DFG research project on the works of Aurora von Königsmarck

Aurora von Königsmarck (1662–1728) was the unrivalled and adored model of a gallant lady and the most important poet of this era in the German-speaking world. From 2025 to 2028, the DFG is funding a project based at the Universities of Würzburg and Eichstätt and the TU/ULB Darmstadt to publish her literary works and a selection of her correspondence.

 

The German-Swedish Countess Maria Aurora von Königsmarck (1662–1728) is regarded in German-speaking countries as the unrivalled and idolised model of a gallant lady. Born into a powerful family of Swedish high nobility, she became the mistress of Augustus the Strong. Their son was Moritz von Sachsen, who later became Marshal of France. She eventually became provost of the imperial women's monastery in Quedlinburg and served as abbess for a long time.

As the organiser and centre of courtly and gallant festivities, as well as a musician and actress, she was considered, as Voltaire put it, ‘the most famous woman of two centuries’. Last but not least, she was also a gallant poet of the highest order, writing secular and religious poetry, dramas, autofictional narratives and literary gallant letters in German, French, Italian, Swedish and Latin. Her correspondents included kings and princes as well as scholars such as Charles XII of Sweden, Frederick William I of Prussia, Anton Ulrich of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Augustus the Strong, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and August Hermann Francke.