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

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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

mildred_of_midgard

More Peter Keith findings.

While editing my essay, I noticed a bit of trivia: both Peter and Hans Hermann had a younger brother (half-brother in Katte's case) who was their parents' first son born after FW became king in 1713, and who was named Friedrich Wilhelm. Georg Friedrich Wilhelm von Keith, born 1713, and Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig von Katte, born 1721 (one of the fratricidal dueling Katte brothers).

Also, since I like to keep an eye on how often these poor women give birth, I notice Katte's mother was giving birth in 1704, 1705, and 1706 before dying in 1706.

His stepmother gets more spaced out births in 1714, 1718, 1721, 1725. Seems nice, but of course, we don't know if she was miscarrying every year.

Peter's mother must have had an iron constitution. I don't have dates for his older siblings, but I know he was the fourth child in 1711, and then she had children five through seven in 1712, 1713, and 1714. Oof!

Ooh, speaking of brothers! I was trying to find out how old Peter's mother was (I only have a death date), to try to extrapolate about children one through three, and I found a 1786 historian saying that of Peter and Ariane's sons, only one is still living, Carl Ernst Reinhardt. You may remember that the two brothers show up in the Berlin address books after going to university, and then the younger one, Friedrich Ludwig, disappears, never to be seen again in any records we could find. We suspected he died, but we couldn't be sure he hadn't moved away or decided to leave public life.

Well, if he disappears after 1764 and is confirmed (with at least reasonable confidence--this author could be wrong, even though he was a contemporary) dead in 1786, he *probably* died when he disappeared from the address books, sometime between 1764 and 1765. Though I suppose he could have been sickly, left public service, and lingered for a few years, but he almost definitely died before age 41, and probably around age 19-21. :(

You may also recall that per the baptism record Cahn found that he was baptized "en chambre" because of "maladie". He may have always been sickly, rallied enough to go to university and enter public service, but didn't live very long. Or he had two unrelated health problems, or fell off his horse and broke his neck, who knows. But poor guy. And poor Ariane, probably losing first her husband and then her younger son less than 10 years later.

Anyway, mystery...if not solved, then at least cleared up a little! Okay, off to update the essay with this new info.

ETA: 1786 author's take on Peter is interesting. First, his explanation of 1730: "The preferential favor in which Peter stood with the crown prince of the time became so dangerous, due to the domestic conflicts between father and son, that he left Prussian service and went into Portuguese service." Not exactly what happened, but interesting to see what stories were going around!

And, aww: Keith appears in a section called "Of the great men that the Prussian state lost through their deaths," and the author lists a bunch of men and says of them that "they were torn from the state by illness, and their merits preserve the most enduring memory for them." Well, it may not be 49,000 years, or the consummation of all things, yet, but I still remember you, Peter!

Another ETA: I forgot to mention, when we first turned up Friedrich Ludwig's baptismal record, we speculated that the "maladie" might have been Ariane's; but from my reading on Cunegonde's kidnapping, at least in that part of Germany, it was normal for the midwife to take the baby to the church for baptism, while the mother stayed home to recover. Given how hard childbirth is and especially was, and traditions of lying-in, I wouldn't be surprised if Friedrich Ludwig would normally have been carried to his baptism by someone other than his mother, while she stayed in bed.

All of which is to say I'm reasonably sure that the malady in question was his, not hers. And given that it was August and not even winter, the fact that it wasn't considered safe to carry him to church must mean he was pretty sick/weak. :/

Edited Date: 2022-11-24 06:33 pm (UTC)

From:

selenak

Friedrich Wilhelms born after FW's ascension to the throne: on that note, I don't know whether I ever pointed this out to you, but I was recently reminded that Lehndorff's first born son (who then tragically dies as a baby in the 7 Years War, to be followed by various siblings) was named by him Friedrich Ahasverus Heinrich, which is the most Lehndorffian thing to do....

Katte's poor mother. I mean, not everyone was MT (and unimpressed with her ministers pleading vacations when she worked for all but two days or so of her pregnancies)!

Disappearing Friedrich Ludwig Keith: I've been meaning to ask - while it's always obvious where the Friedrich, Wilhelm and Heinrich, and even the Georg in everyone's names probably hail from, where do we think the occasional Ludwig (including among the names of "our" Heinrich) comes from? It would be ooc for FW, surely, to do a homage to the French king?

it was normal for the midwife to take the baby to the church for baptism, while the mother stayed home to recover.

I'm reminded also that Lehndorff took the babies of his valets to church to be baptized. And Wilhelmine and Fritz stood in, respectively, for AW's and Heinrich's actual godparents, carrying their baby siblings to church and back during the baptizing ceremony.

Fritz: And the brat cried all the time! #foreverheadcanon

So presumably if you were reasonably sure the baby would live, you asked your boss (i.e. the Lehndorff's valet case), or, if you were royalty, you got yourself some high ranking godparents but had your kids standing in for them at the actual ceremony. Someone like Peter who married the daughter of a noble family would, for a healthy child, surely have had a noble godparent at hand?

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Friedrich Ahasverus Heinrich, which is the most Lehndorffian thing to do....

Hee! But it's worth reminding

cahn that Lehndorff *also* had Heinrich in his name: Ernst Ahasverus Heinrich Lehndorff, so family tradition as well.

Just like little Friedrich Ludwig/Frideric Louis von Keith was presumably named after godfather Fritz *and* maternal grandfather Friedrich Ernst zu Innhausen und Knyphausen (no, these people are really, really not creative).

And, lest we forget, the least creative family of all, the Reuss, where naming your son Heinrich is obligatory. "The House of Reuss practises a unique system of naming and numbering the male members of the family, every one of whom for centuries has borne the name "Heinrich", followed by a Roman numeral."

where do we think the occasional Ludwig (including among the names of "our" Heinrich) comes from? It would be ooc for FW, surely, to do a homage to the French king?

George I, SD's dad, was named Georg Ludwig. He shows up in some of the books I read on the Hanover family as such (or George Louis), in order to distinguish him from all the other Georgs. Just as his son, George II, often shows up as Georg(e) August(us).

So I assume that at least in FW & SD's descendants, the name goes back to G1.

Speaking of names, a neat connection between the book I was reading on the history of the Hohenzollerns (which I have yet to finish but still intend to--it will get more interesting as we move forward in time and records become less sparse and more full of shenanigans), and the podcast I was listening to, was:

1. Friedrich is one of the favorite names of the Hohenstaufen emperors.
2. Friedrich is one of the favorite names of the Hohenzollerns in Brandenburg.
3. The Hohenstaufen were from Swabia.
4. The Hohenzollerns started out in Swabia, expanded to Franconia, then to Brandenburg.

So our Fritz's name and the names of Friedrich Barbarossa and your fave Friedrich II (stupor mundi), all come from Friedrich being a popular name in Swabia almost a thousand years ago, as far as I can tell.

It's also cool seeing the Babenbergers keep using the name Leopold, attested all the way back to the 10th century, and being margraves of Austria, later dukes of Austria, and then, when they die out, being replaced by the Habsburgs, who also continue to use the name Leopold for centuries.

Someone like Peter who married the daughter of a noble family would, for a healthy child, surely have had a noble godparent at hand?

For the non-healthy child Friedrich Ludwig, we have the list of godparents, helpfully identified by

felis when

cahn turned up the record:

Now, godfathers and -mothers! Male ones are Fritz (! although not too surprising with that name) and Frederic Henry de Cheusses, who was the Danish envoy in Berlin from 1743 to 1746 and came from a Huguenot family, just like the preacher. (He's mentioned in the Political Correspondence a couple of times and was envoy to Russia afterwards.)

ETA: Friedrich de Cheusses - the 1745 address calendar says he lived next to the Ilgen's house, which was the family of Peter's mother-in-law and might be where the connection comes from. Also, I had to smile at this description in his wiki record: He did not excel in excellent ability or rich initiative, but he looked good, was very reliable and especially extremely careful. These were precisely the qualities needed opposite Frederick II of Prussia and later opposite Pyotr Bestushev.

Female: Peter's mother-in-law, who apparently wasn't present, as it says she was represented by Ariane's younger sisters, Hyma Maria (the one who married Hertzberg later, but not yet) and Hedwig Charlotte.

Some supporting evidence for asking your boss: From my studies of Count Rottembourg and his estates at Masevaux, I know he acted as godfather to at least two of the people who managed the estates (not servants, but like bailiffs and stewards and whatnot). The most famous of his godchildren, Conrad-Alexandre Gérard, who was named Conrad-Alexandre after Rottembourg himself, ended up following in his footsteps and going into the diplomatic service. He was sent to the United States by France, and became the first ambassador to the newly founded (and still fighting for independence) United States. There's a portrait of Gérard in Philadelphia, and a college named after him in Masevaux.

While Rottembourg died when he was a little kid, and thus can't have directly mentored him in his career, I wouldn't be surprised if there were connections that Gérard senior was able to make use of (France at the time being one big network where you milked your connections for all they were worth, because there was almost no other way to advance).