18th-Century Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 38

[cahn]

Gonna go ahead and make this post even though Yuletide is coming...

But in the meantime, there has been some fic in the fandom posted!

Holding His Space (2503 words) by felisnocturna
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 18th Century CE RPF, 18th Century CE Frederician RPF
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Michael Gabriel Fredersdorf/Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great
Characters: Michael Gabriel Fredersdorf, Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great
Additional Tags: Protectiveness, Domestic, Character Study
Summary:

Five times Fredersdorf has to stay behind - and one time Friedrich doesn't leave.

Using People (3392 words) by prinzsorgenfrei
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 18th Century CE RPF
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great/Hans Hermann von Katte
Characters: Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great, Hans Hermann von Katte
Additional Tags: Fluff, Idiots in Love, reading plays aloud while gazing into each others eyes
Summary:

Friedrich had started to talk to him because he had thought of him as a bit of a ditz.
And now here he was. Here he was months later, bundled up in this very same man’s blankets with a cup of hot coffee in front of him, its scent mixing with that of Katte’s French perfume.
_
Fluffy One Shot about one traitorous Crown Prince and the sycophant he accidentally fell for.

Comments

Fritz and the MT marriage project

[mildred_of_midgard]

(Lie: "My father's ministers want to make me a Catholic!")

Huh. So while this was definitely a lie, I had the impression from Selena's summaries that Fritz was actually proposing to convert to Catholicism in spring of 1731. Today I had to go read these letters myself for the first time, as part of my Peter Keith citation work (this bit comes up in the essay, because it's too good not to include in a footnote), and I find that what Fritz actually says is, "I will marry the archduchess as long as I don't have to convert, because I never ever want to do that as long as I live." And Grumbkow writes to Wolden, "This whole thing doesn't make sense, among other reasons because there's no way they'd let the archduchess marry a prince who wasn't totally Catholic."

Would he have been willing? Presumably. But it makes sense that he was smart enough not to admit that up front to arch-Protestant Dad.

The other thing I found that was super interesting was something we've talked about a lot in salon in our various AUs. Grumbkow says, "As for renouncing his Prussian claims, that'll never work, because everyone knows no one ever keeps their word on a renunciation like this unless there's force involved."

This is so true! I mean, we saw what happened with Philip V "the Frog" (luzula, do you know why we call him "the Frog"?) and his repeated renunciations of his claims to the throne of France: every time it looked like Louis XV might die, Philip got ready to march into France and claim his rights, with a civil war if need be.

ETA: Speaking of Grumbkow and sources for this essay, though, selenak, do you have the source for the August 1731 submission protocol you translated for us here?

Re: Fritz and the MT marriage project

[selenak]

Source for the submission protocol by Grumbkow: it must have been something you asked me to translate back when you started to aquire books for us, and which is in the library - at a guess, Förster’s collection of documents in Volume 3, and/or the much later 20th century “Verbiegung eines Charakters in Wusterhausen” collection? At any rate, it’s not from a book I found on my own, it’s from something you found first.

Re: Fritz and the MT marriage project

[mildred_of_midgard]

Found it in Förster, thanks!