Mystery of Mozart's Skull!

[Peter]

The only mystery as far as I'm concerned is why Mozart's grave remained unmarked. Constanze claimed it was the vicar's job yet for 17 years she made no effort to visit. By then the grave already had the reputation of being untraceable - no one, none of his friends, family, musicians or patrons bothered to erect a memorial to mark the site and this to me is the real mystery.

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'Man know thyself'

[Rod]

Originally posted by Peter:
The only mystery as far as I'm concerned is why Mozart's grave remained unmarked. Constanze claimed it was the vicar's job yet for 17 years she made no effort to visit.

Well she had nowhere to go if she and the vicar forgot where the body was! But presuming she did remember, the more interesting part for me, more so than anything to do with the body, is why she didn't visit.

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"If I were but of noble birth..." - Rod Corkin

[Hofrat]

Originally posted by Droell:
Some 35 years after Mozart, Beethoven died. In the day-to-day life of Vienna, little had changed. Yet Beethoven's funeral attracted 25,000 mourners, practically the entire city. And this for a man who had been a recluse for more than a decade, who had, during that time, composed little, and who, among certain parties, was thought to have been washed up, a man who was, so far as I can tell, actually out of favor. A man who had numerous run-ins with the local constabulary (re: Carl). Yet Beethoven's body went immediately into a clearly marked grave. You can still see it today.

Dear Droell;

The population of Vienna in Beethoven's day was approximately 200,000. Still, the 25,000 person turnout for Beethoven's funeral (which is 1/8th of the population) constitutes a huge crowd.


Hofrat

[Joy]

Originally posted by Hofrat:
Dear Droell;

The population of Vienna in Beethoven's day was approximately 200,000. Still, the 25,000 person turnout for Beethoven's funeral (which is 1/8th of the population) constitutes a huge crowd.


Hofrat

And this too I have read and heard many different reports, some said 10,000 people showed up and now 25,000, it appears to be growing with each report.



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'Truth and beauty joined'

[Joy]

Those are the questions that have me wondering as well. Why didn't the wife visit her husband's gravesite and why wasn't the gravesite marked?
Perplexing questions to which we may never have a satisfactory answer.

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'Truth and beauty joined'

[robert newman]

The story of Rothmayer the Vienna gravedigger digging up the Mozart grave within 10 years of Mozart's death is false. (As correctly said today on Mozartforum Rothmayer only started working as a Vienna gravedigger around 1802). That story is simply not correct. I have never suggested otherwise.

A quite separate issue is whether the Mozart grave was robbed of Mozart's skull by others and ended up in the possession of phrenologists. It's this which was proposed here. I hope to give the name of the phrenological publication and its date by this Sunday latest. (It contains a detailed drawing of the skull).

I note that one Member of Mozartforum has refered to my posting here. Fine. The Rothmayer theory has never been accepted by me and I have never suggested that it was true.

Robert

[robert newman]

A certain 'Missa in Augustiis' (from Toronto) has published the following message on a Mozart website -

'Is it true that phrenologists dug up Mozart after he died (knowing where he was buried) so that they would examine his remains? So claims Robert Newman (whom I think some of you know) on the Beethoven Forum. I have never heard this.

I know this was true for Haydn...but I thought nobody knew or knows the location of Mozart's burial...I thought that was understood by all...'

Sorry Missa in Augustiis, but you've been a little loose with phrasing your question. You cannot say 'nobody knew' the location of Mozart's burial. Those who buried him surely DID. It;s just as clear that those who buried Haydn knew where Hadyn was buried also. Yes ? So, why do you write (regarding the location of Mozart's grave) 'nobody knew' ?

Secondly, the existence or otherwise of a 'phrenological' textbook (inside which is a quite detailed drawing of Mozart's skull - this published in the early 19th century) is certainly not a figment of my imagination but (I hope to show, and this by the end of this coming weekend) a reality. In fact, the existence of this book and its detailed drawing etc. is in my view the reasonable basis for saying that Mozart's skull had indeed been unearthed by the time this book was published - not dug up by Rothmayer but obviously by some other unidentified person or persons. That remains my position. I think it is a reasonable one. But I shall, as promised, do my utmost to provide details of the said book by this Sunday evening (GMT) latest - this being a book I have seen myself several times but whose exact details (as is perhaps understandable in such unusual topics) are not readily to hand. I posted as I did because the book exists.

Regards

Robert Newman

[Droell]

Hello Robert,

You are so close to it. You've given us the priceless information of the secret tribunal. See where this goes:

Pretend you're Mozart, pretend it's 1791. For whatever reason, a legal process is in motion which will, at the very least, strip you of your honor, perhaps chuck you in jail, perhaps even worse.

Do you sit around passively & wait for your life to be ruined? If you spent most of it on the road, hell, no, you don't! You skip town. (And don't tell me Mozart had never done that before.)

But this time it looks serious. Just leaving town won't do. Looks like it will have to be permanent. Not only will the trail have to be covered over, it will have to look as if there never was a trail. That means a fake death & careful preparation for a life in exile.

That takes money. Lots of it. So you stage two operas, write all sorts of works, work like a dog. Where did the "Monies of 1791" go? Perhaps to copyists & orchestrators & composers, as you've suggested, but perhaps also transferred out of the country. And bribes.

Meanwhile, you've got to have an alibi. Or alibis. Look at how silly these sound: You claim a mysterious man has given you a commission for a requium mass & somehow you, a grown adult, a man worldly-wise (as all travelers are) think this is Fate come knocking. Or that you are daily being poisoned. As if you, yourself, do not know what it is you are putting in your mouth, and that seeing a competent doctor for an antidote has somehow never occurred to you. Then, for good measure, (and in complete contradiction to your usual, well-known style of writing) you string out the composition of the requium as long as possible, leaving only deathbed fragments. Really grind it in. You're taking no chances with this alibi!

So we have, in front of us, motive, means and ability. Fleeing town will solve Mozart's problems, and he is well-able to do exactly that. Those who argue that he actually did die on 5 December 1791, must produce some evidence to support their theory. I've yet to hear anything but contradictions. Therefore,

The hunt is on. Who will be the first to find Mozart? (The fame might be immense.) It won't be me, by the way, as I lack the means. However,

Ferdinand Ries, in his Biographical Notes, says that Beethoven gave him a copy of the second symphony, written in his own hand, which Ries said was "unfortunately stolen from me by a friend". (Notes, pg. 66) If I am not mistaken, this happened in London. This score, like all the other autographed scores of the second (I understand there were three), is lost. Ries does not say who stole the score, which was no triffling thing. So a thief both privileged (to Ries) as well as unknown today. Since most everyone in Ries's immediate circle can be accounted for, then as the score was not found with any of them, one might guess the thief to be someone whose actual identity, clearly known to Ries, was to remain secret.

I had thought Mozart would have fled to the ends of the earth, but now I suspect he may have become part of the German/Austrian musical community in London, where his actual identity may have been known to many.

Could Mozart have done this, give up a life of fame & composition & performance, for obscurity & semi-retirement in London? In Paris, Rossini did just that.



[This message has been edited by Droell (edited 01-13-2006).]

[Rutradelusasa]

Originally posted by Droell:
In Paris, Rossini did just that.

I don't think he did that. He retired from composing to pursue his love for cooking. Also because he was tired. Yet he still wrote some wonderful music and published it.



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"Wer ein holdes weib errugen..."

[HaydnFan]

Originally posted by robert newman:

A certain 'Missa in Augustiis' (from Toronto) has published the following message on a Mozart website -

'Is it true that phrenologists dug up Mozart after he died (knowing where he was buried) so that they would examine his remains? So claims Robert Newman (whom I think some of you know) on the Beethoven Forum. I have never heard this.

I know this was true for Haydn...but I thought nobody knew or knows the location of Mozart's burial...I thought that was understood by all...'

Sorry Missa in Augustiis, but you've been a little loose with phrasing your question. You cannot say 'nobody knew' the location of Mozart's burial. Those who buried him surely DID. It;s just as clear that those who buried Haydn knew where Hadyn was buried also. Yes ? So, why do you write (regarding the location of Mozart's grave) 'nobody knew' ?

Secondly, the existence or otherwise of a 'phrenological' textbook (inside which is a quite detailed drawing of Mozart's skull - this published in the early 19th century) is certainly not a figment of my imagination but (I hope to show, and this by the end of this coming weekend) a reality. In fact, the existence of this book and its detailed drawing etc. is in my view the reasonable basis for saying that Mozart's skull had indeed been unearthed by the time this book was published - not dug up by Rothmayer but obviously by some other unidentified person or persons. That remains my position. I think it is a reasonable one. But I shall, as promised, do my utmost to provide details of the said book by this Sunday evening (GMT) latest - this being a book I have seen myself several times but whose exact details (as is perhaps understandable in such unusual topics) are not readily to hand. I posted as I did because the book exists.

Regards

Robert Newman

Obviously, that is me, just so you know; I wanted to get the opinion of the Mozart Forum people as I said I would. I will respond to the rest later.

[Joy]

Originally posted by robert newman:


In fact, the existence of this book and its detailed drawing etc. is in my view the reasonable basis for saying that Mozart's skull had indeed been unearthed by the time this book was published - not dug up by Rothmayer but obviously by some other unidentified person or persons. That remains my position. I think it is a reasonable one. But I shall, as promised, do my utmost to provide details of the said book by this Sunday evening (GMT) latest - this being a book I have seen myself several times but whose exact details (as is perhaps understandable in such unusual topics) are not readily to hand. I posted as I did because the book exists.

Regards

Robert Newman

Do you think you would be able to put up a photo of Mozart's skull from the book for us to see, Robert?

Joy



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'Truth and beauty joined'

[Droell]

Originally posted by Joy:
Do you think you would be able to put up a photo of Mozart's skull from the book for us to see, Robert?

Joy

The skull issue is silly, in my humble opinion. How were grave robbers able to find a body that eluded everyone else? How would they know it was Mozart's? The technology did not exist to plaster his picture all over the walls, and what portraits did exist of him were, every one of them, in private collections. Only someone who personally knew Mozart could identify the body, and I don't suppose any of his friends (who couldn't be bothered for his funeral) would mysteriously turn up as a grave robber's accomplice. (Disturbing a grave is a crime, you know.) How likely is it that one or another eager student of phrenology was simply swindled?

[robert newman]

Here are some rough notes gleaned from different sources on the craze in Vienna for collecting skulls (c.1790 onwards) -

The founder of ‘phrenology’ Franz Joseph Gall (1758-1828) - was born in the Swabian village of Tiefenbronn near Pforzheim (later part of the German Grand Duchy of Baden – a place known to have been regularly visited by both Mozart and his wife during their last years). Gall’s father, Joseph Anton Gall, was a wealthy Roman Catholic wool merchant and Mayor of Tiefenbronn. As such, he would almost certainly have known the good friend of Mozart, Michael Puchberg (also a wealthy textile merchant, amateur musician and director of the largest private cotton factory in Austria). The Galls had been a leading family in the region for more than a century. (Gall's father hoped Franz Joseph would become a merchant like himself and his mother that Gall would become a priest like his elder brother).

Gall's first education came from a priest uncle in the Black Forest. Later Gall attended school in Baden and then in Bruchsal before leaving for Strasbourg University in 1777 to study Medicine. It was there that he was introduced to the comparative anatomy of Johann Hermann (1738-1800), who taught that there was a close relationship between Man and apes. From 1781 Gall continued his medical studies at Vienna where was greatly influenced by his teacher Maximilian Stoll (1742-87). Now a well-known and affluent physician Gall received his Doctorate of Medicine in 1785 and became a successful, well-connected, private physician in Vienna. The biographer F. Schultz notes that the intelligentsia in Vienna at this time (the last decades of the 18th and those of the early 19th centuries) were intensively preoccupied with recognisable features of human faces and heads. ( F. Schulz, Die Schädellehre Dr Gall's und seine Restschädelsammlung im Städtischen Rollett Museum zu Baden bei Wien, Vienna, self published, 1973). During Gall's last years as a medical student he witnessed the founding of the largest general hospital of the century in Vienna and of the adjoining new insane asylum, in the Narrenturm ('Fools' Tower') – this located in the grounds of the university.19 The size and accessibility of these institutions, due to the liberal stance of their directors, Johann Peter Frank and Franz Nord, plus Gall's social status and connections, enabled him to move freely within both institutions as a regular visitor and observe for perhaps the first time large numbers of mental disorders of all kinds and to compare symptoms with post-mortem dissections.

From around around 1791/2 Gall in Vienna began collecting human and animal skulls, preparing coloured wax moulds of brains and plaster casts of heads in order to study skull contours which he increasingly associated with behaviour/characteristics associated with different species or individuals.

By 1802 the Gall collection had grown to around 300 human skulls and 120 plaster casts. Gall sought skulls of individuals with prominent behaviour or capacities such as bravery, or cunning, creativity or criminality. Surely (he reasoned) there was a direct link between personality and physical forms. His quest for unusual and outstanding specimens became a fashion. Gall's macabre collection became so extensive, and his enthusiasm for collecting so well known that he became a notorious local celebrity. He even had the assistance of powerful and well connected officials, such as the then Minister of Police in Vienna, Earl Saurau, who helped to procure for him a large number of criminals' skulls.

Gall was eventually banned from Vienna by the Emperor though his misguided system of phrenology (though eventually rejected as pseudo-science) continued to have great impact on 19th century thought. It’s within this context that I think phrenological reports of Mozart’s skull have to be understood. (That the theft of Haydn’s skull was carried out with police protection and that of leading members of society is already well established though, at the time, this was flatly denied).

This is why I think it highly likely that reports/diagrams of Mozart’s skull from a phrenological publication of the early 19th century provides reasonable grounds for assuming it was removed from his grave during a time when its location was still known but at a date we cannot presently establish.
(Incidentally, phrenologists were also present at the public exhumation of the graves of both Schubert and Beethoven in the 19th century and the craze for phrenology continued till well in to the 20th century)..
(Still looking for the actual book and its details).

Robert

[Droell]

Originally posted by robert newman:

Here are some rough notes gleaned from different sources on the craze in Vienna for collecting skulls (c.1790 onwards) ...

Surely (he reasoned) there was a direct link between personality and physical forms...

Gall was eventually banned from Vienna by the Emperor though his misguided system of phrenology (though eventually rejected as pseudo-science) continued to have great impact on 19th century thought.

The underlying concept is that the soul, in ensouling the body, leaves its distinct mark upon every part of it, soft as well as hard tissue. Anyone who's ever had a palm reader tell you the details of your sex life knows that this stuff, in competent hands, is quite real.

So there is palmistry, reflexology (the feet) iridology (eyes), bumps on the head & more. In India, there are people who will read your shadow. How they do that I haven't a clue. I've met a couple of excellent palmists. Back when I was in Ventura, CA, my neighbor, Ema, dispensed medicinal herbal teas based on reflexology analysis of her customers's feet. Which is not an unusual application of the theory. She still does. She is a graduate of pharmacy of the university at Sarajevo & has many customers.

Back around 1980, I read an obit in the Guardian of a fellow who told women's futures by examining their breasts. A typical eccentric, he was well-enough known, on a national level, to merit a national obit. For shy women, he could work from a "breast print", which was a process similar to finger prints.

My own field, astrology, is not so far removed. I can tell you there has always been a craze for birth data for the rich & famous & that the most absurdly wrong data often circulates widely.

So far as phrenology goes, if we are talking of this or that criminal skull, I should think they are genuine, for the most part. There is never a shortage of prisoners who die in custody. Nor, it seems, is there ever a shortage of cops on the take, making money on the side.

If we are talking of celebrities, I should think they are all frauds unless proven otherwise. Which means the removal of the head from the body and its boiling to remove the soft tissue, done under the direct supervision of competent witnesses, who attest to same on the skull itself. I doubt this was commonly done.

The typical solution, to avoid disturbance to the corpse, was to put the body in a secure crypt, and all those who could afford it, did so.

[HaydnFan]

Ok, firstly, we are not debating the credibility of phrenology, here; (on a side note, Droell: some of the things you were talking about, ie. the soul etc. is complete crap).

Secondly, Robert: it is nice that the context of the scientific studies carried out by Gall leads you to assume that phrenology (esp. of famous people like Haydn) was all the rage in the early 19th century so therefore, Mozart had to have been un-earthed! But in reality, you still have provided no evidence, you know this as well as I do.