Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 44

[cahn]

Not only are these posts still going, there is now (more) original research going on in them deciphering and translating letters in archives that apparently no one has bothered to look at before?? (Which has now conclusively exonerated Fritz's valet/chamberlain Fredersdorf from the charge that he was dismissed because of financial irregularities and died shortly thereafter "ashamed of his lost honor," as Wikipedia would have it. I'M JUST SAYING.)

Comments

Re: Archive updates

[mildred_of_midgard]

... now I'm waiting for it to be 950 pages of Karl Ernst Reinhard's financial records and medical bills. ;)

Lol, you had the same thought as me! No, the good news is they did a breakdown by signature, and almost 40% of it (as measured by height of the stacks of papers) is the Keith family correspondence.

10%: Papiere zur Familie von Keith 1757-1774
20%: Familiennachrichten, Bestallungen, Korrespondenzen, Rechnungssachen, Kuriosa usw. zur Familie von Keith
33%: Der Nachlaß des Freiherrn von Keith 1764 - 1823
37%: Korrespondenzen aus der Familie von Keith

Now that 33% is subject to being medical bills and financial records. :P Though I have to say, Engel's dissertation says he doesn't know what happened to Knobelsdorff's library after it passed into Peter's possession, and I would love to be able to email him and tell him I found out!

Also, if the memoirs *are* anywhere in there, they're probably in that 10%, which means they're probably not as long as, say, Wilhelmine's memoirs. But I'll take whatever he wrote, and I have my fingers crossed for the long shot that they survived!

More seriously, I'm still amazed that "Nachlass Peter Keith" is a thing that turned up in an archive. Can't wait to see what's in there!

I know, I'm so glad that one 19th century scholar researching the Knyphausens decided to quote one letter from Fritz to Peter and also record where he found the letter! (I am especially grateful to him for that second part.)