Marie Henriette Chotek

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Marie Henriette Chotek (around 1906)

Marie Henriette Countess Chotek von Chotkowa and Wognin (born November 24, 1863 in Unterkrupa Castle , Kingdom of Hungary , † February 13, 1946 in Unterkrupa , Czechoslovakia ) was a well-known rose breeder .

Life

Maria Henrietta Hermína Rudolfína Ferdinanda Antonie Anna Countess Chotek was the eldest daughter of Count Rudolf Chotek von Chotkow (1822-1903) and his wife Maria Antonia Eleonore Christiane Hedwig von Khevenhueller- Metsch (1838-1892). She was baptized two weeks after her birth, on December 7th, 1863 in the village church of Unterkrupa by the Tyrnau canon Georg Schnell. Henriette was the second cousin of Sophie Maria Chotek , who died tragically with her future husband, the heir to the throne Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Este , in the assassination attempt in Sarajevo in June 1914.

The Chotek family belong to the prehistoric nobility of Bohemia , the first documentary mention goes back to the year 1181. Beginning with the Imperial and Royal Chamberlain and Colonel Hermann Chotek (1786–1822), the grandfather of Marie Henriette, the Hungarian family line of the Choteks begins in Unterkrupa. When Hermann married Henrietta Brunsvik von Korompa (1786–1857) in 1813 , the rule of Unterkrupa also passed into the possession of the Choteks.

Henriette spent her youth in the winter months in Vienna and she spent the summers on her parents' country estates, but mostly on the Unterkrupa estate. She received her upbringing and education, according to her social class, through home tuition organized by private teachers. In addition to the subjects of geography, history, mathematics and physics, great emphasis was placed on art (drawing) and music lessons (piano). In addition to her German mother tongue, she was taught in Hungarian, French and English. She only learned the Slovak language as an adult.

Henriette Countess Chotek around 1880 ( kkHof-Atelier Adèle , Vienna)

After she was introduced into 'society' in Vienna in 1883, the world of adults opened up to the young aristocrats. On January 30, 1883, she took part in the court ball and was introduced to Emperor Franz Joseph I and Elisabeth of Austria . In her youth, Henriette developed an extraordinary talent for acting. She took part in amateur performances - together with amateur actors from other noble families - which took place in Vienna or in the palace theater of Unterkrupa. These theater performances were organized and artistically supervised by the Viennese theater actress Amalie Bleibtreu . She also liked the so-called " Living Pictures ", in which historical events were usually reproduced and which were very popular at that time.

Henriette Chotek was a deeply religious woman all her life and was closely connected to the Roman Catholic Church . In 1895 she became the lady of honor of the aristocratic women's convent Maria-Schul in Brno . This exclusive women's monastery, founded in 1654, was an institution for unmarried women of the nobility and high nobility, which at the time was under the patronage of Empress Elisabeth.

Although she belonged to the high nobility of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy , she loved the simple life. In 1904 she inherited the rule of Unterkrupa from her father and she was able to pursue her passion in the huge castle park: she grew roses. That is why posterity gave her the epithet ornans : "Rose Countess". She was greatly admired by the villagers, if only for her diverse charitable endeavors, above all she supported poor families and orphans. For this activity she received a diploma of recognition from Pope Pius X in 1909 . She belonged to the women's committee of the XXIII. International Eucharistic Congress in 1912 in Vienna and therefore it has been approved by Pope Pius X with the Honorary Cross Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice award.

After the death of her father on December 3, 1903, the focus of Henriette's work was on the rule in Unterkrupa. Here she turned out to be a talented housekeeper. She decided to build a farmhouse in the castle park about 250 meters from the castle, which she called the "Schweizerhaus". It was to become the center of their later economic activity and activity. The foundation stone for this house, kept in the peasant style of the time and covered with a thatched roof, was laid on July 4th, 1906 by Pastor Anton Rácz. She set up parts of the building complex as a folklore museum. Their staff (mostly gardeners with families) also found apartments in parts of the complex. Over the years, a small settlement developed here through various additions. In 1947 large parts of this property fell victim to a fire, the rest was demolished. Today nothing reminds of this small settlement.

Unterkrupa castle and park (status summer 2015)

In the last years of the 19th century Henriette Chotek began to build a private rosarium in the palace gardens of Unterkrupa . She joined the Association of German Rose Friends (VDR) and took part in various congresses and rose exhibitions. After the death of the well-known rose breeder Rudolf Geschwind in 1910, she acquired most of his roses. It is thanks to her that there are still 29 roses from this rose breeder in the Sangerhausen Rosarium .

Maria Henrietta Chotek was valued by many rose growers. Hermann Kiese (1865–1923) had already dedicated a rose that she herself had chosen to the Countess at the 1910 Rose Congress in Liegnitz : Countess Chotek .

During the First World War , Henriette Chotek volunteered for hospital service, and as head nurse in Tyrnau she looked after numerous wounded soldiers. When she returned to Unterkrupa at the end of the war, the park looked "like a burial place for fallen heroes". It was not easy for the almost 60-year-old countess, especially under the changed circumstances, to rebuild her rose garden. Many rarities were lost forever and were irreplaceable. In the opinion of the Countess, “years will pass before we succeed B. to restore the collection of roses in the garden of Malmaison at the time of Empress Josephine ”. At that time, in exchange with the French rose breeder Jules Gravereaux (1844–1916), she had acquired almost the entire range of roses from Empress Josephine from Malmaison Castle.

Rose Marie Henriette Countess Chotek, bred by Peter Lambert ( 1910)

After the war, Marie Henriette founded a rose school, which she financed by selling cut flowers and plants. Her favorite saying was: “I don't need a gardener, I am a gardener, I just need reliable unskilled workers.” Countess Chotek was a capable botanist and gardener, with German rose breeders as teachers. In 1926 she was able to put the first breeding of a rose by Rudolf Geschwind on the market.

Maria Henriette came regularly to the rose congresses in Germany. Important German rose breeders such as Wilhelm Kordes , Peter Lambert , Gustav Brada and Johannes Böttner were among her personal friends.

The Countess's list of varieties and prices from 1929 lists 885 varieties of roses , of which 228 are loop roses , 33 bourbon roses , 210 park roses of all classes; the rest were polyanthas and hybrid tea roses ; the foreword of the catalog mentions that 6,000 roses were planted in Unterkrupa. She introduced the ' Northern Landrose' , which was also suitable for breeding in cooler areas. In 1934 she grew a shrub rose under the name 'Ignis Chotek' . The well-known Trier rose breeder Peter Lambert - a friend of the Countess - dedicated his multiflora hybrid rose 'Marie Henriette Countess Chotek' , which he had already bred in 1910, to her .

Marie Henriettes Rosarium inspired the "Preßburger Beautification Association", which on her initiative laid out a rose garden in the Au-Park in Preßburg . The then chairman of the association Peter Limbacher (* 1872, † 1947) was so enthusiastic about the countess' rosarium after a visit to Unterkrupa that he decided to create a small rosarium in the Preßburger Au-Park. For this he ordered numerous plants from Countess Chotek. The rose garden was opened to the public on July 13, 1937 in the presence of the Countess.

She was in professional contact with the German rose friends all her life, and when the VDR and the Rosarium Sangerhausen were facing financial ruin due to the inflation, they were actively supported by the rose countess.

In 1934 the countess got into financial difficulties and the rosarium began to deteriorate. In 1938 the rose garden in Unterkrupa was mentioned for the last time in the specialist literature (in connection with a rose exhibition in Pressburg ). Then came the Second World War and its terrible consequences. After the Red Army occupied Unterkrupa in April 1945, the actual work of destruction began. The mansion was looted, the park and the rosarium was nearing its ultimate demise. Her extensive specialist library, her written estate, as well as the rose catalogs (in which she mainly described Rudolf Geschwind's roses in detail) and which she has published regularly since 1929, were also irretrievably lost. This loss has not yet been processed, as her observations and findings cannot be found in either a rose newspaper or a specialist dictionary.

Entrance to the Chotek Mausoleum at Unterkrupa

The meanwhile old countess, who had no offspring because she remained unmarried, was expelled. Maria Henrietta, as the last representative of the "Hungarian Chotek Line" (her grandmother was born in Brunsvik), was to be deported on the basis of the Kosice government program of 1945 and the Beneš decrees . After she had to leave the manor, she was forced to hide from the authorities and kind-hearted residents of the village gave her shelter for the time being. A former servant made sure that Henriette - who was in a desperate physical condition in the meantime - was admitted to the nearby Josephinum monastery and looked after by the local nuns of the Congregation of the Daughters of Divine Love (FDC) . There she died completely lonely and abandoned in February 1946 and was quietly buried in the family mausoleum of the Choteks (which was still built by her father) at the village cemetery of Unterkrupa.

In the mausoleum the words can be read on its epitaph :

DEUM AFFLICTOS NATURAMQUE TOTO CORDE AMAVIT

"God, the suffering and nature loved them with all my heart"

(see also article Dolná Krupá Castle )

Breeds after the death of Marie Henriette Chotek

Marie Henriette was not forgotten as a rose breeder even after her death. In today's Unterkrupa there are efforts to domesticate the roses again and to continue the tradition in a newly created (1996) rosarium, which bears the name " Rosarium of MH Chotek ".

After the Countess's death, two new breeds dedicated to her were successfully brought onto the market:

  • In 2006 Szilveszter Györy bred the rose C omtesse Maria Henrietta
  • In 2013 the company W. Kordes' Sons in Klein Offenseth-Sparrieshoop bred Rose Countess Marie Henriette

literature

  • Dr. Gustav Brada, Sofia: Countess Marie Henriette Chotek and her Rosar, in the Rosenzeliing 1921 (online: Chotek-4, www.ruususeura.fi; accessed on October 13, 2017)
  • Ľudmila Ďuranová: Pestovateľka ruží grófka Mária Henrieta Choteková, in Knižnica, roč. 3, 2002, č.3, p. 150 ( Slovak )
  • Ľudmila Ďuranová - Anna Šourková - Alena Táborecká: Lexikón slovenských žien, Martin: Národný biografický ústav SNK, 2003, p. 288 (Slovak)
  • Stanislav Petráš: Ružová grófka a jej svet, Vydavateľstvo: Občianske združenie Korompa, 2018, ISBN 978-80-973005-3-1 (Slovak)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Henrietta had three younger siblings: Anna Maria Theresia Chotek (1865–1882); Gabriella Edmundine Antonia Chotek (1868–1933) ∞ with Maria Franz Dominik von Schönborn (* 1870, † 1933); Rudolf Otto Hermann Chotek (1870–1921) ∞ with Irma Maria Ráday de Ráda (* 1871, † 1945)
  2. ↑ Her grandfathers Karl von Chotek (* 1783, † 1868) and Hermann von Chotek (* 1786, † 1822) were brothers
  3. ↑ a b quoted from: Rosengräfin-Marie Henriette ... (see web link)
  4. ↑ a b quoted from Dr. Gustav Brada: Countess Marie Henriette ... (online)
  5. ↑ After the Second World War, the rose garden withered due to a lack of maintenance until it disappeared from the park entirely.
  6. ↑ The Chotek Mausoleum was built in 1894 according to plans by the Austrian architect Stanislaus Hanusch (* 1846, † 1904).
  7. ↑ The order had been based in Unterkrupa since 1927.
  8. ↑ The order was founded in 1868 by Franziska Lechner (born January 1, 1833 in Edling near Wasserburg am Inn , † April 14, 1894 in Breitenfurt near Vienna). It soon spread throughout Europe . The sisters also worked in Unterkrupa and were forcibly expelled after the communists came to power in Czechoslovakia .
  9. ↑ In memory of the friendship between the company founder Wilhelm Kordes (* 1865, † 1935) and the Countess of Roses, this rose was given the name of Countess Marie Henriette on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Marie Henriette Chotek's birth . The ceremonial presentation took place on June 8, 2013 in Unterkrupa.
personal data
SURNAME Chotek, Marie Henriette
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Chotek, Maria Henrietta Hermína Rudolfína Ferdinanda Antonie Anna Countess (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Czech rose breeder
DATE OF BIRTH November 24, 1863
PLACE OF BIRTH Unterkrupa Castle , Kingdom of Hungary
DATE OF DEATH February 13, 1946
Place of death Unterkrupa , Czechoslovakia