Page - 272 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 1

Chapter 5272 40 Hirn 1885, i, p. 8 refers to a notebook, a desktop, drawing paper and a drawing board (‘ein ungeschrieben Buch, Pultbretter, Reispapier, Reisbrettsteften’ that crop up repeatedly in the account books of the small school instituted for Maximilian, Ferdinand and the Edelk- naben with whom they were educated. According to Strada Maximilian ii himself highly valued a competence in drawing, which he had taught to his sons in Strada’s studio (Doc. 1566-03-01; cf. below, Ch. 11.5). 41 There is very little known about the education that Maximilian and Ferdinand received; the relevant older biographies give some information (Holtzmann 1903, pp. 16–26; Hirn 1885, i., pp. 4–10; bibl 1929, pp.25–32; Fichtner 2001, pp. 7–12; Simons 2009, pp. 32–39) from which it results that the young Archdukes had good, but not necessarily brilliant teachers: in fact most of them are quite obscure (the few better known ones, such as Kas- par Ursinus Velius and Georg Tannstetter, died before Maximilian was eleven years old). Hirn sums up: ‘Aus all diesen Einzelzügen resultiert ein Bild guter, häuslicher Erziehung, wie es ein wohl situiertes, bürgerliches Patrizierhaus jener Zeit durchwegs aufzuweisen hatte’. He also points out (p. 4) that Ferdinand i personally supervised his sons’ education, and doubtless participated in it to the extent his itinerary allowed. As a young man he himself had spent three years at the court of his Aunt Margaret of Austria in the Neth- erlands, where he met Erasmus, who personally presented him with a copy of the sec- ond edition of his Institutio principis christiani, the beginning of a correspondence which lasted unto Erasmus’ death (Kohler 2003<a>, pp. 56–57; Kohler 2003<b>). 42 Maximilian i/ Treitzsauerwein/ Schultz 1888. Der Weißkunig was written at the suggestion and partly at the dictation of Maximilian i himself by his secretary Marx Trautsauerwein, and illustrated with woodcuts by Leonard Beck, Hans Burgkmair, Hans Schäuffelein and From occasional remarks in the sources it appears that both Ferdinand and his elder brother did indeed know how to draw. Both would in later life be report- ed to engage in various artistic and scientific pursuits: Ferdinand knew how to blow glass and worked at the lathe, and Maximilian was reputed to draw, to be interested in alchemist experiments and to work in precious metals. We have already seen that he was particularly interested in civil engineering.40 It seems likely that the young Archdukes had developed these tastes and talents because the training in design and manual exercise had been an in- tegral part of their education. As yet there is little information on the exact curriculum of Maximilian, his younger brother and the young noblemen that had been selected to be educated with them.41 But though we cannot tell with certainty what they learnt, what books they read, what interested them, some idea of it can be deduced from the ideas current in the period, the themes we know were of interest to their peers, the people they met, the books and other materials that were available to them. One of the objects that certainly were available to them was the Weißkunig, the romanticized autobiography of their great-grandfather, Emperor Maxi- milian i. Though we have no positive proof that their tutors did indeed avail themselves of it, I think there can be little doubt that it played an important role in establishing the curriculum of his young great-grandsons.42 In some