January 11, 1753 Birth of Charlotte Buff (1753-1828) in Wetzlar, Germany. She was a close friend of the poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in their youth. Goethe fell in love with her but she rejected him and instead married Johann Christian Kestner, a diplomat and art collector. In Goethe's novel The Sorrows of Young Werther, the character of … [Read more...]

January 10, 1573 Birth of Simon Marius (1573-1624) in Gunzenhausen, Germany. Marius was the astronomer who named the four largest moons of Jupiter. He was one of the first astronomers to use a telescope, the first to report the spiral nebula in Andromeda and one of the first to note sunspots. January 10, 1785 Death of Heinrich Wilhelm … [Read more...]

January 9, 1674 Birth of Reinhard Keiser (1674-1739) in Weissenfels, Germany. An early composer of operas, his style starts with Baroque and ends with Rococo. He studied music in Leipzig but then went to Hamburg where he wrote 120 operas. January 9, 1803 Birth of Christopher Memminger in Nayhingen, Germany. As a young man he immigrated … [Read more...]

January 8 Feast Day of St. Severinus (ca. 410 – 482) St. Severinus was born in about 410 in North Africa. He traveled to the area which is now Austria in about 453 to be of assistance to those afflicted by the attacks of the Huns. He founded a series of monasteries in the area to attempt to restore a certain order and organization after the … [Read more...]

January 7, 1742 Birth of the enlightenment philosopher, Christian Garve. Garve was a professor at the University of Leipzig. He was noted as a moral philosopher and the translator to German of Cicero's De Officiis and the works of Edmund Burke and Adam Smith. January 7, 1830 Birth of Albert Bierstadt (1830-1902) in Solingen, Germany. … [Read more...]

January 6 Three Kings Day (Dreikönigentag) January 6, 1486 Birth of Martin Agricola (pseudonym of Martin Sore) in Schwiebus (now in Poland). He was a German music scholar and composer in Magdeburg. He was the first to give attention to the musical needs of the Reformation. January 6, 1821 Birth of Jakob Frohschammer in … [Read more...]

January 5, 1762 Birth of Constanze Weber (1762-1842) in Zell, Austria. Weber was a soprano who married Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1782 in Vienna. After her husband's death she oversaw the publication of his music. In 1809 she married Georg Nissen, who wrote the first biography of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Nissen died in 1826 and Konstanze … [Read more...]

January 4, 1428 Death of Friedrich I (also called Friedrich der Streitbare) in Altenburg, Germany. Friedrich became the Elector of Saxony in the Holy Roman Empire. He assisted the emperor, Sigismund, in a campaign against the Bohemian adherents of Jan Hus in 1420. January 4, 1675 Birth of Bl. Liberatus (Johannes Laurentius Weiß) in … [Read more...]

January 3, 1521 Pope Leo X publishes his Papal Bull Decet Romanum pontificem, condemning Martin Luther and officially excommunicating the Augustinian monk for burning Leo's previous bull Exsurge Domine. January 3, 1571 Death of Joachim II Hektor. Joachim II Hektor was the Elector of Brandenburg at the time of the Reformation. He … [Read more...]