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: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[selenak]

Okay, here we go, my attempt, with the preface that "Zeitung" in the 18th century parlance doesn't mean newspaper as it does in today's German, it means "news". If anyone ever reads Schiller's Don Carlos in German, it's used there, for example, in this sense. Also, I'm substituting modern depression for 18th century melancholy. And I'm guessing erXüXde stands for some version of "exultation", the French word meaning the same in English. And finally, the last line uses the third person "Er" address which I'm substituting with the second person address common in English.


I don't know anymore whether there have been news about my return until now; I guess it won't happen until the end of November or early December.

The creditors will have to wait until my return, then everyone shall be paid up to the last dime.

I can't escape my depression and I guess I'll carry it with me for years to come.

Regarding the construction, all is well; but I'm so full of anger, burdened with work, affairs and worries that I can't take joy from it but look with very indifferent eyes on it.

Why don't you come here and we'll see whether two can console themselves better than one.

Okay, were it not for the line about the "bau", which made me associate the various building projects of the 1740s, not solely but notably Sanssouci, I would bet on this being a letter from Crown Prince Fritz, not King Fritz, but then again, when Fritz is Crown Prince Fritz Peter is first FW's page and then a part of the Wesel garnison, and in neither case, he can't just show up at will to wherever place Fritz is. So this has to be written when Fritz is already King, and FW is no longer a factor. Unless, wait, we're talking simply about the difference between Potsdam and Berlin. (I'm recalling here how deeply-in-love Lehndorff treats Heinrich going from Berlin to nearby Potsdam with big Bro as the occasion for bursting into tears as if it's the biggest tragedy ever.) So maybe Peter is in Berlin and Fritz is in Potsdam, or the other way around, in which case Peter can make it there and back without getting into trouble with FW. But that still doesn't explain the "Bau".

So: It's definitely a personal "I'm lonely, I'm depressed, come and console me" kind of summons assuming a friendly relationship between the two correspondants. The use of German also points to young Fritz rather than older Fritz, but that's not an absolute rule (see Fredersdorf). If it's written by Crown Prince Fritz, it means enough to Peter that he carried it with him through all the exile years. If it's written by King Fritz, it means there must have been some type of later years event a bit similar to your story where Fritz goes beyond nice monarch, respectful if distant subject and starts to treat Peter like something more of a friend again.

ETA: Creditors: if it's Crown Prince Fritz, this is obviously a concern since he's getting more and more into debt, and of course both Peter and Katte later get blamed for enabling this. If it's King Fritz, he could be talking about Peter's own need for money.

Daughter of ETA: End of November, early December fits with the time of FW leaving Wusterhausen and moving with the family to Berlin. Okay, now I'm favouring "it's from Crown Prince Fritz" as an explanation.

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Quick note typing on my phone: thank you, and you went through almost the exact same thought process I did! Except I didn't think of Berlin/Potsdam/Wusterhausen, which makes a lot of sense.

If it is crown prince Fritz, though, how do you interpret the building?

I can share the text later today, so Felis can see if there's a different way to read that word.

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[selenak]

Bau: on second thought, could the word have been „Buch“ instead? Because Fritz not being able to enjoy a longed for book because he‘s so angry and depressed would make a lot of sense for Crown Prince Fritz. Otherwise, if he really means Bau as in construction or building, and it‘s Crown Prince Fritz, I‘m stumped. Another inside joke?

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

This is what I'm reading as "bau". I've checked his 'b's, 'a's, and 'u's elsewhere in the text, and it's definitely consistent with how he makes them all.



That's not to say it couldn't be something else, but I'm having a hard time reading it as anything else, including "Buch".

felis, I also give you the word I couldn't decipher and didn't want to spend an hour on, because I have 1500 pages, not counting the Prussian delivery from last month:



I orginally wanted to make it "Ermüde" (partly due to context), but decided there were too many strokes, given that I didn't recognize "Ermüde" as a grammatically correct noun anyway. But if you take the last stroke as the first part of the 'd', which I now recognize it could be, because there is no loop on the 'd'...I'm not sure how that would fit with Selena's translation, but it could be.

Who knows! Over to the Germans, I going back to my ginormous backlog. :D

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[selenak]

Second word, now that I see it - misspelled "Freude", maybe, the first letter could be an F?

The earlier one does look like "bau", not "buch", true.

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Ah, yes, there you are! The first letter could totally be "f", and I can read "Freude" for that. I'm constantly fighting my tendency to read letters as what they look like to my Latin-alphabet-trained eyes, and sometimes I overcompensate.

Still with the "bau", though! *ponders*

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

After much pondering, could "bau" be not a construction in progress, but making arrangements to have a place to store the secret library? It feels like a stretch, but I don't know how many buildings could bring Fritz even hypothetical pleasure ca 1727-1729.

But if it's the 1750s, why on earth is Fritz "one alone"? Doesn't he have other people he can summon? And if they were this close all of a sudden, why didn't Lehndorff notice and tell us? He may fail in his Katte-reporting duties, but he always gives us the Team Keith gossip!

So I'm really leaning toward the Crown Prince dating, if only I could figure out what the building was. (The Crown Prince theory is what I had in mind when I said the ordering of the papers doesn't necessarily mean anything, but I didn't want to influence you, Selena, before I'd heard your own opinions.)

I really wanted to track down the Borck letters from that period and compare the paper, handwriting, etc., but I can't find them in the archive catalog. Curses!

Or perhaps I should say I can't find them *yet*. For the other key component to being an amateur historian, besides being shameless about asking for favors, is being an absolute terrier when you want something!

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[selenak]

After much pondering, could "bau" be not a construction in progress, but making arrangements to have a place to store the secret library?

Could be, absolutely. I may be influenced by someone, I forgot who, in a later era referring to his home as his "Fuchsbau", not as his "nest" as I think the English would have it. And that would make sense. After all, Peter probably was part of the buying books and collecting them for Fritz in one place operation.

And if they were this close all of a sudden, why didn't Lehndorff notice and tell us? He may fail in his Katte-reporting duties, but he always gives us the Team Keith gossip!

Absolutely, he would have been delighted, and at the very latest in his grand retrospective on Peter would have mentioned it instead of saying that near the end, Fritz was favoring Peter again by such things as letting him escort Amalie etc. - summoning him for the pleasure of his company alone would have been a far stronger mark of favor.

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[felis]

re: Borcke letters - those would be in French, though, so maybe not the best to compare the handwriting. Then again, it would give an idea of how practiced his writing was at the time. Because I feel like the handwriting of teenage!Fritz would have to be different even from 22-year-old Fritz in 1734. (His 1728 letter to Wilhelmine looks very much like teenage writing, but I'm not sure how much he was actually trying to imitate her handwriting in that one tbh. Kind of looks like it.)

By the way, did you compare this letter to the few facsimiles of Fredersdorff letters Richter included or just the transcriptions for spelling? Because if it doesn't quite match the 40s/50s handwriting in those, that could also be a hint for an earlier date. (As is the German, tbh. Because we know Peter wrote to Fritz in French in later years, so I don't see why that would change or why Fritz would answer in German all of a sudden.)

re: secret library - didn't that exist in 1727 already, with Duhan's help?

Honestly, this whole letter is really curious to me. Each sentence on its own makes perfect sense for one point in time or other, but all of them together like this? Conundrum.

Also, does the "chagrin, affairs, work, and worries" line strike anyone else as more King than pre-1730 Crown Prince? I mean, I could see him writing that even as a sixteen-year-old, but somehow, it seems more like something King Fritz might list in this way. Especially the work part - I'd expect Crown Prince to mention drill or hunting or something like that, especially if he's writing from Wusterhausen. (And keeping it vague in case of interception is pretty unlikely, given the creditors talk. Then again, the creditors seem more like Crown Prince Fritz indeed, because I'd expect King Fritz to simply order Fredersdorf for example to pay for things that need paying when he's away.)

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

re: Borcke letters - those would be in French, though, so maybe not the best to compare the handwriting.

I was convinced they were in German because the volume I read them in was in German, and in 1881 they tended to publish French letters in French...but of course now that I look closely, I'm reading a more recent translation, not just a more modern printing.

Well, yes, that would not help much with the handwriting...but at least the paper would tell us what Fritz had available to him in Wusterhausen in 1727, and you could compare that to Fredersdorf letters in the early 1750s.

(As is the German, tbh. Because we know Peter wrote to Fritz in French in later years, so I don't see why that would change or why Fritz would answer in German all of a sudden.)

The German is and always has been a huge pointer to Crown Prince Fritz for me.

The *only* reason I can think of for King Fritz switching to German would be that he and Peter early got into the habit young of German for personal, intimate conversation, and French for things that went through secretaries or were meant to be read aloud. Peter's other correspondence with Fritz went through secretaries, whereas this one obviously didn't. To paraphrase Selena's AP when he was talking about the Fredersdorf letters: "This letter wasn't written to be trendy!"

But...Fritz can be pretty intimate in French with all his other correspondents! And Fredersdorf wasn't fluent enough in French for a correspondence, so Fritz didn't have a choice. He was also known to allow business correspondence with ministers who didn't know (enough) French, but if he had a choice, I think he pretty consistently chose French.

There is Gröben, who apparently corresponded with Fritz in French and German, but I don't know if there's precedent for King Fritz doing that. If there were, though, it might very well be someone Fritz got used to corresponding with in German because they knew each other way back when.

By the way, did you compare this letter to the few facsimiles of Fredersdorff letters Richter included or just the transcriptions for spelling?

I thought about comparing the facsimiles for handwriting, but I haven't had time yet (it's 1500 pages of material! plus I've gone back to the last Prussian order!), and also what I really want to compare is the paper. But yes, there are plans to do this.

re: secret library - didn't that exist in 1727 already, with Duhan's help?

I think so? But did it always live in the same building? I don't know/remember. Maybe Fritz and Peter were trying to find a new place for it, especially as I assume it kept getting bigger over the years?

Also, does the "chagrin, affairs, work, and worries" line strike anyone else as more King than pre-1730 Crown Prince? I mean, I could see him writing that even as a sixteen-year-old, but somehow, it seems more like something King Fritz might list in this way.

Yes! I had that exact same thought before I even handed the letter over for opinions! I remember thinking, "I know young Fritz was overworked even as a teenager, Seckendorff commented on it, but the 'affairen' and 'arbeit' are not what I remember young Fritz really objecting to! That sounds more like a workaholic monarch with too many responsibilities, because he doesn't know how to delegate."

But the "I guess I'll be dragging it around for years"...well, adult!Fritz might write this in a moment of depression, but it does sound more like a teenager who's just getting used to it, than an adult who's been living with intermittent depression for 20-30 years?

Honestly, this whole letter is really curious to me. Each sentence on its own makes perfect sense for one point in time or other, but all of them together like this? Conundrum.

Yes!

What makes me lean toward Crown Prince is the whole idea of Fritz writing intimately to Peter, plus in German: even if they did revive the friendship in the 1750s, I would expect King Fritz to write in French.

Especially the work part - I'd expect Crown Prince to mention drill or hunting or something like that, especially if he's writing from Wusterhausen. (And keeping it vague in case of interception is pretty unlikely, given the creditors talk. Then again, the creditors seem more like Crown Prince Fritz indeed, because I'd expect King Fritz to simply order Fredersdorf for example to pay for things that need paying when he's away.)

Yeah, unless maybe it's Peter's creditors. Now, the only debt Peter had ever gotten into, as of 1750, according to him, was the one he was asking Fritz's help with in early 1750, and it is the early 1750s that the letter...but no, that doesn't work, Fritz had already given him money in the summer, which we know about thanks to Hanway.

The order in which the dates of these letters are placed, btw, are: 1749, 1749, 1753, undated German letter, 1752, 1755, 1753, 1756, 1756, 1772, 1774, undated German letter referring to "Frid. Wilhelm II".

So someone either found them or put them in roughly (but not strictly) chronological order--but that person didn't necessarily know when the Fritz letter dated from any more than we do.

Now that you've cross-checked Stratemann and Dessauer, someone needs to cross-check Rödenbeck for 1749-1755: was Fritz ever away for that long at that time of year?

The other thing I originally thought of in connection with this letter, but dismissed it, was September 1753, when Lehndorff says Fritz gave Peter a gracious invitation to join him at camp--but after reading Ziebura, I revised my original reading of that as an invitation to join Fritz in particular. It was an invitation-only, top-secret camp to practice military maneuvers, to which no foreigners were allowed to come. So my reading since learning that has been "Hey, Peter, you're allowed to come watch us practice," not, "Peter, I want to see you in particular."

And Lehndorff says Fritz was in a good mood and being extraordinarily generous with his officers. So he's not singling Peter out here. And if Lehndorff's commenting that the letter was "most gracious", he's probably heard it read aloud, and it was one of those letters in French that was meant to be shared.

Now, maybe in 1753 Fritz was in a good mood and Peter managed to use lessons learned to get on his good side, and some time in the future, either later in 1753, or in 1754 or 1755, Fritz was having a bleak moment and summoned Peter, and maybe because it was so personal, Peter didn't bruit it about that Fritz was summoning him for personal company...I need to check Rödenbeck for this theory.

But 1729 with an unknown "building" that could be a library, and some surprising objection to "affairs, work, and worries" instead of hunting and drilling and not getting to read books, still makes far more sense to me.

I'm just so very puzzled.

Okay, Rödenbeck cross-check for 1753-1755:

1753: Wilhelmine comes to visit in October. Fritz is switching back and forth between Potsdam and Berlin throughout October and November. Does not look like a good candidate.

1754: Fritz mostly in Potsdam until December 20, with only brief visits to Berlin. Could be, with Peter living in Berlin.

1755: Very similar to 1754. Also, Rödenbeck notes that in late October, Fritz wrote to Voltaire. Now, I did say, "Why didn't King Fritz just summon whoever? How is it 'one alone'?" but even as I wrote that, I thought, 1753-1755, the most likely years for Peter to be in favor, were after a lot of deaths and Frexits, and Fredersdorf is increasingly sick and also married. (Maybe Fritz is depressed about the second part, says the person who re-read "Prussian Doll" last week. :P)

So honestly, 1753-1755 fits pretty well with Fritz being away from Berlin until late November/early December, whereas 1728-1729 do not--I felt like FW usually returned a bit earlier than late November/early December, and Felis's and my findings back that up.

But yeah, why can't King Fritz handle creditors from Potsdam? It would be kind of hard to run his kingdom if he couldn't!

Every aspect of this letter fits either 1727-1728 or 1750-1755, but they're a little too evenly divided for my tastes!

What building projects were going on in 1753-1755?

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Oh! Another thing I've been meaning to ask about: "er". Is that how a 16-yo crown prince would address his boyfriend in an intimate letter? A 40-yo monarch addressing his ex with whom he seems to be getting friendly again, yes, absolutely, but a teenage boy? You guys tell me.

Crown Prince Fritz "du"s Gröben in the intimate letters, and then switches to "Er" for the later letters where he's annoyed and a lot more formal. But he's 1) an adult, 2) annoyed. Affectionate and lonely teenage Fritz "er"ing Peter when asking for comfort?

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[selenak]

Depends how early in their relationship this is, I'd say. Also, don't forget, both Gröben and Fredersdorf aren't really good comparisons. Frederdorf because everyone is du-ing their valet, and Gröben because he and Fritz are in the army together, where, again, "du" shows up more often. Plus: the main language Fritz thinks in is French, and there, he's vous-ing even his beloved sister, so the formal mode of address does not signal the same kind of distance it would to us.

Outlier question, though: did you make the identification that this letter was written by Fritz, or did the archive? I mean, is it signed "Friech" or any variation thereof? Because while I don't think Peter would have kept a German letter from SOME GUY... hey, just imagine we're chewing on this and all the time it's not a Fritz note but one from, say, Knobelsdorff!

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Well, I did, and I definitely agonized over the identification as Fritz! It's signed "Fri..i.h", and the Gröben letters have signatures with clearly visible "d"s and other letters, *but*, the "F" and "h" look so much alike I went with it. It may be a different Friedrich, but "Georg Wenzeslaus" it is not. ;)

It would also have to be the only letter signed "Frederick" from a different Frederick in a stack of 11 consecutive letters signed "Federic", "Fr", "Fri...i.h", and "Friedrich", all of which I'm taking to be from our Fritz (who is more likely to sign using just his first name than most people?)

I will screenshot and upload the signatures from Gröben, Richter, and Peter letters for comparison in a bit, so you can see for yourself.

Plus I noticed "dahr" for "da" in both this letter and Richter--but I will start going over spelling and handwriting comparisons in more detail shortly, and report back!

(Was "guht" a normal 18th century spelling? Fritz in the Gröben letters tends to put his "h"s before his "t"s, where I'm used to seeing them after the "t" in pre-spelling reform German, and we've got "guht" here, all through the Gröben letters, and all through Richter...but maybe that was normal?)

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Okay, more of a proper reply.

I also thought the intimacy and choice of German fit way more with Crown Prince Fritz than King Fritz, but I also couldn't make sense of the "bau" or of Peter being able to travel at will!

However, your point about autumn being Wusterhausen time is an excellent one: for Fritz being especially miserable, for Peter being separated from them (minimal servants--as we saw, there was no place for anyone to sleep anyway!), and for Peter being able to sneak out and come visit.

And while "Melancholie" and a desire for the company of others would fit him for his entire life, the tone really reminds me of a letter he wrote to his friend Lt. Borcke in 1727 from Wusterhausen, when Borcke was sick, saying, "I admit that I ought to amuse you with this letter, but rather than give pleasure to others, I need amusement myself to banish my melancholy."

The "bau" is still confusing, and given that Fritz is putting Peter in charge of sculpting in 1755, would make far, far more sense in the 1750s, but in total, it's still much less confusing than how King Fritz could have had a relationship like this with Peter and Lehndorff not tell us about it. ;)

If it's written by Crown Prince Fritz, it means enough to Peter that he carried it with him through all the exile years.

<3333 It also apparently meant enough that he kept it during the page years, despite it containing enough evidence of debts and sneaking out to incriminate both him and Fritz!

In conclusion, if I were going to date this, I would tentatively date it to 1727-1728. 1729 is a possibility, but Peter and Fritz were trying to escape from Potsdam in November 1729, and this doesn't seem consistent with that. Of course, Fritz possibly means, "Come visit me so we can talk about things I don't dare put in writing," so 1729 is not ruled out.

It would be worth cross-checking Stratemann for when Fritz and FW left Wusterhausen in 1727-1729. I will add that to my increasingly long list of things to do!

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[selenak]

In conclusion, if I were going to date this, I would tentatively date it to 1727-1728. 1729 is a possibility, but Peter and Fritz were trying to escape from Potsdam in November 1729, and this doesn't seem consistent with that. Of course, Fritz possibly means, "Come visit me so we can talk about things I don't dare put in writing," so 1729 is not ruled out.

I'm with you there. 1729 isn't impossible, but 1728 is more likely. I mean, Fritz had a bad time in Dear Old Wusterhausen in 1727, 1728, 1729, so that criteria doesn#t give much away by itself, but....

However, your point about autumn being Wusterhausen time is an excellent one: for Fritz being especially miserable, for Peter being separated from them (minimal servants--as we saw, there was no place for anyone to sleep anyway!), and for Peter being able to sneak out and come visit.

*nods* The minimum staff factor really makes Wusterhausen the choice over Potsdam palace or the Berlin town palace, so page!Peter is not required to attend FW, and having been there, Wusterhausen is close enough that you can go there on horseback from Berlin and still be back before the next morning (if Peter has to report to whoever is in charge of the pages).

It would be worth cross-checking Stratemann for when Fritz and FW left Wusterhausen in 1727-1729.

That sounds like a good idea but alas I really don't have the time right now. felis? But I did think of another possible way to exclude one of the years - when was it that FW was really really sick in the late 20s? Because presumably once that happened, he'd been moved to Berlin to have more doctors able to attend him?

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[felis]

Stratemann's account only starts in 1728, but from FW's letters to Old Dessauer, we have the following dates:

1727: in Wusterhausen from September 2nd until at least October 23rd (which covers both Freilinghausen's visit in September and Francke's in October), then there's an inconvenient gap, next letter is December 30th from Berlin

ETA: By the way, do we know for sure that Peter was already FW's page in 1727?

1728: letters from Wusterhausen September 10th and October 14th (this one includes plans to visit Dessau October 27th), letter from Potsdam November 4th, then back and forth between Berlin and Potsdam until he's in Wusterhausen again December 14th

Stratemann mentions that FW and Fritz returned to Potsdam middle of October and that FW went on a journey to Dessau/Halle/Sachsen afterwards

ETA2: Consulting our chronology tells me that they must have returned pretty much immediately after the Hubertus disaster, which was October 19th. (And then during the following trip, the Antisobres were founded.)

/sidenote: November 24th letter from Berlin has this: You'll be so good as to sent ["Keut"] back to me, he is supposed to go before the two Doctors [?], tell him he has order to order the relay horses. The footnote identifies Keut as Keith, a.k.a. Peter - if so, that would mean he accompanied FW on his journey and stayed behind in Dessau for some reason.

1729: Wusterhausen letters September 30th and October 11th, Stratemann says both FW and Fritz visit Berlin for a marriage October 13th/14th, then back to Wusterhausen, letter from Potsdam October 25th (Stratemann: FW only left Wusterhausen for a couple of days, then went back and he and the rest of the family return mid-November), Wusterhausen letters from November 1st and 16th, Stratemann say FW and Fritz visited Frankfurt on the 14th, then returned to Potsdam and stayed there for weeks, letters are from Potsdam for most of December

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

I was going to do this myself, but I had forgotten about the Dessauer letters, so I'm glad you were on it!

/sidenote: November 24th letter from Berlin has this: You'll be so good as to sent ["Keut"] back to me, he is supposed to go before the two Doctors [?], tell him he has order to order the relay horses. The footnote identifies Keut as Keith, a.k.a. Peter - if so, that would mean he accompanied FW on his journey and stayed behind in Dessau for some reason.

I remember this from Kloosterhuis, and he's not 100% sure it's Peter, but it may be. There are a bunch of Keiths, after all!

ETA: By the way, do we know for sure that Peter was already FW's page in 1727?

We do not. We don't have a start date. The only pre-1730 mentions we have are the letter you found, and a June 1729 letter from FW asking an officer in Magdeburg to send "your page Keith" to Potsdam. Kloosterhuis says that *if* 1728 Keith refers to Peter, 1729 Keith is probably the younger brother.

But looking through his memoirs, they say what Formey said: that Peter's father introduced him to FW and FW took him as page. They're so short that maybe he elided over working his way up as page from someone else, but if they can be taken at face value, then 1728 Keith is probably Peter, and thus he may have been around in 1728 or even 1727.

(Yes, I will share the memoirs at some point, I'm just trying to do a first pass through the whole thing to get used to the handwriting and to put off the most difficult spots until the end, and I keep getting side-tracked by things like "which Robert Keith is this?" and "what is up with that letter in German anyway?"

letter from Potsdam October 25th (Stratemann: FW only left Wusterhausen for a couple of days, then went back and he and the rest of the family return mid-November), Wusterhausen letters from November 1st and 16th, Stratemann say FW and Fritz visited Frankfurt on the 14th, then returned to Potsdam and stayed there for weeks, letters are from Potsdam for most of December

Yeah, this is what I found, and it's consistent with Fritz already being in Potsdam in November in time to escape. Now, maybe he didn't *know* he'd be returning so soon when he wrote the letter and was depressed at the thought of being stuck there more, but it's more evidence for 1729 being the wrong year.

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

That sounds like a good idea but alas I really don't have the time right now.

Oh, I had meant me! Cross-checking is a favorite activity for detectives who can read small amounts of Fraktur at a time but not 6 volumes of Nicolai in one week. :P I had already had a quick skim and found much of what Felis did, and made a note to come back to it later.

But I see Felis is not only on it, but has gone above and beyond with remembering the Old Dessauer letters too!

I'm with you there. 1729 isn't impossible, but 1728 is more likely. I mean, Fritz had a bad time in Dear Old Wusterhausen in 1727, 1728, 1729, so that criteria doesn#t give much away by itself, but....

Yeah, 1727 is when he writes from Wusterhausen to Borcke about his melancholy, and 1728 is the infamous forced drunkenness episode.

Now it's possible he hit the breaking point in 1729, this letter reflects that, and when he came back to Potsdam he was like, "Peter, we gotta get out of here now!" But it doesn't sound like someone who's already planning to run away and has an escape route planned with the person he's writing to.

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[cahn]

Why don't you come here and we'll see whether two can console themselves better than one.

I mean... we are all reading this in the Most Shippy Way possible, right?? :D

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[selenak]

Naturally. I immediately had the head canon that another reason why Peter keeps this letter till his death through all the toils and troubles of exile etc. isn't just that it expresses emotional closeness but that after this summons, they had sex for the first time. :)

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Oh, speaking of letters he did and didn't hang on to, it just occurred to me that what we *don't* have are the 1750 nice letter from Fritz and the 1753 one with the invitation to camp. The ones that were presumably in French and read aloud.

Interesting.

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

When I saw your comment, I marked it to reply to with, "Well, Peter certainly is reading it in the Most Shippy Way possible, which is why he hung on to it for so long!"

And then I read further and found Selena had anticipated me. :)

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Okay, headcanon that the reason Fritz has to switch to German is that "Why don't you come here and we'll see whether two can console themselves better than one" was code going all the way back to the 1720s. :P

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Lol, it just occurred to me that when we put together our Frederician pop playlist, the song I chose for teenage Fritz/Peter was "Come Crying to Me."

WELL.

:D

*puts the song on again*

Re: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

Oh, if it is King Fritz writing, I hope my headcanon about Peter and Ariane having an understanding about m/m affairs is true!

Or else we have our explanation of why Peter was so discreet that Lehndorff never picked up on it.

Or, you know, Fritz just wanted to talk literature. Darget, Algarotti, and Voltaire are gone, and Catt hasn't come yet.

Still, though. That use of German!

No lie, I'm going to be disappointed if we decide it's 1720s after all. ;)