Augustin Emil Hofmann von Hofmannsthal

August Hofmann Edler von Hofmannsthal

Augustin Emil Hofmann von Hofmannsthal (26 January 1815 – 31 August 1881) was an Austrian industrialist.

Early life

Hofmann was born in Vienna, Austria on 26 January 1815.[1] He was a younger son of Therese (née Schefteles) von Hofmannsthal and Isaak Löw Hofmann, Edler von Hofmannsthal.[1] Among his siblings was Elise von Hofmannsthal (whose sister-in-law, Adelheid Herz, married Carl Mayer von Rothschild).[1]

His father was a Jewish tobacco farmer who was made a member of the hereditary nobility,[2] as "Edler von Hofmannsthal," by the Emperor of Austria in 1835.[3][a]

Career

He was a silk breeder, factory owner, and the head of his father's subsidiary business-house in Milan.[5] He was a recipient of the Cross of Merit of Austria-Hungary.[6]

Personal life

He converted to Catholicism and, on 5 May 1839, married Petronilla Antonia Cäcilia (née von Rhò) Ordioni (1815–1898) in Milan.[5] The marriage was later found to be invalid due to a legal defect when it was conducted, so they married again Vienna on 8 April 1850.[b] Petronilla, a daughter of Anton Maria von Rhò and widow of Pietro Ordioni (who died in 1835), was from an aristocratic Italian family.[8] Together, they were the parents of:[9]

• Hugo August Peter von Hofmannsthal (1841–1915), a director of the Boden-Credit-Anstalt who married Anna Maria Josefa Fohleutner, a daughter of Laurentz Fohleutner (whose family came to Vienna from the Sudetenland via Bavaria).[10]
• Sylvius Silvio Arvinius Leo von Hofmannsthal (1852–1921), an engineer who married Emerica Albertina "Emma" Burián von Rajecz, a member of an ancient Hungarian noble family.[11]
• Guido von Hofmannsthal (1854-1925),[c] an art collector and banker with Wiener Bankverein who married Franziska "Fanny" Opatalek-Treis in Bad Ischl in 1885.[12][13][14]

Hofmannsthal died on 31 August 1881 at Krems in Lower Austria.[1]

Descendants

Through his son Hugo, he was a grandfather of Hugo von Hofmannsthal (1874–1929), an Austrian novelist, librettist, and dramatist, and great-grandfather of writer Raimund von Hofmannsthal (1906–1974).[15]

Notes

1. Edler was, until 1919, the lowest rank of nobility in Austria-Hungary and Germany, just beneath a Ritter (hereditary knight), but above untitled nobles, who used only the nobiliary particle von before their surnames.[4]
2. As their eldest son, Hugo, was born in 1841, he was later legitimized per matrimonium subregnem.[6] He, therefore, used the surname von Rhò from birth, but beginning in 1850, he used the surname von Hofmannsthal.[7]
3. Beginning in 1901, he used the surname von Rhò as Guido von Rhò.[7]

References

1. Weimarer historisch-genealoges Taschenbuch des gesamten Adels jehudäischen Ursprunges (in German). Kyffhäuser Verlag. 1912. p. 387. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
2. Hofmannsthal, Hugo von; Degenfeld-Schonburg, Grafin Ottonie; Barcel, W. Eric (2000). The Poet and the Countess: Hugo Von Hofmannsthal's Correspondence with Countess Ottonie Degenfeld. Camden House. p. 24. ISBN 978-1-57113-030-3. Retrieved 14 March 2023.
3. Stimer, Herbert (19 September 1949). "Hofmannsthal's Background". The New York Times. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
4. Meyers Enzyklopädisches Lexikon; Bibliographisches Institut, Lexikonverlag, Mannheim/Wien/Zürich 1975, Band 7, S. 420.
5. Hofmannsthal, Hugo von (1968). Four Stories (in German). Oxford U.P. ISBN 978-0-19-832453-9. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
6. "Augustin von Hofmannsthal (1815-1881)". smb.museum-digital.de. Museum-digital. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
7. Knight, Ellen (2015). HUGO VON HOFMANNSTHAL COMPLETE WORKS XXXVII APHORISTIC, AUTOBIOGRAPHIC, EARLY NOVEL PLANS (PDF). S. Fischer Verlag. Retrieved 16 March 2023.
8. Rider, Jacques Le (3 January 2013). Les juifs viennois à la Belle Epoque (in French). Albin Michel. p. 211. ISBN 978-2-226-28470-9. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
9. Raponi, Elena (2002). Hofmannsthal e l'Italia: fonti italiane nell'opera poetica e teatrale di Hugo von Hofmannsthal (in Italian). Vita e Pensiero. p. 291. ISBN 978-88-343-0888-2. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
10. Kovach, Thomas A. (2002). A Companion to the Works of Hugo Von Hofmannsthal. Camden House. ISBN 978-1-57113-215-4. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
11. "Silvio von Hofmannsthal (1852-1921)". nat.museum-digital.de. Museum-digital. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
12. "Guido von Rhò (geb. von Hofmannsthal) (1854-1925)". nat.museum-digital.de. Museum-digital. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
13. Rychlik, Otmar (1994). Gäste: grosse Welt in Bad Vöslau : zur Ausstellung in den historischen Räumen des Schlosses Sommer und Herbst 1994 (in German). Stadtgemeinde Bad Vöslau. p. 225. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
14. Kaluga, M von Katja (2018). Hofmannsthal : Jahrbuch ; zur europäischen Moderne ; im Auftr. der Hugo von Hofmannsthal-Gesellschaft hrsg. Universitätsbibliothek Johann Christian Senckenberg. p. 38. Retrieved 16 March 2023.
15. "POET'S WIDOW IS DEAD; Frau Hugo von Hofmannsthal Succumbs in London". The New York Times. 11 November 1959. Retrieved 15 March 2023.

External links

• August Hofmann Edler von Hofmannsthal portrait, 1850 (at the Frankfurt Goethe Museum).