cahn | Frederick the Great, discussion post 6

...I think we need another one (seriously, you guys, this is THE BEST) and I'd better make it now before I disappear into the wilds of music performance.

(also, as of this week there are two Frederician fics in the yuletide archive and eeeeeeeeeee)
(huh, only one of them is actually tagged with Frederick the Great even though two with Maria Theresia and Wilhelmine, eeeeeee this is awesome I CAN'T WAIT)

Frederick the Great masterpost

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

selenak

On that note! So, the Lehndorff second volume, aka volume 1 of the Appendices, provides, among many other things, the whole, uncut, Marwitz affair entry. Still without a first name for the guy, but there is definitely more to the story. I translate the entire entry, because context is everything.

"Morning with the King. All are delighted to see our sovereign, and one would adore him if only this great man were a bit more gracious to those who want to adore him. But nothing is more humiliating than having to stand around and to wait for hours to at last see someone who doesn't grace us with a look. The fear which princes inspire only signifies their power. Awe is inspired by their dignity; their true glory springs from the estimation and personal respect one has for them. Friedrich does enjoy this precious advantage, and he would be loved, too, if only he numbered kindness among his qualities.
I renew my acquaitance with a man I had not seen since the year 1749. It is a young Marwitz, who started his career as page with the King, and who became a favourite with him as well as with Prince Heinrich. This affection went so far that the two royal brothers turned incredibly furious on each other for his sake. The young page was sent away, but due to urgent pleadings on Prince Heinrich's side, he got a commission in the guard. Some time later, the Prince accused him of falsehood and bad manners, and banished him completely from his company. Since then, the King has occasionally favoured him with his grace, but in the next moment sends him to guard duty and treats him like a criminal. This man now resurfaces on the horizon; the Prince tells me that he is quite amiable, that he invites him to his parties again, and the King has made him his batman. He posseses wit and is somewhat strongly fantastical; I consider him malicious.
In the evening, the whole royal family dines with the Queen Mother."

Well! I dare say! What are we to make of this? And not a single biography has mentioned Marwitz the (former) page had a comeback. Or several. With both brothers. Also of course the whole anecdote coming after a complaint that Fritz doesn't take notice of Lehndorff is incredibly telling. .

There are many other goodies in what I've read through so far. Among other things, I wronged Lehndorff, who does write about his wife to be - she's the "little one" in Magdeburg - with affection, instead of just bitching about his mother-in-law, Editor just cut it. (Along with a great many family related entries; since Lehndorff's family hails from the east of Prussia, he's incredibly worried for his mother and siblings during the war, for example.) After his marriage, we get this entry showing that people (just not EC) already walked in and out of Sanssouci at this point (1758) for tourist reasons, and it's yet another mention of a certain portrait, which is the other anecdote I'm sharing for now, more at some future point because I rather have to sort what not to include as Lehndorff Unplugged has even more on the "Heinrich and Me: A Rokoko Queer" as Folk AU front (Editor, I sympathize - there is SO MUCH, it must have been very hard to choose):

"I show my wife the entire palace and Sanssouci, which is very worth viewing. On this occasion, I have a strange amusment. On my way, I picked up a tailor who had left his parents' home for the fist time in his life, and wanted to travel from Brandenburg to Berlin. The naive and stupid replies he gave had endeared him to me, and thus I had included him among my servants, who told him all kind of nonsense. When he saw the Potsdam palace, his amazement was without limits, and I thought all that gold would make him sink to his knees. His biggest surprise, though, came when he saw in one of the King's rooms the portrait of the Empress-Queen; he was stunned by the beautiful face of Her Imperial Majesty and assured me that he'd always been told she was evil and had long ears. Thus are the simple folk people, and thus we, too, would think if education had not formed our mind and would have taught us better! In the evening, I arrive at my house in Berlin and am amazed to find myself in a household with a wife and a great staff. Divine destiny, you have led me this far, you will not leave me now!

Linguistic footnote: as loyal Prussian, Lehndorff uses "The Queen of Hungary" for MT in 90% of the cases, so it's interesting he here uses "the Empress-Queen" instead.

Edited Date: 2019-12-11 06:32 am (UTC)

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Wow, this is fantastic, thank goodness for Team Frederician Fandom (including the honorary member)!

Some time later, the Prince accused him of falsehood and bad manners, and banished him completely from his company.

OH MAN. Maybe Fritz was onto something with those letters to Heinrich about how Marwitz was Up To No Good. Or maybe Marwitz started showing signs of liking Fritz (whether for political or personal reasons), and Heinrich was all "LIES!"

if only this great man were a bit more gracious to those who want to adore him

Read: would give us real jobs with him instead of dead-end ones with his boring wife.

And not a single biography has mentioned Marwitz the (former) page had a comeback.

I know, we've heard about the first comeback (the urgent pleadings from Heinrich), but not the subsequent ones! He's clearly not as crazy as the Trencks, but the yo-yoing in and out of favor with fortune is reminiscent.

Editor just cut it

Thank you once again, 1907 readers! You really came through for us.

Also, I think we have an abundance of evidence now that Fritz really did have a portrait of MT and it's not just gossip or him telling his staff to tell people it's her. It's her.

Well, Fritz, Lehndorff says what I've been saying for decades now: love you or hate you or both, you're never boring! (I think when everyone says "only true monarch in Europe," "only king in Europe," and so forth, they mean "least boring," "most unpredictable," "always up to *something*," "never an idle moment.")

MT: I could do with a little more boredom!
MT: *throws darts*

[ETA: it just occurred to me that this is one thing Heinrich and Lehndorff have in common! YES GOD YES. You bastard.

Speaking of which, I know the whole "forget about the last twelve years" has to be partly a case of the grass being greener on the other side, but it must have been genuinely frustrating not to have FW2 even engage with him. I can totally see Heinrich thinking, "At least he took me seriously enough to argue back. At least he CARED enough to argue." And missing that aspect of Older Bro even while he wanted to throttle him.]

Lehndorff Unplugged has even more on the Heinrich and Me: A Rokoko Queer as Folk AU front:

Lehndorff is hands-down my favorite memoirist so far. Admittedly I haven't read the umpteen volumes of Casanova, or even the corrupt Gutenberg version. But Lehndorff is endearing and informative and has all the good stuff. I wish he had more good stuff, but I guess I'm willing to forgive him the lack of Katte goodies. Heinrich clearly took up 99% of the space in his brain.

Also, lol, I was reading through old comments tonight and hit this:

OK... tell me more about Lehndorff? So I know from your previous posts that he was EC's chamberlain and Heinrich's friend-with-benefits and had a diary... did he write about Heinrich in his diary??

Did he ever!

Edited Date: 2019-12-11 06:56 am (UTC)

From:

selenak

All hail the honorary member! Our royal patron, clearly. :)

Maybe Fritz was onto something with those letters to Heinrich about how Marwitz was Up To No Good. Or maybe Marwitz started showing signs of liking Fritz (whether for political or personal reasons), and Heinrich was all "LIES!"

I could buy either of those possibilities. Perhaps even in combination, i.e the reason Fritz knew Marwitz was cheating on 19-years-old Heinrich was because it was with him? And Marwitz thought he could continue to swing both Hohenzollern ways? So do we still think this Marwitz is identical with Obelisk Marwitz the quartermaster? I mean, clearly 1757!Heinrich - who of course himself turned out not monogamous, whatever his 19 years old self thought - is cool with him again, at least enough to socialize. Lehndorff classifying him as "malicious" could either be over the top - remember, he even thought Algarotti was too enamored of his own wit, and he sees Wilhelmine "playing the wit" as a downside to her character - or a correct estimation, see also: Heinrich's tendency to end up with boyfriends who pull stunts like Tauntzien in the Paris opera or Kaphengst the fear of the neighbourhood.

Also, I think we have an abundance of evidence now that Fritz really did have a portrait of MT and it's not just gossip or him telling his staff to tell people it's her. It's her.

I would say that means MT has officially won the "who is the supreme arch nemesis here?" stakes, except really, who else? Best Enemies Forever!

I can totally see Heinrich thinking, "At least he took me seriously enough to argue back. At least he CARED enough to argue." And missing that aspect of Older Bro even while he wanted to throttle him.

Oh, absolutely. This was not a man thriving on idleness, much as he enjoyed all the culture and beautiful landscapes etc. Life with Fritz might have been a high wire act where you needed to keep your focus and your balance all the time or you landed in the abyss (from Heinrich's pov), but this, he must have been horrified to discover, was what he'd thrived on, what had challenged him to be on top of his game. Being reduced to dear old Uncle Heinrich who gets invited for the holidays is awful(ly dull) by comparison.

When Luise the new wife of future FW3 (the one who'd be defeated by Napoleon) asked him for a rec list of books, as she'd been woefully undereducated, Heinrich's rec list, Beaumarchais aside, was utterly Fritz-approved. Nearly all French literature of the golden age, and this at a point where other than his own theatre at Rheinsberg, no one played French plays in French anymore and Madame de Stael was busy writing "De L'Allemagne", the Bestseller in which she'd reccomend Germany - all ist principalities - as the most exciting place for literature and philosophy in all of Europe. It would not have computed with either Fritz or Heinrich, and the later spend those twelve years realising just how much he'd been formed by his brother, in everything, and now the other part of the push-pull was gone.

Lehndorff is golden, and I'm very glad indeed we found him!

From:

mildred_of_midgard

I could buy either of those possibilities. Perhaps even in combination, i.e the reason Fritz knew Marwitz was cheating on 19-years-old Heinrich was because it was with him?

Definitely possible. Or possibly Marwitz had signaled his willingness to cheat and Fritz was all, "Haha, no, I enjoy the flirting, but on second thought, I don't have a real sex drive, you're not that great up close, I'm not sharing you with other self, and also you don't seem very reliable. Enjoy the wit, though!"

Life with Fritz might have been a high wire act where you needed to keep your focus and your balance all the time or you landed in the abyss (from Heinrich's pov), but this, he must have been horrified to discover, was what he'd thrived on, what had challenged him to be on top of his game.

That as an excellent and striking description. I also like to think that Heinrich discovered in retrospect that he felt some respect or at least sympathy for Fritz for caring about the same things enough to argue, even if he was clearly WRONG about them.

the later spend those twelve years realising just how much he'd been formed by his brother, in everything, and now the other part of the push-pull was gone.

Yeah. :/ Not the healthiest dynamic, but I can see how it was an addictive one. Re their tastes not updating: I don't have firsthand knowledge of this, but I gather Rheinsberg shows Heinrich having at least somewhat more up-to-date architectural tastes than Fritz and his perma-rococo.

From:

selenak

Wilhelmine Dorothea von Marwitz, married v. Burghausen, from the safe distance of Vienna: "What I'd like to know is how Fritz had the gall to call me Medea and what not, and to withhold my inheritance from Dad, while all this was going on. I mean, sure, I two timed his sister with her husband, but if there ever was a pot slandering a kettle... At least I didn't write Wilhelmine letters about her husband giving me the clap!

From:

selenak

I also like to think that Heinrich discovered in retrospect that he felt some respect or at least sympathy for Fritz

Well... not sure about that, but we get this gem from old Heinrich. Context: remember, Wilhelmine‘s widower died without a son from his brief second marriage, and Bayreuth went to crazy Uncle Christian, who‘d shot his wife‘s hot page. And also died son-less. Which meant that Bayreuth defaulted to the main Hohenzollern line. With all its interiors, including a certain manuscript. At which point the following happens.

FW2: Dear Uncle Heinrich, just to show you I do trust you and value your advice, just got my hands on Aunt Wilhelmine‘s memoirs. Please read them. Without making a copy. I just glanced briefly, but, zomg, I‘m just saying - no copy.

Heinrich: *reads*

Heinrich: Dear Ferdinand, guess what? Big sis wrote her memoirs. Lots of stories I had no idea about, though there was one that brought up a really bad memory from when I was four.

Self: Oh. You mean the hair drag scene where according to Wilhelmine the younger sibs, including you, begged FW for her life?

Heinrich: Friedrich she describes the way I remember him....

Self: She DOES?!?

Heinrich: ...a paranoid mean-tempered bastard once he got on the throne, though charming as a boy. I guess. Everyone is.

Self: Christ.

Heinrich: Have now been inspired to reread his letters.

Self: Have I mentioned yet you all need therapy?

From:

mildred_of_midgard

OMG. "Christ" is right.

from when I was four

For

cahn, Heinrich at 4 = 1730, the year of the escape attempt.

Bayreuth went to crazy Uncle Christian, who‘d shot his wife‘s hot page.

Had forgotten that, so thank you for the reminder!

From:

cahn

ahahahaha, thank you for as always filling in my date-challenged self!! I... would not have gotten that on my own, though it seems kinda obvious now.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

I will try to remember to fill you in on things like dates and Peter III as Elisabeth's successor, things you will get when prompted but not necessarily on your own. I may not always be quite sure which instances those are, but I will try, because honestly, the best way to learn is not from forced memorization, but from encountering the same information in multiple contexts, through repetition.

Personal tangent:, I finally recently realized how much of my success in school, though definitely aided by having a good memory, came from studying the material on my own, outside the assigned lesson plans, because I got the repetition when the other students were having to rely on forced memorization. Ugh, why is our pedagogical system so bad? (I have actual thoughts on this for my blog, and for trying to re-master Latin and Greek more efficiently this time, which will all have to wait.)

From:

cahn

Hee, when it comes to dates (well, really everything, but particularly dates), you can pretty much always assume repetition is necessary (although I think I may finally have had the year of Katte's death drummed into me, at least :P )

From:

cahn

WOW.

...and yeeeeah, alllllll the therapy!

From:

mildred_of_midgard

So do we still think this Marwitz is identical with Obelisk Marwitz the quartermaster?

Hmmmm. So with the caveat that I was clearly off about the odds of General Katt still being alive and marriageable in the 1750s, Quartermaster Marwitz seems just a little bit too old to be boytoy Marwitz. The dates on the obelisk for the former are 1724-1759, which means he'd have been a page at age 21, and Lehndorff is calling him "young" in 1757 despite being three years younger himself.

Not impossible, but not a slam dunk.

From:

selenak

Just to make matters more confusing: Lehndorff mentions - post 7 Years War, so definitely not identical with Quartermaster Marwitz - both a (described as fat) "Colonel Marwitz" whom he visits Paris with - "der dicke Marwitz" - , and a "Chevalier Marwitz" whom gossip suspects of having an affair with Ferdinand's wife/niece. What is it with Marwitz/Hohenzollern pairings? And if Chevalier Marwitz is identical with former page and guardsman Marwitz, does he want to start a family collection? That truly would amount to a Trenck Level of madness.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

I've not had as much luck with the Marwitz clan as with the Katte clan, though I admit motivation may play a role in that. ;)

And if Chevalier Marwitz is identical with former page and guardsman Marwitz, does he want to start a family collection?

I laughed so hard at this, you have no idea.

That truly would amount to a Trenck Level of madness.

But so in character! I'm now calling him Trenck-lite regardless.

(ETA: this comment just pushed our word count to 400,009, guys!)

Edited Date: 2019-12-17 03:24 am (UTC)

From:

selenak

See, all we have to do is find a hint that Hans Herrmann might have had a fling with a member of the Marwitz tribe in his youth, and you'll discover all the first names and birthdates. ;)

Seriously, I suspect someone (Voltaire?) might have trolled people by writing an anonymous "How to succeed at the court of Frederick II" list, and two items on said lists are "have an affair with a member of his family" followed by "then have an affair with the man himself". All the subsequent desasters are the result of people taking this trolling seriously.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Both of these things made me laugh so hard!

See, all we have to do is find a hint that Hans Herrmann might have had a fling with a member of the Marwitz tribe in his youth, and you'll discover all the first names and birthdates. ;)

It's funny 'cause it's true. :P

Blame Lehndorff for not reporting the Hans Hermann gossip.

Seriously, I suspect someone (Voltaire?) might have trolled people

This would make an awesome addition to the Fritz/Voltaire crackfic that

cahn and I would like to see ~~make~~ happen next year.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Seriously, I suspect someone (Voltaire?) might have trolled people by writing an anonymous "How to succeed at the court of Frederick II" list

I'm starting to think you're right. I now have two sources agreeing that in 1740, Voltaire was writing love poetry to an unmarried Ulrica, and Fritz was writing sarcastic poetry back, going, "No, you can't have."

And we all know about Katte's double portrait of Fritz and Wilhelmine.

Hohenzollerns are collectible items!

From:

selenak

Voltaire/Ulrike, now there's a crack pairing I never thought I'd see. :) Given her fondness for despotism, it would have crashed and burned even faster than any other pairing, but undoubtedly we'd have gotten good pamphlets out of it.

Gustav: So, let me see whether I understood that correctly. You, Mom, start a major scandal about my creative solution to the succession problem involving an expert, and now I hear that back in the day, you got wooed by the most notorious writing scoundrel of Europe who simultanously was flirting with Uncle Fritz?

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Ulrike: Can I help it if everyone wants me? I said he wooed me, not that I invited him into my bed. No, I let your Uncle Fritz write him some poetry, which I figured having to read that would be enough to turn anyone off. Little did I know Voltaire was into bad poetry, and they had a poetry-reading "arrangement". *air quotes with her fingers* But trust me, there were no threesomes.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Correction: 1743, not 1740. It was Voltaire's second visit, not his first.

Googling just now, I found a scholarly article arguing that Fritz thought the flirtation was innocent, did *not* object, and was in fact trying to prolong it by adding some poetry to the mix. Well, well! (Crack pairing indeed.)

From:

cahn

OMG. Are there, like, excerpts of this poetry? (These can go in the next post, if they exist :) )

From:

cahn

LOL FOREVER OMG

Me: Hey, I have a dumb question. Who IS this random guy anyway? Tell me about him?
Mildred: I will use my superpowers of search and connections to unearth his diaries!
Selenak: I will use my superpowers of translation and analysis to translate these diaries!
Lehndorff: *is awesome*
Me: ...my superpower is the one of asking dumb questions! This is great!

One of the great things about it is that I would never have dared to ask a stupid question like "Who is this guy anyway??" in any other context, because I would have been intimidated by other people knowing so much more and would feel like they wouldn't want to answer my dumb questions. Whereas it's not like you guys don't know an intimidating amount of stuff, but you know exactly how little I know ("He was, like, King of Prussia, right?" "Well, actually...") and are still willing to fill me in (...sometimes multiple times, lol) <333333

Lehndorff is hands-down my favorite memoirist so far

SAME. He's both endearing and informative, like you say! And I can't stop laughing at his utter cluelessness, he's such a dork, I love him.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Remember how I invited someone to our discussions yesterday? (

selenak, she will not be joining at this time, although may in future. She wrote the Fritz mob boss fic and knows fun anecdotes about 18C and 19C historical figures we haven't discussed yet.)

Anyway, I was explaining how our discussion space is totally chill, and a key part of the dynamic is that you don't know much more than what we've told you,

cahn but you're delighted to hear about it, so there's no need to be intimidated by "Oh no, am I the least knowledgeable person here?" (Which I otherwise totally would be in selenak's presence.) Because whatever historical gossip you want to share, *someone* will be excited about it, and it may or may not be new to the other participants as well.

And she thought that sounded very nice and welcoming.

So you definitely have a superpower, and I would argue that it's not at all a dumb question! Because like I said, Lehndorff was only vaguely on my radar, in that when you asked I knew where to find quotes, but I hadn't registered him as a *person*. And I certainly wouldn't have been able to read those diaries! 99% of this was new to me, and the bits that weren't, I didn't realize were from him, and that was useful. (He gets quoted a lot in isolation, but nobody ever gives you the Lehndorff rundown.)

So thank you for being a very key part of this dynamic, making the discussion happen, and helping to keep it chill. <3333

(I honestly feel like it's a superpower because I would never ask these questions, because I feel like I'm *supposed* to know this stuff, or at least look it up? And a whole whole bunch of it has been new to me, and I would never have learned any of it without you to ask and selenak to answer. <3 And every once in a while I produce something that's new to selenak, and it's like, "Score!" ;) )

Any two of us would have stopped after a few comments, or a few dozen, and the three of us are now at...397,915 words. It's certainly been a glorious experience for me.

From:

selenak

So thank you for being a very key part of this dynamic, making the discussion happen, and helping to keep it chill. <3333

Seconding this a thousand times. But for you, I would never have discovered the adorkable Lehndorff myself, nor would I have read more than those Fredersdorf letters already quoted in online articles, nor would I have wonderful fannish chatting for months now! Gott bewahre dir!

From:

cahn

Oooooh Marwitz!! Yay Team! :D

but eeeeeeditor, I actually want to know about Lehndorff's wife! Thanks 1907 readers! (If for no other reason than that it makes Lehndorff rather more human, which... don't you want to know about the character of the person you're getting all your ~~sensationalistic gossip~~ citations from?)