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

Re: Katte and blame

[selenak]

No, I haven't, though I have seen other works quote from it, as it's one of the earliest FW biographies. Martin Sabrow the Gundling biographer quotes from it for obvious reasons but with great scepticism where appropriate, for example, Sabrow points out that Fassmann's story that Gundling after getting fired post F1's death wasn't just job- but also homeless, headed for a tavern and entertained the guests with his drunken ramblings, which is where Grumbkow found him, literally can't be true because we know where Gundling was living thanks the Berlin address book, that the tavern Fassmann mentions didn't even exist yet, that he most likely was sent on an inspection tour through Brandenburg thanks to his essay about manufacturing and that this is how he originally reccomend himself to Grumbkow and FW. So what Fassmann did was projecting and conflating based on being Gundling's rival and knowing him in his final years, but Förster picked up the story from Fassmann and from there it ended up in all the FW biographies thereafter which touched on how Gundling went from being F1's historian to his position with FW.

This said, and with the caveat Fassmann was a satirist by profession, he really does get quoted by FW biographers, and it would be interesting to read his book not least because it might tell us where various FW related stories have their origin. Also for the comparison with Morgenstern's later FW book.

Fassmann's life of FW

[mildred_of_midgard]

Yeah, I was thinking it might be interesting for telling us where certain stories come from. Here you go! Let me know if you have any issues accessing it.

It's also really long, and given what I can see of the topics, you'll probably do a lot of skimming. But hopefully you'll be able to find us some good bits to share!

(I'm reminded looking at this that what I hate about the evil font is not so much that the letters are different, i.e. the font per se, which I could get used to, as that the quality of the printing is almost always SO BAD.)

Re: Fassmann's life of FW

[selenak]

The quality of printing is indeed horrid. Since I'm also continuing with listening to the History of the Germans podcast, it tickles me that Fassmann (who publishes this in 1735 and at least early in the book lays it on as thickly about FW's wonderfulness as if he was Voltaire in the 1730s writing to Fritz about Fritz' wonderfulness) points out FW was "born in the purple", i.e. when his father F1/still F3 at this point wasn't a mere Kurprinz anymore but a Kurfürst, an Elector, and clearly that shows FW was born to make millions happy by his rule and has something of the divine in him, I kid you not:

As soon as the new Kurprinz Friedrich Wilhelm was born to the world and made his first sounds, one could immediately see he was perfectly formed and made. Indeed his face showed the beauty of his lady mother, his heroic expression the spirit of his grandfather, as well as the majestic nature which always shone from the eyes of his lord father...

...to give you an impression of Fassmann's style.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW

[mildred_of_midgard]

I noticed the born in the purple and was tickled for the same reason!

...to give you an impression of Fassmann's style.

Oh, good lord! That is some fanboying.

Printing quality: I need to vent about who in 1735 thought it was necessary to print things like this and torture us poor future English speakers.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - up to 1730

[selenak]

Okay, I've now progressed to 1730, though I admittedly skipped a lot of declarations. It's really noticeable that Fassmann didn't join FW's court until the later 1720s. Until that point, there isn't much about FW the person, it's just FW the model reform monarch. And good lord, pages upon pages of descriptions of SD's entrance in Berlin as a bride, or F1's wake and funeral procession. And so many royal declarations! There are some childhood anecdotes, though notably no unflattering ones (no Tiny Terror FW beating up his teacher or his cousin here!), for example the one where young FW swallows his golden shoe clip because he hates waste and splendor that much as a kid already.

The comparison to Morgenstern, writing just a few decades later, is instructive, because Fassmann and Morgenstern knew FW in roughly the same decade, and neither knew him when young, i.e. they're both referring hearsay. But Morgenstern is writing in Fritz' era, and so there's F1 bashing, Tiny Terror FW, SC criticism, and what might just be the earliest mention in a public source (as opposed to private correspondence not accessible to normal contemporaries) of young FW wanting to marry Caroline before he hooks up with SD. By contrast, Fassmann doesn't mention Caroline, SD was the perfect princess and then became the perfect Queen, and she and FW have the perfect marriage. What else!

Then we get into the later 1720s, and suddenly you get detailed stuff that actually feels like an eye wittness account, like this one about FW's 1728/1729 serious illness:

"As his majesty for as long as it took had many sleepless nights, he used to sleep a while in the morning starting at 4 or 6 am. When he awoke and if his great pain permitted it, he threw himself into the business of governing, as he signed, dictated or answered many letters. At noon he rose if possible from bed, put on a dressing gown and had lunch with her Majesty the Queen and some of the children who were at Potsdam. Such as his royal highness the Crown Prince, the current Margravine of Ansbach, and his Royal Highness Prince August Wilhelm. Her Royal Highness the Margravine of Bayreuth was then still in Potsdam, but because she was suffering from chicken pox had to be locked up with Fräulein von Sonsfeld in the later's room all the time.

After lunch His Majesty, pain and weakness permitting, either went back to bed or painted, an art which he had learned in his youth and mastered fairly well. His Majesty created various portraits of farmers from different nations. To this end, there always had to be a painter at hand in the afternoon who mixed the colors and made the first sketch. As his Majesty tried to push back sleep for the entire afternoon until 9 or 10 pm at night so he might have a calmer night thereafter, there needed to be certain people in the room at all times whom he tolerated, no matter whether they were sitting or lying with him in the bed. The Queen' s Majesty came and went, and one could see more than once that His Majesty once the pain had lessened a bit, put his hand into her Majesty's most lovingly, seeking either additional soothing this way or expressing the calmness of his heart. His Royal Highness the Crown Prince and the current Margravine of Ansbach went up and down through the room. His Royal Highness the Crown Prince used to either read French books, or listen to the conversation, while her Royal Highness the Margravine of Ansbach either knitted or wove. Most of all Prince August Wilhelm used to be in the room for the entire afternoon, and either wrote or painted, in which art he had already done a few things."

Sidenote: Morgenstern says FW only started to learn how to paint in 1730, not in his youth, and so does Förster; I'm inclined to believe them. But the rest is believable enough.

Absolutely no mention of any father/son problems until we get to the FW and Fritz tour of the summer of 1730. And there Fassmann first gives us the tourist attractions and FW's reaction to each of them as if he's writing a travelogue, which made me wonder whether he's actually going to skip over the entire incident. But no. After talking about FW, Mannheim tourist, he suddenly says, only slightly paraphrased: Oh, and on this journey, something went down between the King and the Crown Prince, which has been talked about so much that I guess I have to include it. Now I don't know what really happened, and nor do you, reader, and since neither of us will ever find out, let's just be joyful that the cloud of this sad disagreement has disappeared and now the King and the Crown Prince are living in perfect harmony again. True, this sad affair has cost this officer of the Regiment Gens d'Armes, one Herr von Katte, his head, and this despite him being the son of ultra respectable FW buddy and officer Hans Herrmann and the grandson of rich and respected Wartensleben. V. sad. But look, these things happen between royals! Future F1 also ran away from his Dad when he was still a Kurprinz! And hey, we can all read in the newspapers that Fritz of Wales hardly ever shows up at court but keeps staying at a place called Richmond. FW and Fritz aren't unusual, is what I'm saying. I hope people in high places won't hold it against me that I mentioned this wretched affair at all, it's just that it's so well known that my readers wouldn't trust me if I didn't mention it. Okay, so FW then went to Wusterhausen and spend the rest of the year there...

By contrast, his report on the bonkers Clement affair actually is pretty matter-of-factly and much as I've found it in other accounts. Fassmann doesn't doubt for a moment Clement was a gifted conman (with untrustworthy black eyes!) (also of small stature and fat! So it can't have been his looks, I guess...) and a lying liar. He doesn't mention that FW had a hard time giving up on Clement, but other than that, his account, as mentioned, is very much on the money. Interestingly, he does mention that in the fallout of the Clement affair SD's lady in waiting, Frau von Baspiel, had to leave the court after a brief Spandau interlude with her husband, but he doesn't include the fact that this was because while Frau von Baspiel had nothing to do with Clement or insane kidnap plans, she did in fact spy for the Saxons (and had been Manteuffel's mistress). Whether this is because Fassmann truly doesn't know or whether he wants to be discreet, I have no idea.

One more trivia fact: if his account of FW breaking the "you're going to get married" news to Friederike Louise is in any way correct, the Hohenzollern called this sister of Fritz' "Louise".

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - up to 1730

[mildred_of_midgard]

Until that point, there isn't much about FW the person, it's just FW the model reform monarch. And good lord, pages upon pages of descriptions of SD's entrance in Berlin as a bride, or F1's wake and funeral procession. And so many royal declarations!

This is what I meant when I said given the length (for those who haven't looked, it's over a thousand pages long) and what I could see of the topics, you were going to do a lot of skimming/skipping!

young FW swallows his golden shoe clip because he hates waste and splendor that much as a kid already.

Oh, hahaha, not because he was a toddler throwing a temper tantrum and trying to get his way, which is the explanation I've always seen from less favorable-to-FW sources? :P

And there Fassmann first gives us the tourist attractions and FW's reaction to each of them as if he's writing a travelogue, which made me wonder whether he's actually going to skip over the entire incident.

OMG, we had the same reaction! I went looking for 1730, of course, and I found the trip and it just went on and on, and I also wondered if he was going to talk about the escape attempt at all! And then I found Katte's name, read that sentence, and gave up on the print and decided you could tell me the rest. <3

But look, these things happen between royals!

I mean, he's not wrong! But *some people* used that as an argument to go, "FW, you don't want to be like Philip II and Peter the Great!"

Okay, so FW then went to Wusterhausen and spend the rest of the year there...

Lol, yeah, I think somebody is trying to get a job back or at least keep his options open. (I am reminded of Pollnitz and his desire to keep his options open when talking about various princes in Europe. The Ruspanti? Pensioners of the Grand Duke!)

By contrast, his report on the bonkers Clement affair actually is pretty matter-of-factly and much as I've found it in other accounts.

Ooh, wonderful, this is one of the things I went looking for and didn't have the patience find and hoped you would find and tell us all about!

(with untrustworthy black eyes!) (also of small stature and fat! So it can't have been his looks, I guess...)

Oh, this matches the description you found in Weber a while back: "Here we get a physical description by the arresting officers who bring hin to Spandau - 'the black and brown fat gentleman in an Hungarian furcoat'." I guess he could still have been tall in that description, so good to know that his height was not what recommended him to FW!

So if that description is firsthand, from the people arresting Klement, then that backs up Fassmann's info as pretty solid.

if his account of FW breaking the "you're going to get married" news to Friederike Louise is in any way correct, the Hohenzollern called this sister of Fritz' "Louise".

Always nice as a fanfic writer to know what these people called each other!

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - up to 1730

[selenak]

Always nice as a fanfic writer to know what these people called each other!

One of the reasons why I was glad Morgenstern referred to Gundling as Paul von Gundling, thus telling us which of the two first names, Jakob Paul, he actually used.

re: skimming/skipping, I also skipped a lot of Great Northern War stuff, FW at Stralsund, that kind of thing, sorry. Incidentally, perhaps worthy of note that Fassmann consistently uses the latinate for Peter the Great - Petrus Magnus, in the correct declined case wherever he uses it, ditto Carolus for Charles of Sweden, whereas a few decades down the line a writer like Nikolai doesn't, he just uses the German version.

"Wallis" for "Wales", otoh, is used throughout the century, as in Prince of Wales. Btw, if in 1735 someone like Fassmann, who doesn't speak English and is no longer connected to someone in the Prussian government, still knows all about Team Hannover's dysfunctionality, it means these stories have hit the German scandal sheets, which is the kind of 18th century internationality for a royal father/son conflict which doesn't involve one party beheading the other party's lover that I hadn't imagined before salon.

I went looking for 1730, of course, and I found the trip and it just went on and on

This really reminded me of young AW's "My life so far" essay as referenced by Ziebura, listing as the big event of 1730 "Heinrich moved in with me". :) Seriously, cahn, right until Mannheim, this readers like a travelogue/tourist guide book!

I think somebody is trying to get a job back or at least keep his options open.

Let's not forget, Fassmann could also be betting on the fact that even if FW doesn't take him back, Fritz might after FW's death. Hence careful Crown Prince praise in the book, and lots of praise for SD, perfect mother and wife and Queen. After all, Fassmann was a member of the Academy as of 1731 (when Gundling died). (He just didn't become the boss as he expected to.) He might have counted on coming back after FW's death, and as he mentions a couple of times in the book, FW has just survived a very dangerous illness (again), i.e. concluding FW might not make it through another decade wasn't utterly far fetched.

So if that description is firsthand, from the people arresting Klement, then that backs up Fassmann's info as pretty solid.

True, as he wasn't able to consult any secret Saxon or Prussian archives. Also, he's even handed in that he describes Clement fooling three high officials in a row (Eugene, Flemming and FW), and where he guesses - that when Clement went from working for Racoczky to working for Eugene by bringing a lot of Racozky papers wsith him, he might have used a mixture of real and forged documents already to beeef his importance up and when getting away with it took it from there.

Basically Fassmann strikes me as the 18th century equivalent of a journalist willing to put in research effort but also without the narrative ability which, say, Nicolai has in his collection, and without much of the way of scruples if you recall the hatchet job he did on Gundling in another book. He must have had a considerable streak of cruelty himself.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - up to 1730

[mildred_of_midgard]

This really reminded me of young AW's "My life so far" essay as referenced by Ziebura, listing as the big event of 1730 "Heinrich moved in with me". :)

Me too, I thought of the exact same thing! Salon: the hive mind. :)

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - up to 1730

[cahn]

This really reminded me of young AW's "My life so far" essay as referenced by Ziebura, listing as the big event of 1730 "Heinrich moved in with me". :)

Heh! I didn't think of it myself, but yeah :)

I think somebody is trying to get a job back or at least keep his options open.

Let's not forget, Fassmann could also be betting on the fact that even if FW doesn't take him back, Fritz might after FW's death

Oh, yeah, I can see how that would make him... tread very carefully around the whole Katte thing.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - up to 1730

[cahn]

Heh, I was surprised FW was said to be painting farmers and not, err, soldiers. I wonder if these were tall farmers?

But look, these things happen between royals!

Awwww, wow.

Now I don't know what really happened, and nor do you, reader, and since neither of us will ever find out,

but salon has done its best

(also of small stature and fat! So it can't have been his looks, I guess...)

Hee!

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - up to 1730

[selenak]

Re: farmers, I'm torn between assuming Fassmann used "farmers" as a euphemism because he knows FW's thing about his tall soldiers gets sniggers all over Europe, or believing it's literally true and FW also painted some wholesome farmers which haven't been preserved. Wouldn't put it beyond him, but otoh if the farmers model, they don't work, which doesn't compute with thrifty FW. Whereas he has the soldiers right at hand.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - up to 1730

[cahn]

ahahahaha! I love this logic about the farmers not working if they're modeling. Whereas the soldiers might as well be modeling...

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - the end

[selenak]

With some more skipping of royal declarations, I was able to finish. You also can tell that after 1731, Fassmann is reporting hearsay again, but he's thorough, I'll give him that - he evidently uses the Berlin newspaper which Martin Sabrow also used for his Gundling biography for its various announcements about the royal family and about famous visitors. This is useful when FS visits in time to attend Fritz' engagement party, because Fassmann bothers to write down every single official engagement FS had during the three weeks he spent at the Prussian court, so if anyone ever wants to write Murder At the Wusterhausen Express with FS as Poirot, there's some good material there. Interestingly, when trying to explain why there's so much fuss about the young Duke of Lorraine, Fassmann does NOT mention "most likely future husband of MT, and thus future Emperor", he says it's because FS is related to FW via Lieselotte. (As in, Liselotte was FS' grandmother, and niece to FW's grandmother Sophie of Hannover.) I'm reminded of Stratemann mentioning FS prefered sitting at the kids' table during the festivities, and hey, who wouldn't, with FW and SD as the alternative? But Fassmann doesn't mention it, because he wasn't there, he's going by newspaper reports.

Also, unless I skipped it, which is possible, he doesn't explain why he left FW. (Stratemann, otoh, in his envoy reports explains it completely.) He's ultra discreet about that one. He defends FW's recruitment practices by royal prerogative and that the population owes it to its sovereign like it owes taxes, and no one is better to his soldiers and more careful with their lives than FW. And all other kings also draft and gangpress, without being as careful with their soldiers, so there! And Prussian soldiers learn how to have an excellent character, be clean, be god fearing and obedient, not like those evil whoring soldiers elsewhere.

Fassmann is your source for the royal pages: "There are several royal pages, as far as I recall, there are sixteen of them. These are directed by their Hofmeister and live all together at the royal palace. They are taught in all necessessary sciences, have a red uniform, and show up two times a day, always paired up, at the royal palace for their service, where they are directed towards their stations. These are all youngsters between 12 and 16 years of age. Additionally, his Royal Majesty has those pages who are always serving him and are always with him. These are somewhat stronger and more grown up than the other pages, approximately between 18 and 20 years of age, and if they behave well, they get promoted to Lieutenants thereafter."

He's also the source for the pages and the royal kids getting plenty of food. Not the exotic expensive stuff like when F1 was king, but good, season appropriate food, with lots of meat and meat soups for the royal kids! So there, doubters.

FW, model husband, faithful alone among kings, also would never allow rude speech in front of his darling wife, best and most loving of queens. Now it's not like Fassmann doesn't include stories which are less than complimentary to FW, but not in a knowing way, I don't think. For example, like Morgenstern he has the bit where FW makes the Jews of Berlin buy the boars he's hunted, ha ha ha. (Ugh, FW. And Ugh, Fassmann.) Also, FW so can be merciful! Why, there was this husband who killed his slut of a wife, and he'd have gotten the death penalty for that, but when FW heard what a slut the wife was, he pardoned the guy!

Then there's this: In the year 1728, there were six young bears at Wusterhausen. These walked around on their hind feet, and in order to make them adjust better to this, their forefeet were bound together on their backs. Moreover, all their teeth had been knocked out in order to prevent any accidents. Now, when I had been called (to Wusterhausen) in the autumn of that year, I had no idea about these animals (....) But when one evening I was in the room where his Royal Majesty used to hold court and was one of the last to leave, I suddenly was surrounded by all these little black men when I crossed the courtyard in order to get to my quarters. This confused me at first, and I didn't know what to think until I realised these weren't little devils but young bears.

Two thoughts:

a) These aren't necessarily the same bears Gundling had to cope with, since the Gundling incident happened a decade earlier, I think, but I bet those bears were treated the same way. (Which would explain how Gundling survived being locked in a room with young bears and firecrackers to frighten them.)

b) Poor bears. Teeth knocked out, forelegs tied to the back? Ugh.

When Fassmann, near the end, lists all the members of the royal family, you can tell he likes Charlotte and Friederike Louise best of all the girls, because they get more than a page each, where Wilhelmine gets just a few lines saying she's a very virtuous and god fearing (!) model of a wife now. Fritz, future King, is now a wonderful person and all the world has only good things to expect from his reign. Heinrich he hasn't seen since Heinrich was five, but he thinks this is a smart kid who would make a good future Dompropst and theologian.

FW, model father:
His Majesty could enjoy himself thoroughly when taking the young prince (AW) by his hand at Wusterhausen or in Potsdam or in their rooms and debated with him. In the evening, when the princes had to be brought to bed, he first came to his Majesty in order to wish him a good night, kissed the King's hand and said: "Good night, dearest Papa!" Then the King's Majesty kept holding his hands a good while longer, asked various questions, lifted him upwards and kissed him. But when his Royal Highness Prince Heinrich had grown a bit (from being a baby), His Royal Highness August Wilhelm had to share the post of a royal Mignon with the later. Both royal brothers got drilled as soldiers sometimes in his Royal Majesty's evenings societies by an officer in 1731, and both proved themselves able to do these exercises which of course they loved doing. They showed themselves very spirited for as long as they were allowed to remain in the evening get together, which usually lasted until they were called to the table by the King's Majesty. Now when his Royal Highness Prince Friedrich Heinrich was five years old, it happened that during his spirited and energetic jumping around his sword got between his legs, so the little boy fell down. This frightened his Royal Majesty, so he pretended to be angry and demanded the sword back from the Prince, had it taken away from him while pretending the Prince was now under arrest. Oh, that resulted in the boy crying and lamenting! The Prince kissed the King's hand and asked to be pardoned, and said: "Oh, dearest Papa! I will not do it again!" But that didn't help, the Prince had to go, and go the most Serene Lady Mother (which was his arrest), and did not get the sword returned to him until Her Majesty the Queen pretended to have asked for him to be pardoned.

Okay. Bear in mind: this is 1731. Fritz is still in Küstrin. I don't know how much Heinrich at age 5 comprehended from all that had been going on, but since he was a bright kid, the basic "Oldest Brother got arrested" principle might have sunk down. And FW pretends to have him put under arrest, and makes him go through asking for a pardon, like Big Brother had done for real that same year? L'autre moi-meme indeed.

There's also a lot about FW's good deeds for the Salzburg Protestants (giving them a new home), founding the famous Charité hospital, founding orphan houses and schools etc., all of which he did do, but good lord, this is in general a white washing/spin-meister job of the first order. I suspect Fassmann after a few years in the wilderness was short of cash and toyed with the idea of going back in the hope of getting rehired?

ETA: Lastly: Fassmann early on mentions FW being fluent in French from childhood onwards (true) and later insisting on only talking German to his children (also true and often testified) in order to make them love the language.

Now remember which language FW's children used near exclusively when grown up, and also (most of) their religious commitment in adulthood.

Fontane, when commenting on Heinrich's pretending to have forgotten his German in his old age: "One is tempted to call this the logical consequence of a childhood where German was rammed down one's throat."

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - the end

[mildred_of_midgard]

This is useful when FS visits in time to attend Fritz' engagement party, because Fassmann bothers to write down every single official engagement FS had during the three weeks he spent at the Prussian court, so if anyone ever wants to write Murder At the Wusterhausen Express with FS as Poirot, there's some good material there.

Ooh, nice! Page numbers? I have actually considered writing this fic.

And all other kings also draft and gangpress, without being as careful with their soldiers, so there!

I mean, this is true! Fritz would later draft and gangpress with the express intention of getting cannon fodder for his high-casualty battles, especially with desertion rates so high! And don't even get me started on the British.

Still not cool (moment of silence for the shepherd). Also, less importantly but hilariously, I think FW started more international incidents with his neighbors over his recruiting practices than anyone else. :P

Why, there was this husband who killed his slut of a wife, and he'd have gotten the death penalty for that, but when FW heard what a slut the wife was, he pardoned the guy!

...

For all Fritz's misogyny, his willingness to let the woman cheat as long as the man cheats first is a breath of relatively fresh air. (Misogyny still not cool, Fritz.)

Also, FASSMANN. I know you are a product of your time BUT STILL. Some people managed to be LESS AWFUL.

(Which would explain how Gundling survived being locked in a room with young bears and firecrackers to frighten them.)

Yep, makes a lot of sense.

b) Poor bears. Teeth knocked out, forelegs tied to the back? Ugh.

Yeah. Poor bears. :/

since he was a bright kid, the basic "Oldest Brother got arrested" principle might have sunk down. And FW pretends to have him put under arrest, and makes him go through asking for a pardon, like Big Brother had done for real that same year? L'autre moi-meme indeed.

ZOMG. I knew you would find all the best anecdotes here! I was not expecting a faux arrest from Heinrich's childhood while Fritz was in arrest himself. Yeah, that must have been stressful, and wow. One could work that into a fanfic. ;)

Now remember which language FW's children used near exclusively when grown up, and also (most of) their religious commitment in adulthood.

Yep, and their great interest in forbidden philosophy. FW really knew how to make his kids love things, didn't he.

"One is tempted to call this the logical consequence of a childhood where German was rammed down one's throat."

Yep! As I've recounted, I had the same violently allergic reaction to unsuccessful attempts to ram Spanish down my throat as a child.

Thank you for reading this so we didn't have to! (What a find re Heinrich's faux arrest, too.)

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - the end

[selenak]

Page numbers? I have actually considered writing this fic.

FS shows up on page 426. (BTW, FS' schedule includes dining chez Grumbkow. This made me conclude Seckendorff must have informed the Imperial court that Grumbkow had the best cook in Berlin.) (Reminder: after Grumbkow's death in 1739, SD writes to Fritz that she made FW hire Grumbkow's cook, and "since then, we dine better".)

I was not expecting a faux arrest from Heinrich's childhood while Fritz was in arrest himself.

Me neither. I mean, I was familiar with part of that story, not from Ziebura, but from that dissertation about Heinrich as a military leader which I read a year or so ago; early on when summing up his pre 7 Years War life, the author did include a story about how he stumbled over his sword as a child and how FW therefore sent him back to his mother. But without Fassmann's phrasing, there is no indication this was played out as a faux arrest/pardon seeking. Again, 5 years old kids might have a short memory, but if as we suspect Heinrich was the original source for Catt's version of FW's August 1730 homecoming (children, urged by SD plead, FW shouts, children hide, Heinrich specifically hides under the table (which makes us think he's the one narrating the story) and he can remember this stuff in 1758, he sure as hell could in 1731.

BTW, something else I was also familiar with from the dissertation is Fassmann claiming when Heinrich got out of the baby stage he shared the favourite position with AW, because Morgenstern - who only joined the court in 1736, i.e. when Ferdinand was a year older than Heinrich was in 1731 which was Fassmann's cut-off - says the exact same thing about Ferdinand, leading me to the conclusion that second favourite was always the youngest boy once he's past the toddler stage but before the point where he starts to have opinions.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - the end

[cahn]

He's also the source for the pages and the royal kids getting plenty of food. Not the exotic expensive stuff like when F1 was king, but good, season appropriate food, with lots of meat and meat soups for the royal kids! So there, doubters.

Uhhhh. Okay.

Also, FW so can be merciful! Why, there was this husband who killed his slut of a wife, and he'd have gotten the death penalty for that, but when FW heard what a slut the wife was, he pardoned the guy!

Argh, FW! And Fassmann!

(Which would explain how Gundling survived being locked in a room with young bears and firecrackers to frighten them.)

...I never thought to wonder about that! But okay, yeah!

b) Poor bears. Teeth knocked out, forelegs tied to the back? Ugh.

THIS WAS MY REACTION

Okay. Bear in mind: this is 1731. Fritz is still in Küstrin

oh. OH. OMG. Poor Heinrich! (and poor Fritz, of course!)

Fontane, when commenting on Heinrich's pretending to have forgotten his German in his old age: "One is tempted to call this the logical consequence of a childhood where German was rammed down one's throat."

...yeah, fair.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW - the end

[mildred_of_midgard]

(Which would explain how Gundling survived being locked in a room with young bears and firecrackers to frighten them.)

...I never thought to wonder about that! But okay, yeah!

I wondered about that from the beginning! Possibly because I used to sit next to a coworker who was obsessed with bears and bear maulings, so my first thought whenever Gundling or someone has an encounter with a bear is "Why aren't you dead?"

No teeth and front legs tied would do it, poor bears.

oh. OH. OMG. Poor Heinrich! (and poor Fritz, of course!)

Right? RIGHT?!

Re: Fassmann's life of FW

[luzula]

OMG, that is terrible. *sympathy* Luckily I have never had a problem with English-language scanned printed material from the 18th century being hard to read.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW

[mildred_of_midgard]

Thank you for the sympathy. *g* I just think it's unfair to have to deal with a foreign language, an unfamiliar font, *and* poor print quality in the same text. Two out of three, I could deal with, but this is just too much!

selenak continues to be a lifesaver and to have my eternal gratitude.

ETA: Come to think of it, I don't think I've had much trouble with English-language printed material either. Only German. :P Granted, I'm more sensitive to poor print quality in German, since I'm operating with a double handicap there (language and font), and obviously actual German speakers like Selena can handle the above. So maybe the stuff I've run into in English is just as bad and I can just handle it (as noted, I think I can handle any two out of the three obstacles, just not all three).

But maybe 18th century publishers in Britain just went to more trouble, and/or Google scanners have gone to more trouble to clean up where they can. ;)

(Koser's Kronprinz, thank god, has a beautiful crisp black text against a white background that every blackletter font should aspire to.)

Re: Fassmann's life of FW

[(Anonymous)]

I suspect it's mostly a question of the printing material. A book like Fassmann's would be a cheap thing, like the anonymous Katte pamphlet - which also had a horrid quality to decipher -, bad paper, smudgy printing letters - while Koser gets published more than a century later as a quality product. Remaining within the 18th century, I think something like most-likely-Voltaire's anonymous early 1750s pamphlet would presumably have a far worse quality than, say, Voltaire's subscription-paid edition of Corneille's works with Voltairian comment. Though since no German but Roman letters would be used in either case, there's one difficulty spared in any event.

Re: Fassmann's life of FW

[cahn]

...I don't think I could read that if it were in English and regular lettering! !I can make out a "Leben und" and a "Augusti An" (maybe?) and that's it. Some of that just looks like chunks of black!

Re: Fassmann's life of FW

[mildred_of_midgard]

See, I think you could, though! I can get a fair bit even with my limited knowledge of German. And one thing I learned in my linguistics studies is that the brain has a pretty astonishing ability to extrapolate from the signal in a stream of speech, written or spoken, that has a high noise-signal ratio. Which is why I'm not surprised (but deeply grateful) that a fluent speaker like selenak can make heads or tails of this, even if she has to make some educated guesses along the way.

Also, I was looking at Hanway's travel journal (you may remember he was friends with Peter and talks about Peter), published in 1750, and while I still think it's better print quality than a lot of the German publications I've seen (yes, Selena, the 1731 Katte pamphlet was unforgettable, and I've been thinking of it through this whole conversation!), I realized I *am* somewhat compensating for faint letters with my knowledge of the English language. (In other words: if it were German, I'd be annoyed; because it's English, I'm not.)

What I can read, guess, and wildly speculate about for the Fassman is this:

Jahren
Der Allerdurchlauchtigste und Gross-
machtigste König, dessen Leben und
Thaten hierinnen zu [?lesen], [?erblickte] das
Licht der Welt [?am] 15. Augusti An.
1688 und [?man] [?solte] sich [?fast] [?wu]ndern
[?das] [...][?chrono]logi bey derselben Zeit [..]cht [?et..]
[...] [?befand] [...]viret, [...]

The all-illustrious and most powerful king whose life and deeds are contained herein, beheld the light of the world on August 15 Anno 1688, and [then Mildred starts to lose the plot].

It's not nothing, and you can see how I got bits and pieces while flipping through! But you can also see how quickly I decided to pass it over to the all-illustrious and most powerful Selena. ;)

Interestingly, I just realized Wikipedia gives his birthdate as August 14. I swear that looks like a 5, though.

Also, my brain keeps trying to fill in "am" before the date, but my eyes do not see an 'm' there. Maybe there's a word that means "the night before" but is much shorter than Vorabend. Anything is possible if you don't know the language and it's this smudged!

Re: Fassmann's life of FW

[cahn]

Woooow. That is sure something!