Christoph Städele

Christoph Städele (born September 27, 1744 in Memmingen ; † March 31, 1811 there ) was a hat maker and poet from Memmingen in Upper Swabia .

Childhood, school and wandering

Coat of arms of the hat makers' guild

Gottfried Städele, the father of Christoph Städele, member of the hatmaker's guild and jury member of the imperial city of Memmingen, was married to Anna Barbara Hail for the first time. The marriage had three children. Anna Barbara Hail died on October 3, 1742. On January 7, 1743, Gottfried Städele married Anna Helena Hermann a second time. Almost a year later in December 1743 a girl was born and in September 1744 Christoph Städele saw the light of day. He was the first son from the second marriage and was baptized Protestant. Eighteen more children were born by 1767, ten of whom survived childhood. Anna Helena Hermann outlived her husband Gottfried Städele by six years. After the death of his father, Christoph had to seek alms from the City Council of Memmingen. On February 8, 1785, the Städele's widow received five guilders every quarter from the city's general alms box .

In his autobiography, Christoph Städele wrote that there was nothing significant to tell from his boyhood . The pupil Christoph attended the local Latin school and got into conflict with the principal there. He asked his father to leave school and learn the trade of hat maker. After two years of apprenticeship with his father, the boy went on a seven-year journey. Letters to his father show that Städele found his situation as a wandering day laborer oppressive. He complained that his feeling for nature and art was dying out. Worries about daily bread were at the center of his life. On his wandering he came to Ludwigsburg and was recruited by an organization that was looking for colonists for the Falkland Islands . He signed but did not take any cash for the passage of the ship. Based on his letters, the father found out about his son's plans. He wrote back to the son that he could use him again in his home business. Christoph returned to his hometown Memmingen in 1764. The Falkland colonist advertisement later turned out to be a fraud.

Hatter and poet

He found his zest for life again, began to write and raved about the poems of the German poet Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock . His brother took over hatmaking. In 1780 the father died. Before his father's death, Städele applied for a schoolmaster position in Biberach an der Riss , which he did not get. He took an exam before the superintendent of the imperial city in the hope of becoming a schoolmaster in Memmingen. In 1781 his friend, Johann Georg Schelhorn d. J., preacher at the St. Martin Church in Memmingen, an appointment as overseer and court master at the ducal military academy Hohe Karlsschule in Stuttgart , with the assurance of good pay. After much deliberation, he refused. In 1780 he applied for the boy's schoolmaster position in Memmingen, which he did not get. He asked to be included on the list of applicants, which the council refused. In 1782 he and ten other Memmingen citizens applied for the vacant Messner position at St. Martin. His application was rejected. In 1782, despite obvious material problems, his collected poems appeared in one volume.

Schoolmaster and choirmaster

In 1785 the schoolmaster's post at the boys' school became vacant, for which Städele had applied with two other citizens. Thanks to the official examination before the superintendent, he was taken. His material situation improved considerably. On April 1, 1785, Christoph Städele and Anna Regina Huberin sought Heyrath's consensus and announcement from the council , which was approved for him. On May 20, 1785, he paid a forty-five Kreuzer marriage fee . On May 30th 1785 the wedding took place in St. Martin. In the same year he applied for the better-paid girls' school head position, which he also received. In 1797 he was appointed choirmaster as the successor to Ellmers at St. Martin. With the material security that he now had, his literary creativity slackened. He died of emaciation on March 31, 1811 while teaching the third elementary girls' class. His grave in the old cemetery in Memmingen cannot be found. In the last years of his life he saw the desertification of Memmingen on the border of the newly formed Kingdom of Bavaria .

Poetry sample

His poems make him appear as a sympathizer of the Göttingen grove. Echoes of Sturm und Drang with Klopstock's pathos. With the emphasis on a common Germany in the time of regional fragmentation, glowing joie de vivre and excessive patriotism, he wrote in the fashion of his time:

To you German brothers!

Let us be happy!

Sing German songs!

Drink German wine!

See the beautiful full glass!

Brothers how do you like that

Ha! you haters of joy!

Old grumpy you!

Stay with your water

and leave us alone.

Crickets and a bad woman

I wish you to pass the time.

Literary work

On July 22, 1776, a poem appeared in the Teutsche Chronik by the socially critical poet Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart . In October of the same year Schubart printed a Städeles ode on the death of the Göttingen Hainbund poet Ludwig Christoph Heinrich Hölty . The text of a libretto in a composition by the Memmingen artist and innkeeper Christoph Rheineck , which was performed on September 12, 1779 at Wolfegg Castle for the wedding ceremony of the ruling Prince Josef Alois von Waldburg zu Wolfegg-Wolfegg, has been lost. In 1778 the passion cantata The Passage of Jesus was published . Gotthold Friedrich Stäudlin published a poem by Städele in the Swabian Muses Almanac in 1782.

literature

• Uli Braun: Christoph Städele - hat maker and poet, a contribution to the literary history of the imperial city of Memmingen in the 18th century. In: Memminger Geschichtsblätter Jahresheft 1967
• Teutsche Chronik by Christian Daniel Schubart 59th item, 87 items ff. 1776, printed by Christian Ulrich Wagner, Ulm
• Cantata text; The course of Jesus' death. A cantata set to music by Christoph Rheineck. Memmingen 1778, 2nd edition Memmingen 1780
• Various poems, published in the Memminger Intellektivenblatt for various years

Web links

• Christoph Städele in the street directory of Memmingen
• Memminger history sheets

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Christoph Städele, Gedichte Memmingen 1782. City Library Memmingen