Innsbruck, I must paint you

Before Albrecht Dürer was 

,

he was a young hopeful making his way in the world. He was apprenticed to the workshop of Michael Wolgemut in Nuremberg, and then left his hometown in April 1490 as a journeyman. He spent several years in Basel.

Albrecht Dürer, Portrait of Michael Wolgemut
Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Dürer returned to Nuremberg in 1494, and married the bride his parents had selected for him, Agnes Frey.

Albrech Dürer, 'My Agnes'
1494 sketch
Public domain, via Wikimedia commons

About two months later, Dürer was on the road again. This time, his destination was Venice. On his way there, he stopped in Innsbruck.

I like to imagine that he was as beguiled by that city as I have been, because he painted some watercolors while he was there: the courtyard of Innsbruck Castle:

Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

And this view of Innsbruck from the north:

Public domain via Wikimedia commons

If you've visited Innsbruck, you'll notice that very little about this view is recognizable today. There are two things, however. It's hard to tell from this little reproduction, but Dürer captured the remarkable blue-green color of the Inn River that is still so striking today:

The Inn near Kufstein
October 2015

Another thing that is still recognizable is the building marked with the pink arrow (sorry, Albrecht):

Standing at the foot of the bridge which gives Innsbruck its name is the Ottoburg:

The Ottoburg today

According to the Ottoburg website, its history dates back to the 12th century. In 1498, future Emperor Maximilian I gave the building to his former nanny out of gratitude for her service to him. I picture him being quite a handful as a child, so it seems like the least he could do. ;-)

At the time Dürer painted his watercolors of Innsbruck, he had not yet come to Maximilian's attention. Later, Dürer would work on some of the most important parts of the emperor's artistic legacy, his 'Gedächtnis' (memorial), like the Arch of Honor, the prayerbook, and the Triumphal Procession.

Last but not least, posterity's 'view' of Maximilian has been largely determined by Dürer's final portrait, now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna:

Public domain via Wikimedia commons

Yet there he was, just starting out, painting away in the capital of then King Maximilian's only home turf, Tyrol. I wonder, when Dürer looked back upon his career, did he ever feel a bit prescient?

We'll probably never know. For now, Tiny Albrecht Dürer gives you a friendly goodnight:

Playmobil AD that I bought in Nuremberg.
Portrait of Maximilian sold separately.

A Gentle Walk around Tyrol

Poor, neglected blog! If I were a REAL writer I could make everyday life scintillating, I suppose. Better than, "Well, I wrote another thousand words today, and then I cleaned the bathroom. I bet Thomas Mann never had to clean the bathroom..."

You see why I only blog when something out of the ordinary happens, like another fun fact-finding trip to Tyrol! When I was there last year, I spent two days visiting museums and the Hofkirche. This time around, I focused on the great outdoors, spending time where Maximilian exercised his favorite hobby (hunting) and visiting the site of one of his few successful battles for territory: Kufstein, near the German border, which he besieged and conquered in 1504.

In keeping with this mission, I decided not to stay in Innsbruck proper, but rather in a delightful 'Berghütte' (mountain cabin) outside of town. Airbnb has been very good to me, I must say!

The cabin, with shower and sauna
on the ground floor

If you're going to spend your life following a dead emperor around, at least make it one who liked to hang out in beautiful places, that's what I say.

I've woken up to worse views.

As I mentioned before, Emperor Maximilian is still a folk hero to the Tyroleans, not because he was emperor, but because he was their 'Landesfürst', that is, he was the territorial ruler of Tyrol from 1490 until his death in 1519. Innsbruck was one of the places he liked best and visited most often during his peripatetic life. 

How do I know he's still a folk hero? Because when you mention to Tyroleans that you are writing a book about Emperor Maximilian I, they invariably start telling you stories about his life. (This in contrast to Germans, who tend to wrinkle their brows and say, "Which one was he, again?")

One of the favorite stories (or legends, depending on who you want to believe) is how Max climbed so high on one of his hunting expeditions that he couldn't get down again, and was rescued by an angel. This supposedly took place outside of Zirl, a little town near Innsbruck, in the Inn River valley. I took the bus there on the first day of my trip. 

The Inn River

The Martinswand, the scene of
Maximilian's dramatic rescue

At the foot of the Martinswand is a place called Martinsbühel, where one of the emperor's hunting lodges still exists!

St. Martin's Chapel, right next to the lodge

Maximilian was a gifted athlete and skilled hunter who loved to show off, especially in front of good-lookin' ladies. A great way to accomplish this was something called Schaujagd; literally, hunting that you watch. The Martinswand was a prime location for this. The ladies would gather in the courtyard, and watch the hunters climb the wall and chase chamois with long spears. 

An example of Schaujagd, from Maximilian's
hunting and fishing book, by Jörg Kölderer.
c. 1500. 

Since there was no Schaujagd going on the day I visited (though there were a few rock climbers out on the wall) I was forced to entertain myself, darn it. So, I took a little walk. 

My destination: The Kaiser Max Cave

It was steep, but doable. The next photo attempts to show the switchbacks. The steepest parts were provided with barriers of steel cable, to prevent people from blundering off the edge.

There's no shortage of astonishing views in Tyrol, lemme tell ya.

And then I made it: Kaiser Max Cave:

Celebratory selfie

The man himself! He looked busy, so I didn't bother him:

Remember the hunting lodge?

Since it was such a beautiful day, and I still had some vim and vigor left, I hiked up and down a gorge called Ehnbachklamm after I climbed back down the Martinswand.

None of the pictures really do it justice! One of the most amazing things was this: the whole time, 40 minutes up and 40 minutes down, all I could hear was the sound of rushing water. 

After 4-5 hours of hiking I got back to Innsbruck and ate a huge salad and 3/4 of a pizza. There may or may not have been beer involved as well. The next day I was so sore could barely walk, so instead of besieging Kufstein I sort of hobbled around it. But I'll save that story for another day. 

Austrian Wake-up

Taking the train from Munich to Innsbruck was a lot of fun, I must say, even if all my pictures from the train turned out blurry!

It's a short trip; just under two hours. As soon as you cross the Austrian border, you stop at a little town on the Inn called Kufstein.

Outside of Kufstein, with the Inn River
looking unusually placid.

Kufstein's #1 landmark is a fortress perched on a hill: Festung Kufstein

Seen from the bridge over the Inn

I hear you now: "Sara, this has something to do with Emperor Maximilian, doesn't it?" Why yes, how discerning of you! 

Kufstein Fortress was first mentioned in a document dating from 1205, and about 300 years later, Maximilian besieged it with his troops, acting in his capacity as territorial ruler of Tyrol. 

The siege of Kufstein, 1504*

This was actually part of a war of succession between the Upper-Bavarian and Palatine line of the House of Wittelsbach. Maximilian was on the side of the Bavarians, since his sister Kunigunde (I know, poor girl) had been married to Duke Albrecht IV of Bavaria since 1487.  

After the battle, Kufstein and two other territories belonged to Tyrol. It was one of Maximilian's few successful battles for territory, and of course he wanted it memorialized. Here it is, one of the 'slides' in his monumental pictorial ode to himself, the Triumphal Procession (Triumphzug):

Even though Max has gone down in history as 'the last knight' (not a contemporary nickname, by the way) he was quite innovative when it came to warfare. Under his command, infantry troops became more prevalent: they wore fancy clothes and were called 'Landsknechten'. Battalions of foot soldiers armed with pikes had the advantage over the old style warrior, armored knights on horseback.

Battle Scene from Weiß-Kunig
by Hans Burgkmair

You see one of Maximilian's other innovations in that print too: artillery. He didn't invent it, but he exploited it more fully than other rulers had done to that point. 

Which brings me to the title of this blog. Whimsically enough, Max liked to name his cannon. He named them things like Schöne Kathl (Pretty Kate), the Turkish Empress, and Purlepaus. My favorite nickname is 'Weckauf aus Österreich': Austrian Wake-up. 

A replica of ol' Wake-up
from Fortress Kufstein

Here are some more pictures from my day at the fortress:

After Max blew it up, he rebuilt it again, and today Festung Kufstein remains one of his most important building projects. The walls of the Kaiserturm are anywhere between 4 and 7.5 meters thick at various points! 

Max commemorated in a later fresco

When in doubt, eat pastry. This is a 'Krapfen',
filled with delicious apricot preserves. 

*Kufstein 1504 Image courtesy of Dnalor 01- CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Feeding the Royal Face, Part Two

Last time, I talked a little bit about what you might call the day-to-day imperial food culture. But what about those really big occasions, when a little something extra was called for?

Maximilian as King of the Romans
17th century woodcut

When Maximilian became King of the Romans in 1486, he gave orders for food to be prepared on streets and squares for the common people. For example, a gigantic spit was erected where a whole ox was roasted, which was filled with a pig, which was stuffed with a goose, then a chicken, then a game bird. Rhein wine flowed from city pumps.

Maximilian sees your Turducken, and raises you an Oxpigoochibird.

While the commoners were feasting thusly, Maximilian and his father, Emperor Friedrich III, were dining at the Rathaus (city hall), where a festive coronation banquet was given. Kaiser and King sat eight steps higher than everyone else under a golden canopy, and ate from gold plates while the rest ate from silver. Fifty different dishes were served, including thirty-two different meat dishes.

Maximilian (wearing crown)
and Friedrich III (wearing turban)
depicted as Magi in an altarpiece

Another time, Maximilian and his entourage were celebrating Epiphany on the road. They stopped at an inn in Bozen, South Tyrol, all one hundred and forty of them, and had dinner. I certainly hope they called ahead.

Maximilian, c.1500
Glass panel

The menu consisted of four capons, nine chickens, two hares, one Star* of white peas "for his majesty's own mouth", sauerkraut, beets, apples, onions, cabbage, pears, two pigs "turned into sausages at his majesty's command", cumin seeds, and four hundred pounds of beef and veal.

Mention was also made of milk, vinegar, salt, barley, and lard, presumably from which to make sauces, and fine white flour for rolls.

*According to Wikipedia, a Star was about thirty liters. Let us hope that his Majesty elected to share his peas with the entire company, for the sake of the imperial digestion.

Food was linked to status in Maximilian's time, as it is today. Certain things on this menu were more likely to be found on the table of a peasant than an emperor, like cabbage, sauerkraut, and beets. Capons were a high-status food, however, and presumably Max made short work of all four of them himself.

Banquet scene from Weiß-Kunig

The cost for all of this? Unfortunately, the bill for the drinks didn't survive, but the food bill came to twenty Rhenish gulden, or about eight Kreuzer per person. Just to give you some idea of the value of money in those days, it was possible to live on an income of forty gulden per year, if you were extremely frugal.

I'll leave you with an interesting twist on 'four-and-twenty blackbirds baked in a pie'. In 1454, Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, gave a massive banquet which included, as part of the non-edible entertainment, twenty-eight musicians in a pie crust.

Sources:

Adamson, Melitta Weiss: Food in Medieval Times. Greenwood Press, 2004.

Benecke, Gerhard: Maximilian I: An Analytical Biography. Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982.

Wiesflecker, Hermann: Kaiser Maximilian I: Jugend, burgundische Erbe, und Römisches Königtum. 1971.

At table with the Emperor

Banquet of the Peacock
Anon, mid-15th century

Characters in novels have to eat sometimes, even in a book about art, music, and an emperor's quest for immortality. So I've been doing some reading about food in the late middle ages and early modern era, roughly around the year 1500. Learning about people's eating and drinking habits and food preparation is always interesting, otherwise we wouldn't find ourselves watching cooking shows for hours on end, right?

Before we talk about what Europeans were eating in the early sixteenth century, let's take a moment to consider what they weren't eating: they weren't eating tomatoes, corn, or chocolate. They weren't eating out-of-season fruit, and they weren't drinking coffee or tea. Even the potato, something we consider a staple of the traditional German diet, wasn't introduced in Europe until the second half of the sixteenth century.

So what were they eating? What did Maximilian find on his breakfast table in the morning, alongside his copy of The Financial Times? (Just kidding, there were no newspapers, either.)

Maximilian's Power Lunch
by Altdorfer

The short answer is bread, meat, and wine. Meals were served twice a day at court in Innsbruck, at 9 AM and 4 PM, and everyone ate together in one large dining hall, from the emperor on down to the lowliest kitchen maid. Who sat where was dictated by strict protocol. The royals, court officials, and the upper servants ate rolls of fine white flour, while the lower servants ate coarse dark rye bread. The diet was heavily meat-based, especially at the court of a fanatical hunter like Maximilian. 

Stag Hunt of Frederick the Wise by Cranach (detail)
Maximilian is on the right, in a blue hunting habit

Here's a typical menu at the Innsbruck court of Maximilian and his second wife Bianca Maria Sforza:

Breakfast: meat and soup, game fried in batter or in a pie with pastry, cabbage, porridge, bread, and wine.

Dinner: Cooked cabbage or beets, stew, salted calfs head, or similar dishes according to season.

Wine mixed with water was the beverage of choice.

Anonymous painting depicting
Herod's banquet
Innsbruck, 16th century

Catholics had to adhere to strict rules regarding fasting, and there were lots of fasting days: the forty days of Lent, plus Wednesday, Fridays, and Saturdays throughout the year, and the eve of major feast days. No meat, dairy, or animal fats were to be consumed. Cooks became very creative while working within these restrictions: almond milk sounds like a modern invention, but it was widely used on fast days instead of cow's milk, and they even succeeded in making cheese out of it!

If you were entertaining important guests on a fasting day, here's what the menu might have looked like:

1. Almond puree with dumplings
2. Fresh fish, boiled
3. Cabbage with fried trout
4. Crayfish cooked in wine, then pureed and sprinkled with cloves
5. Figs cooked in wine with whole almonds
6. Rice pudding made with almond milk and decorated with whole almonds
7. Trout boiled in wine
8. Crayfish cooked in wine
9. Shortbread with grapes covered with dough, and sprinkled with icing sugar
10. Various kinds of pears, apples, and nuts
    
    
    
    

    

    The Marriage at Cana by Gerard David,
    with members of Maximilian's family depicted

    
    

Maximilian was fond of good wine, especially Ribolla and Malvasia, and he liked fruit: apples, pears, cherries, peaches and grapes. He also had his fruitier special-order southern fruit like melons, oranges, and figs.

Food is a powerful way to connect to happy memories: people evoke nostalgia by preparing cherished family recipes. Maximilian was no different. In a letter to his daughter Margaret, who was governor of the Netherlands, Maximilian mentions that he is sending her a kitchen hand, and asked that he be taught to make pâtés in the Flemish way. Considering that Maximilian spent some of the happiest years of his life at the Burgundian court, it's no wonder that he looked to food to remind him of those days.

Banquet scene from Weiß-Kunig
showing Margaret of York,
Maximilian, and Mary

Sources:

Adamson, Melitta Weiss: Food in Medieval Times. Greenwood Press, 2004

Benecke, Gerhard: Maximilian I: An Analytical Biography. Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982