Page - 721 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 2

721Ambitions as a Publisher mistress is a misapprehension of Svátek which needs to be corrected again and again.6 Some years after his wife’s death, perhaps on his trip to the Elector August of Saxony in the autumn of 1576, Strada began a liaison with Margaretha Hum- mer or Himmer, from Marienberg in the Margraviate of Meissen, whom he describes in his will both as his ‘Dienerin’—his servant—and his ‘concubine’. In 1582 Rudolf ii had legitimized the two sons she gave him, Tobia, born in 1578, and Martino, born in 1580. Martino appears to have died soon after, since he is not mentioned in Strada’s will, but his sister Sicilia survived and was promised a legacy of hundred Gulden. Whereas their mother had to be content with her outstanding wages, a third of the revenue of Strada’s various houses and gar- dens was assigned to Tobia’s maintenance and education, and he was allotted a decent share in his father’s inheritance. Moreover his father appointed cura- tors expected to manage his patrimony until his majority and ‘to raise him to diligent study, gravity and the fear of God’.7 Strada doubtless had taken equal care of the education of his legitimate male offspring, who were taught in the Vienna Jesuit College, founded by Peter Canisius in 1552 in response to Ferdinand i’s request to Ignatius of Loyola.8 6 Svatek 1883; Svatek 1891–1892; cf. Ch. 0.1. In fact Rudolf ii’s mistress was Anna Maria Strada (1579–1629), the natural daughter of Ottavio Strada and one Mariana Hofmaisterin, according to his testament of 26 February 1606 [HHStA, Obersthofmarschallamt, Karton 624, Konvolut 1606/1]. She was the mother of two of Rudolf’s illegitimate but recognized sons, Mathias and Carolus Faustus (but not of his favourite son Julius, who would become insane and is the subject of many legends and romantic tales). This is clear from the documents relating to Don Mathias of Austria in the Vienna Hofkammerarchiv, Hoffinanz, r., nr. 185, ‘1622, Jan. 18’ (‘Konvolut Don Mathias’). I am grateful to Hofrat Dr Christian Sapper who discovered and shared these documents with me at the time; see now his exhaustive study on Rudolf’s chil- dren, which includes brief essays on the Strada family and Anna Maria’s husband, Christoph Ranfft von Wiesenthal (Sapper 1999, pp. 30–44). They are corroborated by Ottavio Strada himself in the entry of Rudolf ii in his ms. Chronica thesauri antiquitatum (Prague, University Library, cod. xi.d.20), p. lviii), which gives a survey of Rudolf’s children from various mothers, of whom only Anna Maria Strada is mentioned by name. Her marriage to Christoph Ranfft is evident both from the ‘Konvolut Don Mathias’ and from Ottavio’s will (cf. Jansen 1988, p. 132 and 143, n. 5). Much later, when already resident in France for many years, Ottavio Strada the Younger still kept in touch with his half-sister and her family, witness a letter by Ranfft to his brother-in-law of 1629 (Vienna, HHStA, rhr, Privilegia Varii Generis 1/10, fol. 80–87). 7 Doc 1584-07-01; Lietzmann 1997, pp. 391–392 suggests that Strada met Margaretha in Meissen on his way back to Vienna from Dresden; Doc 1582-00-00. Tobia was perhaps still alive when his brother Ottavio made his testament on 25 February 1605, though he had not kept in touch: ‘Meinem unehlichen Bruder Tobiam verschaf ich 30 L. wan er noch lebt’. [HHStA, Obersthof- marschallamt, Karton 624, Konvolut 1606/1]. 8 ‘In casa delli Jesuiti ò tenuto in donzina alle spese in compagnia d’altri gentilhuomini gli miei figliuoli’. (Strada to Jacopo Dani, Doc 1576-09-28).