II. - Schloss Schwetzingen

II.
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II. Schwetzingen – A Prince Elector’s Eighteenth-Century Summer Residence
could not accommodate the courtiers, their
servants and the administration. The Elector
paid for domestics’ board and lodging as long
as they stayed at the houses of Schwetzingen
citizens. Those not needed there all the time,
such as the members of the court orchestra,
were paid the travelling fares when they
had to be present for performances. The
administrative authorities, too, remained at
Mannheim. However, as all documents had to
be presented to the Elector, the offi cials had
no choice but to commute to Schwetzingen
on a regular basis – government business
could not be suspended for six months a
year. Evidently traffi c on the highroad to
Mannheim was lively. Inventories of lodgings
at Schwetzingen have survived from 1758
and 1762. 25 In 1758 234 members of the court
could not be accommodated at the palace, and
the treasury paid out a total of 4442 Gulden
(fl orins) for their lodging. The inventory
also reports where exactly those people were
staying. The inhabitants of Schwetzingen
evidently profi ted from the court’s presence
in a number of ways. There was the letting of
rooms and selling of wares, but there was also
the possibility of participating in the cultural
life of the court itself. Burney writes: “The
Elector ... has a concert played every night at
his palace whenever there is no play at the
theatre. When there is, however, not only his
subjects but every foreign visitor may attend
free of charge... Whoever walks the alleys
of Schwetzingen during the summer must
be under the impression that the town is
inhabited entirely by musicians unceasingly
plying their craft; in one house he may hear
a fi ne violinist, in another, a fl autist; here, an
excellent oboist; there, a bassoon, a clarinet,
a cello or a concert of several instruments
playing together.” 26
The French philosopher Voltaire (1694-1778)
writes about his stay at Schwetzingen in
25 Generallandesarchiv Karlsruhe, Pfalz Generalia 77/8506, see
also Pelker 2004, pp. 19 ff.
26 Burney [1980], pp. 228 f.
1753: “Je suis actuellement dans la maison de
plaisance de Mgr l’Electeur palatin.” 27
The Typology of the Summer Residence
A “maison de plaisance” is usually translated
into German as a Lustschloss, that is a
“pleasure palace” or, as it happens, a summer
residence. But these terms, like “hunting
lodge” or “hermitage”, often provide little
useful information about the property so
described. Krause has succeeded in providing
a defi nition based not so much on terminology
as on the uses the property was put to,
and the precise nature of the pleasure sought
and found in the country. According to this a
summer residence is situated not too far from
the ruler’s main seat of power. 28 The decisive
element of its use is a moving of the residence
there, for a limited time each year but on a
regular basis.
At Schwetzingen the ceremonial observed was
based on that of the imperial Habsburg court
at Vienna where the old Spanish-Burgundian
ceremonial was practised. 29 During the reign
of Emperor Charles VI (r. 1711–1740) a
continous switching of residences is evident.
In late April or early May the imperial court
moved from the Hofburg at Vienna to the Laxenburg,
an old moated castle outside the city.
After a brief return to Vienna towards the end
of June, the court moved again to spend the
hot summer months at the so-called ‘Favorita
auf der Wieden’. In mid-October it returned to
Vienna to spend the winter there.
However, neither the Favorita nor Laxenburg
Castle were prestigious pleasure palaces of
the ‘Maison de plaisance’ type. The decisive
element is the fact that at those temporary
seats of the emperor and parts of his court, all
events subject to the court ceremonial could
take place. For example, princes could be
enfeoffed and large-scale audiences con-
27 Henry Anthony Stavan, Kurfürst Karl Theodor und Voltaire,
Mannheim 1978, p. 8.
28 Katharina Krause, Die Maison de plaisance Landhäuser in der
Ile-de-France (1660-1730), München/Berlin 1996, pp. 8 ff.
29 See also Henriette Graf, Die Residenz in München.
Hofzeremoniell, Innenräume und Möblierung von Kurfürst
Maximilian I. bis Karl VII., München 2002; Brigitte Langer,
Pracht und Zeremoniell – die Möbel der Residenz München,
München 2002.