• 267. Sophie Tischbein to Caroline in Bamberg: Leipzig, 28 August 1800 [*]
Leipzig, 28 August [1800]
|608| The things belonging to our heavenly Auguste that you sent to my children provided both considerable pain and considerable of joy for them — the dear girls were unable to get hold of themselves the entire day, weeping incessantly. [1] —
I was actually glad to see these tears flow, for beautiful, loyal Auguste certainly deserves to be remembered thus. —
O God, my dear Madam Schlegel, there is nothing I can say to you — your pain is justified, and your loss irreplaceable — it is incomprehensible to me how you are able to bear it — the death of this dear child has caused me, too, to weep so many tears. I loved and cherished her almost like my own child, and did not Auguste love me as well almost with the tenderness of my own child? —
You would have received a letter from me earlier except that I very much wanted to include the drawing by Caroline. —
Just one thing regarding the portrait of the dear child: [2] —
Tischbein sends his regards and promises to send the picture as soon as possible, it is just that it is impossible to finish the one you saw, for if the neck, the hair, and the incidental objects were to be painted over, the head would end up looking miserable, like a skull, — changing anything about the head, even the tiniest detail, would be too dangerous, the similarity could suddenly be lost entirely, so there is nothing else to do but use the unfinished original to make a |609| faithful, good, and finished copie. The latter already has its background priming and will be quite similar to the original.
You will then receive a proper, finished picture that will give you much joy and in which you will fully recognize the sweet creature, it is just that Tischbein is asking for a bit of patience, since he has to finish some work for Orlof that is rather pressing because in two weeks Orlof will be returning from Lauchstädt and wants to take his pictures along with him.
Tischbein will be glad to honor your wish with regard to the halo [3] — but it is not possible for him to do the kind of small picture you desire. First, he has no real practice doing such pictures, and then his eyes would also not permit it — he is very sorry he cannot fulfill this request for you.
The drawing by Caroline closely resembles the picture, and I hope you will be satisfied with it — please make do with this work (which Caroline prepared gladly and quite diligently if also with tears —) until you have the picture itself, then Schlegel will probably want the drawing.
Caroline is doing another drawing for me, and for herself and Betti she is making a miniature on a case in which they will keep dear Auguste’s letters. [4] My children will never again find a girl whom they will love as much; they will remember Auguste forever. —
Stay well, you poor, unfortunate mother. Your always loving
Sophie Tischbein
Notes
[*] Auguste had spent much of the autumn of 1799 in Dessau with the Tischbein family after having made their acquaintance in Jena earlier that summer. Concerning the family’s move to Leipzig in January 1800, see Caroline’s letter to Auguste on 11 November 1799 (letter 255), note 2 (Rudolf Koch and Fritz Kredel, Deutschland und angrenzende Gebiete [Leipzig 1937]):
[1] Frontispiece to Friederike Helene Unger, Albert und Albertine (Berlin 1804):
News of a person’s death was customarily delivered by a letter with a black wax seal to prepare the recipient for the sad news; in the following illustration, such a letter is held by the young woman on the right (Caspar Netscher, The Letter with the Black Seal [1665]; Staatliches Museum, Schwerin):
[2] Here it is difficult to determine exactly which drawings or portraits of Auguste are meant, since all but Tischbein’s 1798 portrait — for which Auguste sat for the artist in person in Jena — have been lost or are unknown (Daniel Nikolaus Chodowiecki, Von Berlin nach Danzig: Eine Künstlerfahrt im Jahre 1773, von Daniel Chodowiecki. 108 Lichtdrucke nach den Originalen in der Staatl. Akademie der Künste in Berlin, mit erläuterndem Text und einer Einführung von Wolfgang von Oettingen [Leipzig 1923], plate 73):
He may have finished what is usually called the “1798 portrait” in 1799, or even later. In any event, by 14 September 1800 Caroline did have at least that oil portrait (1798) and a picture made from it — with a halo — in Bamberg (see Wilhelm Schlegel to Ludwig Tieck from Bamberg on 14 September 1800 [letter 267e]) (Daniel Nikolaus Chodowiecki, illustration for Taschenbuch zum geselligen Vergnügen [1799]):
Writing in (1913), 1:756, Erich Schmidt summarized the situation at the time as follows:
Friedrich Tieck’s bust of Auguste was lost or otherwise disappeared [correct: it ended up in the Thorvaldsen Museum in Copenhagen]; hence apart from the one portrait by Friedrich August Tischbein from 1798, to what these present letters mention one can add:
- copies, the drawing with the “soft halo” (Wilhelm to Ludwig Tieck from Bamberg on 14 September 1800 [letter 267e]);
- studies (drawings) by Tischbein’s daughter Caroline [mentioned in this present letter but apparently no longer extant];
- see also Georg Waitz, (1882), 82 (which also mentions Johann Franz Gareis [see Charlotte Ernst to Wilhelm Schlegel in January 1801 (letter 282a)]);
- and an unsuccessful likeness by Maria Alberti [see Friedrich Schlegel’s letter to Auguste in November 1798 (letter 207b), with note 5].
[3] Wilhelm Schlegel mentions this picture in the previously mentioned letter to Ludwig Tieck on 14 September 1800 (letter 267e); i.e., Caroline received this picture while yet in Bamberg.
Although its fate is unknown, it was an iteration of Tischbein’s 1798 portrait, but with a halo presumably after the customary portrayals of the saints and esp. the Virgin Mary, as in the following 18th-century rendering (Auguste’s portrait, included for comparison, from Erich Schmidt’s 1913 edition of these letters) (Giovanni Battista Piazzetta [painter] and Marco Alvise Pitteri [engraver], Trinitatis, delicia Virgo Maria [ca. 1722–86]; Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum; Museums./Signatur MAPitteri AB 2.39):
[4] Regrettably, this carrying case and letters seem not to have been preserved. Back.
Translation © 2014 Doug Stott