sent to him. (Agnes Selby, 9 August 2007)

Well it must have been a "ghostie" who wrote to me and to Dr. Levine that the list of performers at St. Michael's Church exists but not what was peformed on that crucial night. (Agnes Selby, 17 August 2008)

It must have been a ghostie indeed, because neither Neal Zaslaw nor Robert Levin ever received any letters from Selby or St. Michael's Church. In August 2004, Selby reported on www.openmozart.net that "an Australian PhD student named Morgan Flannery is currently doing research in the Lichnowsky archive in Prague and will present his findings at a congress in the Mozart Year". This student (originally intended to serve as her sock puppet) also turned out to be one of Selby's countless fabrications. When in 2008 she was asked about Mr. Flannery's research and why he had never published anything concerning the Lichnowsky papers in Prague, Selby simply decided to give Flannery's career an unexpected turn towards family life and to declare the Lichnowsky papers destroyed:

Morgan Flannery lives in London where he has a teaching job. The last I saw him was over a capuccino at the Sydney seaside suburb of Woolloomooloo, where good capos can be found. Morgan has since his Prague adventure got married and has to now "earn his crust". It is true, he has yet to present his findings but I did not realize it was my duty to inform you of his inability to complete his thesis in time. You see, the Lichnowsky files were indeed burnt during World War II by the Germans, and information is difficult to find although he has a good bit of material available. The Germans did a lot of damage to beautiful Prague!!! As a very young and enthusiastic warrior of that era, you must remember it well. (Agnes Selby, 17 August 2008)

It is not quite clear as to whether the words "as a very young and enthusiastic warrior of that era, you must remember it well" were meant to refer to me. The fact that Selby obviously tried to slander me by staging me as Nazi soldier, speaks volumes about her deranged state of mind. I have dealt with Mrs. Selby's amazing concoctions in my article "Süßmayr und die Lichterputzer: von gefundenen und erfundenen Quellen" in the Mozart-Jahrbuch 2006, (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 2008, 425–38).

Selby's book presents a grossly overoptimistic, untrue, and apologetic picture of Constanze Mozart as a flawless saint. This does not correspond to the current state of research and is caused by Selby's only rudimentary knowledge of the scholarly literature. The reissue of Selby's book is a regrettable waste of money and paper. This book has not even come close to an expert musicologist's proofreading eyes, and there is ample reason to presume that not even the publisher bothered to read it with adequate attention. It is a real pity that Selby was unwilling to completely overhaul her work. So many interesting topics related to Constanze Mozart are still waiting to be explored more deeply: Where and when did Constanze move after Mozart's death? Where exactly did Nissen live in Vienna? Why did Constanze reject Schwanthaler's first design of her husband's statue? Who destroyed the many letters of Leopold Mozart? Who is the woman on the supposed "photograph of Constanze Mozart" that, for simple technical reasons, cannot originate from before 1842? What about the early musical career of Karl Mozart who in many Viennese sources is being addressed as "Tonkünstler"?

Karl and Wolfgang Mozart, both addressed as "Tonkünstler" in an 1811 register of the Hauptregistratur of the Vienna Magistrate (A-Wsa, HReg. B1/104, fol. 180r)

Karl Mozart being described as "als Hand[lungs]pr[aktikant] abwesend soll klein seyn" ("absent as business intern, is said to be small") on an 1805 conscription sheet of the Palais Eskeles (A-Wsa, Konskriptionsamt, Stadt 1110/1r). Selby considers it possible that "Constanze feared that Wolfgang might be conscripted into the Austrian army", but in fact both Mozart brothers were exempt from service owing to their small body height. The above entry was first published in 1957 by Gustav Gugitz, but Selby is completely ignorant of the standard German Mozart literature.

Georg "von Niessen" listed as "Dänischer Gesandschafts Rath" on a Viennese conscription sheet from 1805 (A-Wsa, Konskriptionamt, Stadt 4/2r). This entry proves that Nissen already was living with Constanze Mozart in 1805, in the house Stadt No. 4.

The Hollitzer Wissenschaftsverlag did not put any editorial effort into the production of this superfluous book, which is proved by glaring typos such as "Beamarchais", "Greisinger", a "quintet K. 542" (p. 60), numerous missing spaces, and a letter written by Leopold Mozart on "November 17, 1886" (p. 78). It would also have helped if the editors (i.e. the notoriously sloppy Michael Hüttler) had at least done a little research concerning Mrs. Selby's reputation as an extraordinarily imaginative author. While the negative effect of Selby's book had already died down in Australia, her work from the 1990s is now unfortunately being revived in Europe, as if it were a scholarly contribution that meets today's standards.

Selby's book was not the only biography of Constanze Mozart published in 2013. At the same time, the German musicologist Gesa Finke published her dissertation entitled Die Komponistenwitwe Constanze Mozart. This book, which addresses the topic "Mozart's widow" from the perspective of "commemorative and gender studies", also resulted in a massive failure, albeit on an academic level. Finke was completely on her own and had to fulfill her task without any competent help from her incompetent advisor. But this will be the topic of a future blogpost.

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Wir sehen voraus, daß wir auch manchmal in den Fall kommen werden, daß ein Liebling der Menge nicht gerade auch unser Liebling sei und wollen die deshalb unvermeidlichen Vorwürfe gern über uns ergehen lassen.

(Goethe: Über strenge Urteile)

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© Dr. Michael Lorenz 2014.

Updated: 8 November 2024