Schloss Wasserhof: Beethoven’s 1826 Residence in Austria
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.2
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Austria
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- Eras represented
- Early Modern
- Civilizations
- Habsburg, Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Domestic
- Remains
- Elite Residence
On this page7 sections
History
Schloss Wasserhof is a sixteenth-century estate building in Austria, now within Krems an der Donau, where Ludwig van Beethoven stayed during the autumn of 1826. The present building dates from around 1550, while the surrounding estate at Gneixendorf has medieval associations and later became connected with Beethoven’s final years.
Medieval origins and changing ownership
Gneixendorf appears in twelfth-century history through Otto von Machland, a medieval nobleman associated with a bequest of the estate to Baumgartenberg Abbey, a Cistercian monastery in Upper Austria. The estate also included a house and vineyard. Count Adolf von Althan acquired it in 1630, after which it passed through several owners before Nikolaus Johann van Beethoven, Ludwig van Beethoven’s brother, purchased it in 1819.
Beethoven at Gneixendorf
Ludwig van Beethoven arrived at Schloss Wasserhof with his nephew Karl van Beethoven on 29 September 1826. During the stay, he completed the String Quartet in F major, Op. 135, a composition for two violins, viola, and cello, on 30 October. He then wrote a new finale for the String Quartet in B-flat major, Op. 130, replacing its original Grosse Fuge. Beethoven sent the manuscript to his publisher on 22 November and left for Vienna in early December. He became ill during the journey and died three months later.
Later ownership and renovation
Nikolaus Johann van Beethoven sold the estate in 1836. On 21 July 1847 it passed to the von Kleyle family and later came by inheritance to Ida Alesina von Schweitzer, née von Kleyle. In 1862, she and her uncle Friedrich von Kleyle assembled recollections of Beethoven’s stay in Gneixendorf for the physician and writer Franz Lorenz. Since 2007, the property has been privately owned by the Viennese architect Ernst Linsberger. Comprehensive renovation took place between 2011 and 2015.
Remains
The sixteenth-century building
The present Schloss Wasserhof dates from around 1550. Its surviving form includes the southwest corner of the building, where Beethoven occupied a three-window room on the first floor during his stay. A sundial from the late eighteenth century is set between the second and third south-facing windows. Its position is recalled in a remark by Karl van Beethoven in one of Ludwig’s conversation books, notebooks in which visitors wrote messages for him after he became deaf: “There is a sundial in front of your windows.”
Restored fabric
The building underwent comprehensive renovation from 2011 to 2015 during Ernst Linsberger’s ownership. The restored structure retains the room associated with Beethoven’s 1826 residence and the late eighteenth-century sundial on the south façade.
