Meta from Salis

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Meta from Salis

Barbara Margaretha von Salis-Marschlins (born March 1, 1855 at Marschlins Castle in Igis ; † March 29, 1929 in Basel ), better known as Meta von Salis , was the first woman historian in Switzerland, one of the most famous women's rights activists and a campaigner for the Women's suffrage . She was also a passionate philosopher and pen pal of Friedrich Nietzsche and his sister Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche .

life and work

Marschlins Castle

Meta von Salis comes from the old Grisons noble family von Salis and grew up in Marschlin's parents' castle . In accordance with her father's conservative upbringing ideal, she attended typical boarding schools for girls. After her training in what she called housewives breeding institutes , she continued her self-taught training and, as a young woman, decided to become an educator, at that time one of the few employment opportunities for women from the upper class. From 1883 she was the first woman in Switzerland to study history, philosophy and art history at the University of Zurich . In 1887 she received her doctorate with a dissertation on Agnes von Poitou and thus became the first "Frau Doktor" in the canton of Graubünden. Then she worked as a freelance journalist and publicist.

As a women's rights activist, she first drew attention to herself in 1886 with the lyrical pamphlet The Future of Women . More attention was paid to an article in the liberal daily newspaper Züricher Post on January 1, 1887: under the title Heretic New Years Thoughts of a Woman , she called for political voting rights for women for the first time in German-speaking Switzerland. She also made known her work as a lecturer, including a series of lectures from 1894 entitled Women's Suffrage and the Choice of Women . Her final sentence was:

«As long as the man does not recognize the equality of women in the state, their maturity is not a fact, they remain exposed to all the coincidences of fate. Either the same laws, the same rights, the same duties and punishments, impartial judges, or the moral and physical decline of mankind is relentlessly continuing! "

Meta from Salis in the 1890s
von Salis with her favorite dog "Bruce" at the entrance to the "Upper Gardens" of Marschlins Castle

In addition to political equality, Meta von Salis particularly demanded legal equality for women. She criticized the fact that the woman was not recognized as a responsible person under Swiss law, but how such a person could be convicted in court. In literary terms, too, she dealt with the disadvantage of women in poems and novels, for example in the novels The Guardian Angels (1889) and Fearless and faithful (1891).

Her journalistic efforts for the Zurich doctor and women's rights activist Caroline Farner , who spent seven weeks in custody in 1892 for alleged embezzlement and was exposed to a public character assassination campaign, attracted a lot of attention . She was able to fight for legal rehabilitation (Farner was acquitted in 1893), but was subsequently embroiled in a defamation process by the unsuccessful judge and sentenced in 1894 to an - albeit symbolic - prison term. After this setback, she withdrew more into private life. In 1904 she emigrated to Capri with her partner Hedwig Kym and, after their marriage to Ernst Feigenwinter in 1910, lived with her in the same household until her death in Basel. Hedwig Kym's marriage, which came as a surprise to all acquaintances, had very irritated Meta von Salis. Before her relationship with Hedwig Kym (1860–1949), Meta von Salis had a love affair with Theophanie Schücking (1850–1903) for years, which ended abruptly because her father Levin Schücking claimed it for his own plans, while the daughter was in vain tried to rebel.

Meta von Salis met Friedrich Nietzsche personally in 1884 and, after his intellectual death, showed herself to be a generous patroness of the Nietzsche archive . In 1897, for example, she bought the "Villa Silberblick" in Weimar for her friend Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche, which served as the headquarters of the archive. However, after Förster-Nietzsche carried out unauthorized renovations to the building, the two women fell out and von Salis sold the house to Nietzsche's relative Adalbert Oehler , from whom Förster-Nietzsche was later able to buy it himself. As an admirer of Nietzsche, Meta von Salis also published the successful book Philosophy and Noble Man about her encounters with the philosopher in 1897 .

Meta von Salis was a distinct individualist; she rather distrusted the contemporary women's movement. Except in the case of women's rights, she represented decidedly conservative and aristocratic views on all other socio-political issues. In the 1920s she published regularly in the Swiss Monthly Issues for Politics and Culture. After the lost legal battle of 1894, she turned away from the fight for women's rights and was now more interested in Arthur de Gobineau's racial theories . She was strengthened in her German national consciousness by reading Heinrich von Treitschke's letters . In her later writings she was shaped by German national and racist ideas.

Publications (selection)

  • Poems. Schmidt, Zurich 1881.
  • The future of women. Buchholz & Werner, Zurich / Munich 1886.
  • Agnes of Poitou, Empress of Germany. A historical-critical-psychological treatise. Dissertation, University of Zurich. Zurich 1887.
  • The Guardian Angels. Novel. Merhoff, Munich 1889.
  • Fearless and faithful. Novel. Merhoff, Munich 1891.
  • The Farner-Pfrunder trial in Zurich. According to the records and after life communicated. Eastern Switzerland, St. Gallen 1893.
  • For understanding: an attempt. Rischmüller & Meyn, Munich 1894.
  • Philosopher and nobleman. A contribution to the characteristics of Friedrich Nietzsche. Naumann, Leipzig 1897; Scientific publishing house, Schutterwald / Baden 2000.
  • Chosen women of our time. 2 volumes. Self-published, Marschlins / Basel 1900/1909.
  • Aristocrats. Arnold Bopp, Zurich 1902.
  • Aristokratika II. Arnold Bopp, Zurich 1909.
  • Gemma: Memories of Baroness Emma von Wöhrmann. Basel 1918.
  • Memories. Self-published, Basel [between 1916 and 1919].

literature

  • Maria Bindschedler : Nietzsche's letters to Meta von Salis . In: Neue Schweizer Rundschau , Vol. 22, 1954–1955, pp. 707–721. ( Digitized version )
  • Andrea Bollinger: Salis, Meta von (Marschlins). In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
  • Andrea Bollinger: Women's suffrage and noble people. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung . February 26, 2005.
  • Brigitta Klaas Meilier: High season in Sils-Maria. Meta by Salis and Friedrich Nietzsche: On the history of their meeting. Schwabe, Basel 2005.
  • Katharina Loeliger: On the social criticism Meta von Salis based on her novels "The Guardian Angel" (1889), "Feartlos und loyal" (1891). Licensed thesis , University of Basel. Basel 1984.
  • Dorothea Roth: "Whoever says race says aristocracy". Meta von Salis and Germany, 1900–1923. In: Basler Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Altertumskunde . Vol. 101 (2001), pp. 243-280 ( full text ).
  • Berta Schleicher: Meta von Salis-Marschlins: The life of a fighter. Rotapfel, Erlenbach / Leipzig 1932.
  • Doris Stump : They kill us - not our ideas: Meta von Salis-Marschlins, 1855–1929, Swiss writer and women's rights activist. Dissertation, University of Zurich, 1984. Paeda-Media-Genossenschaftsverlag, Thalwil / Zurich 1986.
  • Doris Stump: "Nietzsche spoke of his intellectual interests ..." Meta of Salis' encounter with Friedrich Nietzsche . In: David Marc Hoffmann (ed.): Nietzsche and Switzerland. Zurich 1994, ISBN 3-907495-61-6 (OFFICIN), pp. 96-101.
  • Meta from Salis. In: Swiss Lexicon in twelve volumes. Visp 1998/1999.
  • Franziska Trenkle: Meta von Salis-Marschlins (1855-1929) and Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (1844-1900). An exchange of letters. In: Friends of the Klingental Museum. Annual report 2006 , pp. 65–70.

Web links

Commons : Meta von Salis  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Terra Grischuna , 6/2009.
  2. ^ Meta von Salis: The Farner-Pfrunder trial . Eastern Switzerland, St. Gallen 1893.
  3. ^ Regula Schnurrenberger: Friends and companions. Approaches to the phenomenon of female couples around 1900. In: Ariadne. Forum for Women's and Gender History, issue 48, 2005, p. 52.
  4. ↑ Dorothea Roth: "Whoever says race says aristocracy". Meta von Salis and Germany, 1900–1923. In: Basler Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Altertumskunde. Vol. 101 (2001), p. 282 ( full text ).
personal data
SURNAME Salis, meta of
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Salis-Marschlins, Barbara Margaretha von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss historian and women's rights activist
DATE OF BIRTH March 1, 1855
PLACE OF BIRTH Marschlins at Igis
DATE OF DEATH March 29, 1929
Place of death Basel