BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Monday, July 31, 1826

Today is Ignaz Schuppanzigh’s name day. Although invited to spend the day, Beethoven does not attend, in part because Nephew Karl said that he would be too busy and cannot get away.

Unbeknownst to either Beethoven or Holz, Nephew Karl goes to Baden today, possibly to select a place to commit suicide when the time comes. Going on Monday would allow him to vanish from his rooms without any question, purporting to be at his classes; he would have too easily been missed on the weekend. But while he is in Baden, he is seen speaking to two officers, though what they discuss is unknown. In light of later remarks, he may be interested in what the life of a soldier is like. He returns to Vienna most likely this evening or possibly early tomorrow morning. [Conversation Book 116, 52v.]

Beethoven’s patron Archduke Rudolph arrives in the lake valley of St. Gilgen on what is now Lake Wolfgang, just west of the baths at Ischl where he has been enjoying the spas for close to three weeks. According to the report from Salzburg in the Wiener Zeitung of Tuesday, August 8 (Nr.180) at 755, also quoted in the Brünner Zeitung of August 11, 1826 (Nr.219) at 933, “His Royal Highness arrived in the lakeside village of Strobel at 3:30 p.m. from the spas of Ischl, boarded a ship that had already been prepared and decorated, and sailed to the neighboring market and pilgrimage site of St. Wolfgang [c.934-994]. From there, his Highness authorized them to continue further across the lake to the steeply rising rock face, on whose wooded heights the old holy Bishop of Regensburg once settled, living a miracle-working life. His Royal Highness allowed himself to be guided there, repeatedly sounding the echo of gunfire, trumpet, and shots, and then returned, bestowing blessings, via Strobel to Ischl. The clearest sky, accompanied by the wild gusts of the sea, favored the journey of His Imperial Highness, and elevated the sheer enjoyment of the landscape of Austrian Switzerland.” [Wolfgang, Bishop of Regensburg, had lived in the area as a hermit for the last 18 years of his life, apparently as a result of a political dispute between Duke Henry II of Bavaria and Emperor Otto II. After he was found by a hunter, he was brought back and died, with many miracles reported at his grave. Wolfgang was canonized in 1052.]