On November 21, 1747, Leopold Mozart married Anna Maria Pertlin (or Bertlin), daughter of the steward of the Convent of St. Gilgen. "To-day is the anniversary of our wedding," wrote L. Mozart (November 21, 1772); "it is, I believe, exactly twenty-five years since we were struck with the good idea of getting married, or rather it had occurred to us many years before. But good things take time."
They were reputed the handsomest pair of their time in Salzburg, and their existing portraits do not contradict this. Frau Mozart was, as far as she can be represented by letters and descriptions, a very good-tempered woman, full of love for her family, but in no way distinguished; and the often verified experience that great men owe their gifts and their culture principally to their mothers was not proved to be true in the case of Mozart. She submitted willingly to the superiority of her husband, and left to his care and management with absolute confidence all that lay outside the sphere of the actual housekeeping. The possession by WOLFGANG'S MOTHER AND SISTER—HIS BIRTH. each of those qualities necessary for the happiness of the other lay at the root of the heartfelt love and affection which bound them to each other and to their children, and the latter were provided with the surest foundation for their moral culture in the influence of a pure and harmonious family life. They were deeply attached to their cheerful, happy-tempered mother; but that she failed in authority was clear when she accompanied her son in his ill-considered visit to Paris. In spite of her better judgment she was unable either to control his impetuosity or to withstand his endearments.
Though far inferior to her husband in cultivation, she was not without understanding, and had a turn for the humorous, which characterised her as a native of Salzburg. In this respect Wolfgang was her true son.
Of seven children resulting from this union, only two survived: a daughter, Maria Anna (called Marianne or Nannerl in the family), born July 30, 1751, and a son Wolfgang, born January 27, 1756.[26] His birth almost cost his mother her life, and her lingering recovery occasioned much anxiety to her friends.
The daughter showed so decided a talent for music, that her father early began to give her lessons on the clavier. This made a great impression on her brother, then but three years old; he perched himself at the clavier, and amused himself by finding out thirds, which he struck with much demonstration of delight; he also retained the more prominent passages in the pieces which he heard. In his fourth year his father began, in play, to teach him minuets and other pieces on the clavier; in a very short time he could play them with perfect correctness and in exact time. The impulse to produce something next awoke in him, and in his fifth year he composed and played little pieces, CHILDHOOD. which his father then wrote down.[27] A music-book which was intended for Marianne's exercises, and preserved by her as a precious relic, was in 1864 presented by the Grand Duchess Helene to the Mozarteum in Salzburg.[28] It contains minuets and other little pieces, and further on longer ones, such as an air with twelve variations, and is partly filled with passages by the composers Agrell, Fischer, Wagenseil, &c., of increasing difficulty, for the purpose of instruction, in the handwriting of the father and his musical friends. Wolfgang learned from this book. The following note is appended by his father to the eighth minuet: "Wolfgangerl learned this minuet in his fourth year." Similar remarks occur repeatedly; e.g., "This minuet and trio were learned by Wolfgangerl in half-an-hour, at half-past nine at night, on January 26, 1761, one day before his fifth year." They are simple, easy pieces in two parts, but requiring an independence of the hands, not possible without a degree of musicial comprehension which is surprising in so young a child.
The first of Wolfgang's compositions have his father's superscription: "Di Wolfgango Mozart, May 11, 1762, and July 16, 1762," little pieces modelled on those he had practised, in which of course originality of invention cannot be looked for; but the sense of simple melody and rounded form so peculiar to Mozart are there already, without any trace of childish nonsense.
The book went with them on their travels, and Mozart used the blank pages to write down pieces, which afterwards appeared in the first published sonatas (1763).
Most of the anecdotes of Mozart's childhood which testify to his wonderful genius, are contained in a letter from SCHACHTNER. Schachtner, which is here given entire, as the direct testimony of a contemporary.
Joh. André Schachtner (died 1795) had been court trumpeter at Salzburg from 1754, for which post a higher degree of musical attainment was necessary then than at the present day. He was not only a skilled musician, but displayed considerable literary cultivation, which he had obtained at the Jesuit school of Ingolstadt. The translation of a religious drama, "The Conversion of St. Augustine" from the Latin of Father Franz Neumayer, gained him the somewhat ambiguous praise of Gottsched, who writes: "We may even say that he wrote good German, nay, almost that he wrote good German poetry."[29] We shall find him later acting as librettist to Mozart.
He was intimate in Mozart's home, and his warm attachment is proved by the following interesting letter, written soon after Mozart's death to his sister.[30]