Marie Kerner (writer, 1813)

Marie Kerner at the age of 17 . Lithograph based on a drawing from 1831 by Emilie Reinbeck .

Marie Kerner (born December 2, 1813 in Welzheim , † April 14, 1886 in Tübingen ; full name Rosa Maria Kerner , married Niethammer ) was a German writer and daughter of the poet and doctor Justinus Kerner .

Life

Childhood and youth

On December 2, 1813: Justinus Kerner's daughter Marie is born.

On February 28, 1813, the doctor and poet Justinus Kerner and his bride Friederike married in Enzweihingen . Justinus was practicing in Welzheim at that time. The young couple initially lived in cramped and improvised conditions in the Ochsen inn there . The first child, Rosa Maria, was born on December 2, 1813. It had two godparents: On the one hand Rosa Maria Varnhagen von Ense , after whom it was named - it was the sister of the diplomat Karl August Varnhagen von Ense , a friend of Justinus Kerner's college; on the other hand Ludwig Uhland , the most important poet of the Swabian Romanticism ( Schwäbische Dichterschule ), who immediately dedicated a few verses to the newborn. In December 1813, shortly after their daughter was born, the Kerners were able to move into a better house in Welzheim.

Marie , as she was called in the family, could ride earlier than walk, because the father took his little daughter with him to visit sick people in the Welzheimer Wald when she was just a few months old . Marie grew up with her siblings Theobald and Emma in a loving family environment - not a matter of course in the early 19th century.

Justinus was popular with his Welzheimer patients, so his practice grew rapidly, but his income remained modest. Probably for this reason he looked around for a better-paid position and in January 1815 moved to the town of Gaildorf am Kocher, 20 kilometers to the northeast, as a senior medical officer . The Welzheim citizens were reluctant to let their doctor go and gave Marie a large box of flax as a dowry as a farewell gift . This box, as Marie later said, was the pride of her childhood. She was happy to go after her mother on stage and ask her to show her the flax that the mother kept for her and from which she actually had her daughter's trousseau spun and woven later.

In the Gaildorf apartment of the Kerner family it was so cold in winter that mother Friederike often had to send her daughter Marie to friends just so that she could warm up. Shortly after her fourth birthday, Marie fell ill with "brain fever" and soon after with jaundice . She survived all diseases without any problems, but remained small for a long time and was overtaken in growth by children of the same age.

For such a protected child, Marie suffered a considerable number of accidents, all of which occurred during the Gaildorf period. At the age of about six and a half years she had an accident with a carriage near Löwenstein when the horses ran away, the vehicle overturned and was dragged on lying on the roof. Justinus Kerner, who had ridden in another carriage, followed fearfully and found his daughter under the rubble of the vehicle. Marie had head injuries and a fractured collarbone, and at first it seemed as if she was about to lose her left eye, but she recovered quickly from her injuries. Later she fell into the stove from a pier while walking , but was rescued; then she was hit by a horse-drawn cart in Gaildorf and got off lightly again; and eventually she inflicted serious facial injuries with her father's razor, but this too had no serious consequences.

Marie was aware of the fact that the Kerner family moved to Weinsberg on January 19, 1819. As she later wrote, she was looking forward to her new home, but it was very cold that day and she froze during the trip and complained about it. The family lived in Weinsberg for three years before they had their new house built in 1822 . There, Marie and her two siblings experienced how their parents' home became a meeting place for the poets of Swabian Romanticism and a scene of the intellectual life of that time. She watched all of this with great interest and keen mind. She also drew personal gain from the diverse social connections of her father Justinus: As a teenager, she spent several weeks as a guest of the family of Count Alexander von Württemberg at Serach Castle near Esslingen , where she was able to make friends with his sister, who was born in 1815, the later Countess von Taubenheim , who also had the first name Marie.

Marriage and salon sociability

Finally, on November 25, 1834, Marie married the four years older Heilbronn city ​​doctor Emil Niethammer. This was the son of Elias Niethammer, who had worked as senior medical officer in Weinsberg before Justinus Kerner. With regard to her husband, Marie could remember an incident twelve years ago: When the topping-out ceremony was celebrated during the construction of the Kernerhaus , the carpenter was standing on the roof decorated with a fir tree and quoted a judgment from Ludwig Uhland. Then he threw down a glass, which fell without breaking at the feet of a boy who immediately picked it up - the boy was Emil Niethammer, Marie's later husband. Such stories were popular with romantics, for they trusted the element of chance because they believed that behind it they saw the reign of fateful powers.

Within ten years, Marie gave her husband seven children: Hermann (born August 8, 1835), Anna (November 19, 1836), Karl (June 21, 1838), Helene (August 10, 1839), Justinus (December 10 1842), Georg (April 19, 1844) and Ludwig (May 31, 1845).

But the sons Karl and Justinus did not even live to see their first birthday, and Emil Niethammer also died on June 6, 1847 at the age of only 38. As a young widow, Marie returned to her parents' house in Weinsberg with her five remaining children. After the death of her mother Friederike on April 4, 1854, she took over the household of the Kernerhaus, she and her daughters also read to Justinus, who was suffering from cataracts, and wrote letters for him - in this context Justinus appointed his granddaughter Anna to be his “councilor and first secretary ”; sometimes her younger sister Helene had to step in as "second secretary". In addition, Marie accompanied her father in the summer of 1854 on his research trip to Meersburg on Lake Constance to the important archivist Joseph Freiherr von Laßberg , a brother-in-law of the poet Annette von Droste-Hülshoff (Laßberg provided his friend Justinus with the primary sources from the life of the historically important doctor Franz Anton Mesmer with the help of which he could compile a Mesmer biography).

Justinus Kerner increasingly suffered from age-related complaints, for the relief of which he took various bathing trips. In the summer of 1855 he went to Baden-Baden to the Stephanien-Bad for a cure , in the summer of 1856 to Bad Cannstatt to the Leuzische Bad, always in the company of his daughter Marie. In the summer of 1857, Marie treated herself to a cure and traveled to Bad Niedernau alone - Justinus meanwhile complained about her absence. The Kerner family traditionally maintained friendly contacts with the Württemberg royal family . In October 1857 , the Crown Prince couple Karl and Olga visited the town of Weinsberg, the castle ruin Weibertreu and the Kernerhaus, with Justinus acting as a tour guide on the Weibertreu. Princess Olga (one of the most beautiful women of her time, still known today for the Winterhalter portrait) expressed the wish to meet Marie Niethammer's children - Anna received special attention as Kerner's “secretary”. Around three and a quarter years later, however, Marie lost another child , because on January 18, 1861 her youngest son Ludwig died in Weinsberg at the age of 16. Her father Justinus passed away on February 21, 1862, and her brother Theobald then took over the house and the practice. Marie, on the other hand, moved to Tübingen to live with her son Georg, who had made it there as a staff officer and battalion commander.

Stories about the Kerner family

Marie had inherited literary talent from her father. She used this to set a literary monument to her beloved parents in 1877 with the book "Justinus Kerner, childhood love and my father's house, based on letters and personal memories". She used the oral traditions of the family and Justinus Kerner's diary from 1807/1808, which is still preserved today, as sources. The beginning love affair between Justinus and Friederike (including the almost six-year waiting period), the marriage of the two on February 28, 1813 and the first years of marriage in Welzheim and Gaildorf, respectively, are described in humorous stories, then the Weinsberg time with building the house, the successful medical one Work of her father Justinus, family life (including the many pets) and the Kernergarten including the romantic, enchanted ghost tower. The numerous guests and patients who have visited the Kernerhaus in almost four decades, especially the Seer von Prevorst, occupy a large space . Occasional problematic situations are described discreetly, the reader can only guess between the lines.

Last years of life

Marie Niethammer nee died on April 14, 1886. Kerner at the age of 73 in Tübingen. Her sister Emma survived her by nine years, her brother Theobald by 21 years.

plant

• Marie Niethammer: Justinus Kerner's childhood love and my father's house, based on letters and personal memories (1877), published by JG Cotta'schen Buchhandlung, Stuttgart, among others

literature

• The life of Justinus Kerner, tells about himself and his daughter Marie , Justinus-Kerner-Verein and Frauenverein Weinsberg e. V., Weinsberg 2005, ISBN 3-922352-11-1 . The book contains: childhood love and marital status (or: and my father's house) based on letters and personal memories of Marie Niethammer.
• Theobald Kerner: The Kernerhaus and its guests , Justinus-Kerner-Verein and Frauenverein Weinsberg e. V., Weinsberg 2005, ISBN 3-922352-10-3
• Dear friend! Where are they? Justinus Kerner's correspondence with Ottilie Wildermuth 1853–1862 , new ed. by Rosemarie Wildermuth, Justinus-Kerner-Verein and Frauenverein Weinsberg e. V., Deutsche Schillergesellschaft Marbach, Lithos-Verlag Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-88480-022-1

Web links

• Works by Marie Kerner in the Gutenberg-DE project
• Marie Kerner in the family tree at Justinus-Kerner- und Frauenverein Weinsberg e. V.