Archduke Maximilian Francis of Austria
Encyclopedia
Archduke Maximilian Francis of Austria (8 December 1756, Vienna
– 26 July 1801) was an Archbishop-Elector of Cologne, the last child of the Habsburg ruler Maria Theresa
and her husband, Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor
. His siblings included two Holy Roman Emperor
s (Joseph II
and Leopold II
), as well as Queen Marie Antoinette
of France
and Queen Maria Carolina of Two Sicilies. He was the last Elector of Cologne and an early patron of Ludwig van Beethoven
.
, Austria
. In 1780 he succeeded his uncle Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine
as Hochmeister
(Grand Master
) of the Teutonic Knights
.
In 1784 he became Archbishop-Elector of Cologne
, living in the archbishopric's seat at Bonn
. He remained in that office until his death, meaning that he participated as Elector in the election of his brother Leopold II in 1790 and later that of his nephew Francis II
in 1792.
Maximilian Francis succeeded to the title of Elector of Cologne and the related Bishopric of Münster and maintained his noble court
in Bonn
. A keen patron of music, Maximilian Francis maintained a court orchestra where Ludwig van Beethoven's father was a tenor
in the court chapel and played an important role in the early career of Ludwig van Beethoven
. The young Beethoven was an employee in his court's musical establishment, where his grandfather, also named Ludwig van Beethoven, had been Kapellmeister
.
The court organist
was Christian Gottlob Neefe
, who became an early mentor and teacher to Ludwig van Beethoven. Recognising his young pupil's remarkable gift both as a performer and a composer, Neefe brought Beethoven into the court, convincing Maximilian Francis to appoint him as assistant organist. Maximilian Francis, too, recognised the extraordinary abilities of the young Beethoven. In 1787, he gave Beethoven leave to visit Vienna
to study with Mozart
, a visit cut short by the illness and death of Beethoven's mother. In 1792, Maximilian again agreed to let Beethoven depart for Vienna in order to pursue studies with Joseph Haydn
, Antonio Salieri
and others, where he continued to pay Beethoven's court salary. Maximilian Francis maintained an interest in Beethoven's progress, and several letters from Haydn to Maximilian detailing his student's progress remain extant. The Archduke anticipated that Beethoven would return to Bonn and continue working for him, but in fact Beethoven never returned, choosing to pursue his career in Vienna.
Maximilian Francis's political rule over the Archbishopric met with disaster in 1794, when his domains were overrun by the troops of Revolutionary France. During the Napoleonic Wars
, Cologne
and Bonn were both occupied by the French
army, in October and November of 1794. As the French approached, Maximilian Francis left Bonn never to return and his territories on the left bank of the Rhine eventually passed to France under the terms of the Treaty of Lunéville
(1801). The Archbishop's court was dissolved. Although Maximilian Francis still retained his territories on the right bank of the Rhine, including Münster and the Duchy of Westphalia
, the Elector, plagued by corpulence and ill-health, took up residence in Vienna after the loss of his capital and remained there until his death at age 45 in 1801, at Hetzendorf Palace. The dismantling of the court made Beethoven's relocation to Vienna permanent, and his stipend was terminated.
Beethoven planned to dedicate his First Symphony
to his former patron, but Maximilian Francis died before it was completed.
In conspiracy theories, such as the one promoted in The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail
, Maximilian Francis was alleged to be the twenty-second Grand Master of the Priory of Sion.
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
– 26 July 1801) was an Archbishop-Elector of Cologne, the last child of the Habsburg ruler Maria Theresa
Maria Theresa of Austria
Maria Theresa Walburga Amalia Christina was the only female ruler of the Habsburg dominions and the last of the House of Habsburg. She was the sovereign of Austria, Hungary, Croatia, Bohemia, Mantua, Milan, Lodomeria and Galicia, the Austrian Netherlands and Parma...
and her husband, Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor
Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor
Francis I was Holy Roman Emperor and Grand Duke of Tuscany, though his wife effectively executed the real power of those positions. With his wife, Maria Theresa, he was the founder of the Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty...
. His siblings included two Holy Roman Emperor
Holy Roman Emperor
The Holy Roman Emperor is a term used by historians to denote a medieval ruler who, as German King, had also received the title of "Emperor of the Romans" from the Pope...
s (Joseph II
Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor
Joseph II was Holy Roman Emperor from 1765 to 1790 and ruler of the Habsburg lands from 1780 to 1790. He was the eldest son of Empress Maria Theresa and her husband, Francis I...
and Leopold II
Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor
Leopold II , born Peter Leopold Joseph Anton Joachim Pius Gotthard, was Holy Roman Emperor and King of Hungary and Bohemia from 1790 to 1792, Archduke of Austria and Grand Duke of Tuscany from 1765 to 1790. He was a son of Emperor Francis I and his wife, Empress Maria Theresa...
), as well as Queen Marie Antoinette
Marie Antoinette
Marie Antoinette ; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was an Archduchess of Austria and the Queen of France and of Navarre. She was the fifteenth and penultimate child of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa and Holy Roman Emperor Francis I....
of France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and Queen Maria Carolina of Two Sicilies. He was the last Elector of Cologne and an early patron of Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
.
Biography
Maximilian Francis was born at the Hofburg Imperial PalaceHofburg Imperial Palace
Hofburg Palace is a palace located in Vienna, Austria, that has housed some of the most powerful people in Austrian history, including the Habsburg dynasty, rulers of the Austro-Hungarian empire. It currently serves as the official residence of the President of Austria...
, Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
. In 1780 he succeeded his uncle Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine
Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine
Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine was a Lorraine-born Austrian soldier.-Background:Charles was the son of Leopold Joseph, Duke of Lorraine and Élisabeth Charlotte d'Orléans...
as Hochmeister
Hochmeister
The grand master is the holder of the supreme office of the Teutonic Order. It is equivalent to the grand master of other military orders and the superior general in non-military Roman Catholic religious orders...
(Grand Master
Grand Master (order)
Grand Master is the typical title of the supreme head of various orders of knighthood, including various military orders, religious orders and civil orders such as the Ancient Order of Hibernians and the Orange Order...
) of the Teutonic Knights
Teutonic Knights
The Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem , commonly the Teutonic Order , is a German medieval military order, in modern times a purely religious Catholic order...
.
Archbishopric of Cologne
The Electorate of Cologne was an ecclesiastical principality of the Holy Roman Empire and existed from the 10th to the early 19th century. It consisted of the temporal possessions of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Cologne . It was ruled by the Archbishop in his function as prince-elector of...
, living in the archbishopric's seat at Bonn
Bonn
Bonn is the 19th largest city in Germany. Located in the Cologne/Bonn Region, about 25 kilometres south of Cologne on the river Rhine in the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, it was the capital of West Germany from 1949 to 1990 and the official seat of government of united Germany from 1990 to 1999....
. He remained in that office until his death, meaning that he participated as Elector in the election of his brother Leopold II in 1790 and later that of his nephew Francis II
Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor
Francis II was the last Holy Roman Emperor, ruling from 1792 until 6 August 1806, when he dissolved the Empire after the disastrous defeat of the Third Coalition by Napoleon at the Battle of Austerlitz...
in 1792.
Maximilian Francis succeeded to the title of Elector of Cologne and the related Bishopric of Münster and maintained his noble court
Noble court
The court of a monarch, or at some periods an important nobleman, is a term for the extended household and all those who regularly attended on the ruler or central figure...
in Bonn
Bonn
Bonn is the 19th largest city in Germany. Located in the Cologne/Bonn Region, about 25 kilometres south of Cologne on the river Rhine in the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, it was the capital of West Germany from 1949 to 1990 and the official seat of government of united Germany from 1990 to 1999....
. A keen patron of music, Maximilian Francis maintained a court orchestra where Ludwig van Beethoven's father was a tenor
Tenor
The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
in the court chapel and played an important role in the early career of Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
. The young Beethoven was an employee in his court's musical establishment, where his grandfather, also named Ludwig van Beethoven, had been Kapellmeister
Kapellmeister
Kapellmeister is a German word designating a person in charge of music-making. The word is a compound, consisting of the roots Kapelle and Meister . The words Kapelle and Meister derive from the Latin: capella and magister...
.
The court organist
Organist
An organist is a musician who plays any type of organ. An organist may play solo organ works, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers or instrumental soloists...
was Christian Gottlob Neefe
Christian Gottlob Neefe
Christian Gottlob Neefe was a German opera composer and conductor.Neefe was born in Chemnitz, Saxony. He received a musical education and started to compose at the age of 12...
, who became an early mentor and teacher to Ludwig van Beethoven. Recognising his young pupil's remarkable gift both as a performer and a composer, Neefe brought Beethoven into the court, convincing Maximilian Francis to appoint him as assistant organist. Maximilian Francis, too, recognised the extraordinary abilities of the young Beethoven. In 1787, he gave Beethoven leave to visit Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
to study with Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
, a visit cut short by the illness and death of Beethoven's mother. In 1792, Maximilian again agreed to let Beethoven depart for Vienna in order to pursue studies with Joseph Haydn
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
, Antonio Salieri
Antonio Salieri
Antonio Salieri was a Venetian classical composer, conductor and teacher born in Legnago, south of Verona, in the Republic of Venice, but who spent his adult life and career as a faithful subject of the Habsburg monarchy....
and others, where he continued to pay Beethoven's court salary. Maximilian Francis maintained an interest in Beethoven's progress, and several letters from Haydn to Maximilian detailing his student's progress remain extant. The Archduke anticipated that Beethoven would return to Bonn and continue working for him, but in fact Beethoven never returned, choosing to pursue his career in Vienna.
Maximilian Francis's political rule over the Archbishopric met with disaster in 1794, when his domains were overrun by the troops of Revolutionary France. During the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
, Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
and Bonn were both occupied by the French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
army, in October and November of 1794. As the French approached, Maximilian Francis left Bonn never to return and his territories on the left bank of the Rhine eventually passed to France under the terms of the Treaty of Lunéville
Treaty of Lunéville
The Treaty of Lunéville was signed on 9 February 1801 between the French Republic and the Holy Roman Emperor Francis II, negotiating both on behalf of his own domains and of the Holy Roman Empire...
(1801). The Archbishop's court was dissolved. Although Maximilian Francis still retained his territories on the right bank of the Rhine, including Münster and the Duchy of Westphalia
Duchy of Westphalia
The Duchy of Westphalia was a historic territory in the greater region of Westphalia, located in the east of modern North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Originally, Westphalia formed with Angria and Eastphalia one of the three main regions of Saxony...
, the Elector, plagued by corpulence and ill-health, took up residence in Vienna after the loss of his capital and remained there until his death at age 45 in 1801, at Hetzendorf Palace. The dismantling of the court made Beethoven's relocation to Vienna permanent, and his stipend was terminated.
Beethoven planned to dedicate his First Symphony
Symphony No. 1 (Beethoven)
Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony No. 1 in C major, Op. 21, was dedicated to Baron Gottfried van Swieten, an early patron of the composer. The piece was published in 1801 by Hoffmeister & Kühnel of Leipzig...
to his former patron, but Maximilian Francis died before it was completed.
In conspiracy theories, such as the one promoted in The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail
The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail
The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail is a book by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln....
, Maximilian Francis was alleged to be the twenty-second Grand Master of the Priory of Sion.