Little backstory: In the latter part of his life, Fritz employed a "reader" (Vorleser) named Henri de Catt. Catt wrote some memoirs that make it clear Fritz confided in him. Those nightmares I told you about in another comment were recounted to Catt, plus there's one passage where Fritz talks to Catt about Katte's execution, a subject that was evidently very difficult for him to discuss throughout his life.
Meanwhile, I'm watching this subtitled German documentary film (the one with the escape attempt I gave you the clip from), at the rate of about five minutes every few days because that's about my attention span for audiovisual media, and I just got to the part where Catt is introduced.
Now, the similarity in name between "von Katte" and "de Catt" has been remarked upon by a number of us independently. Jokes and even fanart have been made on tumblr. I noticed it myself and attributed it to complete coincidence; it's not exactly a rare name to have a variant of. But this documentary is the first time I've seen someone at least semi-serious-business comment on it, and this is what they have to say: "Did Frederick choose de Catt because his name is so similar to that of his old friend Katte?"
IMO? No, of course not. Fritz was always picky about who he chose to let into the inner circle, Henri de Catt meets the usual standards, it's not a rare name, and the actual Katte family has plenty of members among the nobility, and we don't see him being drawn to them at all. (Katte's dad gets a promotion immediately after Fritz becomes king, and that's the only interaction that I'm aware of.) I think they're making too much of a coincidence.
But did Fritz get any kind of half-painful, half-pleasurable twinge from the similarity in names, especially shortly after meeting Catt? I consider that quite likely. And would such a twinge have made him any more likely to open up about Katte and Küstrin to someone he'd already admitted into the inner circle? Maybe. I myself experienced a comparable phenomenon once, and I wasn't even close to my sister who died young, nor was her death traumatic for me. (Stressful, yes; traumatic, no.)
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Little backstory: In the latter part of his life, Fritz employed a "reader" (Vorleser) named Henri de Catt. Catt wrote some memoirs that make it clear Fritz confided in him. Those nightmares I told you about in another comment were recounted to Catt, plus there's one passage where Fritz talks to Catt about Katte's execution, a subject that was evidently very difficult for him to discuss throughout his life.
Meanwhile, I'm watching this subtitled German documentary film (the one with the escape attempt I gave you the clip from), at the rate of about five minutes every few days because that's about my attention span for audiovisual media, and I just got to the part where Catt is introduced.
Now, the similarity in name between "von Katte" and "de Catt" has been remarked upon by a number of us independently. Jokes and even fanart have been made on tumblr. I noticed it myself and attributed it to complete coincidence; it's not exactly a rare name to have a variant of. But this documentary is the first time I've seen someone at least semi-serious-business comment on it, and this is what they have to say: "Did Frederick choose de Catt because his name is so similar to that of his old friend Katte?"
IMO? No, of course not. Fritz was always picky about who he chose to let into the inner circle, Henri de Catt meets the usual standards, it's not a rare name, and the actual Katte family has plenty of members among the nobility, and we don't see him being drawn to them at all. (Katte's dad gets a promotion immediately after Fritz becomes king, and that's the only interaction that I'm aware of.) I think they're making too much of a coincidence.
But did Fritz get any kind of half-painful, half-pleasurable twinge from the similarity in names, especially shortly after meeting Catt? I consider that quite likely. And would such a twinge have made him any more likely to open up about Katte and Küstrin to someone he'd already admitted into the inner circle? Maybe. I myself experienced a comparable phenomenon once, and I wasn't even close to my sister who died young, nor was her death traumatic for me. (Stressful, yes; traumatic, no.)