cahn | Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 48

Some awesome historical RPF

candyheartsex stories for meeeeee (or by me, in one tiny case) with historical characters! I'm just going to note whom the stories are about here. They are all so good!!

Anne Boleyn/Catherine of Aragorn
Frances Howard and Frances Coke (or: James I's court was basically a HOTBED of scandal, omg)

And two that are also historical RPF but also consistent with the Jude Morgan novel The King's Touch, which is an excellent historical novel narrated by James ("Jemmy") Scott, Duke of Monmouth, Charles II's illegitimate son.

Princess Henrietta of England (Charles II's sister and wife of Philippe I duc d'Orleans)
James of Monmouth/William/Mary

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

selenak

Monsieur mon tres cher ami et tres chere compere,

I have the pleasure of sending the signet which the scoundrels have had engraved. Lieutenant v. Gartz, the bringer of these news, will tell you about the infamous villanies, which because of all the mess I don't have had the time yet to put in writing. Literally: "To put on paper, but I don't think that's how you epxress it in English." The postmaster is a villain, but in this, he's innocent. In the Fredersdorf fashion, to which I am much obliged as I have learned so much working under him (i.e. Fredersdorf), I enquired with good and bad words, until I received the laque used to recreate it from the signet maker. His Majesty wants to keep this secret, the signet maker will also go on trial. Enough, the bastards have gotten some of their reward, and I thank God I'm rid of him. Dear Friend, please help me out by informing me how you've done it around the 24th when you used to the receive the money, and afterwards granted the bills which have to be paid. You'll oblige me and do a favour to our gracious King. I've received the bills from Michelet already. The cellermaster Grohe has already written to me that Koltz wanted to supply Champagne and Burgundian wine. But the King doesn't want them. Mon tres cher ami, would you be so kind as to check from whom the last few wines were coming from, I'm supposed to order those again, they were fine. Dearest Friend, have you already seen St. Michel and my fat/plumb darling? Imagine, what Grace, His Majesty out of his own initiative has told me that when I'm returning home I should get married and live in my own house, for You've known me for a long time to be an honest fellow.

Please assure Mrs. Fredersdorf (literally "Mrs. Treasurer, i.e. Fredersdorf's highest ranking title)- of my respect, and thus I am remaining,

mon tres chere compere, etc.

Throwing the Lt. out and the transcription now saying "meine dicke Trutschel" made me conclude we're not talking about two but one marital prospects here, solely Leinings. Trutschel is a southern German word (the second in a row, I notice) I haven't encountered in the North so far, which either means Leining himself is originally from the South or that Southern German maintains more old fashioned words than Northern German (also possible.)

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Trutschel is a southern German word (the second in a row, I notice) I haven't encountered in the North so far

Ah, interesting! Good to know! See, this is why I have you do these translations; I can get the gist, but I don't catch little details like this. (I have requested the Kiekemal trial records, but I don't need little details there. ;))

for You've known me for a long time to be an honest fellow.

And here's another reason, your translation forced me to stare at the tail end of a word and decide that could be "kennten" and not "kennte." (I was going with "Sie" as "Seine Majestät", the equivalent to the more common "Elle" for a monarch in French, but I actually think a partially written final 'n' makes more sense of why the tail of the 'e' is so long.) Btw, it could also be "kannten", so if you tell me that makes grammatically way more sense there, I will change it.

Koltz wanted to supply Champagne and Burgundian

I'm going to go with

felis's Kotzkoffeki (Goltzkowsky) there, as that makes a lot of sense to me.

In the Fredersdorf fashion, to which I am much obliged as I have learned so much working under him (i.e. Fredersdorf)

Awww. A touching little detail that my transcription last time missed, and which makes me extra glad I decided to order the whole correspondence and suffer the (literal, physical) pains of learning to decipher it!

made me conclude we're not talking about two but one marital prospects here, solely Leinings.

So remember that in future letters, we discover he already has a "frau"? The one who will be wined and dined by the Fredersdorfs? And we debated whether that was a wife or a woman (i.e., mistress), and you decided in favor of "wife" since he would probably have done the respectable thing? And we concluded that he probably just didn't tell Fritz he was already married.

What I also remember is that he says "my Frau will get fat" after thanking the Fredersdorfs for the wining and dining. If that's the same person as "meine dicke Trutschel", it's interesting if she's already fat...

Felis and I are also still not 100% sure of the "St" in "St Michel". "Sf Michel" seems even weirder to me, but St-Michel sounds more like a placename than a person's name, though people are named after the place they came from. I'm still open to ideas on this one.

Anyway, one more letter down! I'm making good progress revising them, so the transcriptions will keep coming.

Literally: "To put on paper, but I don't think that's how you epxress it in English."

Meant to say: this is actually perfectly fine English.

Edited Date: 2024-06-16 05:53 pm (UTC)

From:

cahn

In the Fredersdorf fashion, to which I am much obliged as I have learned so much working under him (i.e. Fredersdorf)

Awww. A touching little detail that my transcription last time missed

Oh, I like this too!

From:

selenak

Same here. BTW, I was wavering between “in the Fredersdorf fashion”, “in the Fredersdorf manner”, and “in the Fredersdorf way” - whatever sounds idiomatically most fluent in English, I suppose. And on second thought, perhaps instead of “good and bad words” it should be “soft and harsh words” in English?

Anyway, something that unites the first three guys we’re seeing writing to Fredersdorf in 1757 - Leining, Fredersdorf’s secretary Gentz and later Anderson - is that they all come across as looking up to him and not just professing their friendship but wanting advice, signalling some kind of mentor relationship. It occurs to me that they are all probably younger than him (except for Anderson, I mean, I have no idea whether or not he is younger, but I guess job wise he could be of the same age) , and of course given the different positions he had, he really could have worked as a role model for each of them.

From:

cahn

I think "in the Fredersdorf fashion" is the one that I like the most (as wording, not as a translation), although it's a bit idiosyncratic -- I suppose "in the Fredersdorf manner" is idiomatically smoother. "Soft and harsh words" is probably better in English, yes.

is that they all come across as looking up to him and not just professing their friendship but wanting advice, signalling some kind of mentor relationship.

I like thinking about Fredersdorf also being a good teacher/mentor! :D

From:

mildred_of_midgard

I think "in the Fredersdorf fashion" is the one that I like the most (as wording, not as a translation), although it's a bit idiosyncratic -- I suppose "in the Fredersdorf manner" is idiomatically smoother. "Soft and harsh words" is probably better in English, yes.

Yeah, either "fashion" or "manner" works for me; "way" isn't wrong, per se, but it's definitely markedly more casual. "In the Fredersdorf tradition" would also work for me.

Agree about "soft and harsh words," that's probably something I would have changed if I were polishing this up for Rheinsberg (which I intend to do if we make it through the rest of the letters--which I hope we do!).

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Update: I just got to the part in Gentze's letters where he's referring to "Madame Leining", so I'm assuming that means they're married and nobody told Fritz (or he forgot). :P