Joseph ii biography

The first enquiry in respect of the crown prince’s marriage came from Naples when namn was just twelve years old. At that time the southern Italian kingdom of Naples and Sicily was ruled by a collateral line of the Bourbons. The scheme of allying the Habsburg and Bourbon dynasties had its attractions. In this case a double marriage was proposed: the Austrian heir to the throne was to marry a Neapolitan princess, and the Neapolitan crown prince to become the husband of one of the Habsburg archduchesses. The reaction in Vienna was positiv, but it was suggested that the plans could wait for a few years.

Shortly afterwards, in , the prospect of a union with Isabella of Parma (–) arose. The proposal came from France, as the northern Italian duchy of Parma was ruled bygd a collateral line of the Spanish Bourbon dynasty. Thus the Bourbons in Parma were merely a cadet branch of a collateral line of the Bourbons, and Parma itself was an unimportant

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Scientist of the Day - Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor

Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor, was born Mar. 13,   He is best known to the modern public as the enlightened ruler who commissioned Mozart's The Abduction from the Seraglio in , and who then complained to Mozart (if the film Amadeus () be our guide) that there were "too many notes" (to which Mozart supposedly replied, "there are just as many as are required").  In addition to the roles, real and imagined, that he played in Mozart’s musical life, Joseph also crops up several times in the history of Enlightenment science.  Two months ago, we featured Wolfgang Ritter von Kempelen as our Scientist of the Day.  Von Kempelen was an  Austrian inventor who built a chess-playing automaton called "The Turk".  He presented it to Empress Maria Theresa of Austria in , but it seems to have been put away and forgotten. Joseph succeeded his mother Maria Theresa in , and one of his first acts as sole Emperor

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Mozart &
Material Culture

Joseph II was an accomplished musician and his tastes informed musical life in Vienna during the s: he was partial to German opera and opera buffa, Harmoniemusik (music for wind bands) and simple, accessible church music; he disliked elaborate court music, opera seria and ballet. A supporter of Mozart, Joseph commissioned Die Entführung aus dem SerailK in and Der SchauspieldirektorK in and engaged Lorenzo Da Ponte as court poet, which in turn led to the composition or performance of Le nozze di FigaroK, Don Giovanni K and Così fan tutte K In December Joseph created a position for Mozart at court, as Royal and Imperial Chamber Musician (k. k. Kammermusikus), solely, as he wrote, ‘out of consideration that so rare a genius in the world of music should not be obliged to seek abroad for recognition and his daily bread'. Joseph’s musical predilections also explain why, in Vienna, Mozart composed no church music except the mass K (not, in a