The Goethe House in the old town of Frankfurt am Main was the family residence of the Goethe family, most notably Johann Wolfgang von Goethe until 1795. Johann Wolfgang was himself born here in 1749 to his parents, Johann Caspar Goethe, a lawyer, and Katherine Elisabeth Textor, daughter of the mayor of Frankfurt. Johann Wolfgang lived here, along with his sister Cornelia, until 1765, aged sixteen, when he moved to Leipzig to study law. Goethe subsequently wrote about his childhood spent here in his autobiography Aus Meiner Leben: Dichtung und Wahrheit, (Out of my Life: Poetry and Truth), (1811-1833), and describing his birth thus: Frankfurt am Main [ˈfraŋkfʊrt] is the largest city in the German state of Hessen and the fifth largest city of Germany. ... Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (pronounced [gø tÉ™]) (August 28, 1749 – March 22, 1832) was a German writer, politician, humanist, scientist, and literary philosopher. ... 1795 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... Events While in debtors prison, John Cleland writes Fanny Hill (Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure). ... 1765 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ... Map of Germany showing Leipzig   Leipzig? [ˈlaiptsɪç] (Polish; Sorbian/Lusatian: Lipsk) is the largest city in the federal state (Bundesland) of Saxony in Germany. ... Dichtung und Wahrheit (Poetry and Truth) (1811-1833) (it should be recognized that the German Dichtung also means fiction which indicates a humourous notion that perhaps not all aspects are unfolded truthfully therein), is an autobiography limning Goethes happy childhood, his relationship with his sister Cornelia, and his infatuation... 1811 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ... 1833 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ...

"On the 28th of August, 1749, at mid-day, as the clock struck twelve, I came into the world, at Frankfurt-am-Main. My horoscope was propitious: the sun stood in the sign of the Virgin, and had culminated for the day; Jupiter and Venus looked on him with a friendly eye, and Mercury not adversely; while Saturn and Mars kept themselves indifferent; the moon alone, just full, exerted the power of her reflection all the more, as she had then reached her planetary hour.

She opposed herself, therefore, to my birth, which could not be accomplished until this hour was passed."

Showing a prodigious intellect and talent from an early age, Goethe wrote his first substantially acknowledged novel Götz von Berlichingen and his ode to suicide The Sorrows of Young Werther here as well as beginning his great work, Faust. Today, the visitor can see the study with its writing desk as it would have been used by Goethe to pen these early works. Die Leiden des jungen Werther (In English: The Sorrows of Young Werther) is a loosely autobiographical novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, first published in 1774. ... Faust or Faustus is the protagonist of a popular German tale that has been used as the basis for many different fictional works. ...

History

The house was bought in 1733 by Goethe's grandmother, Cornelia Goethe, a guest house hostess. It was in fact originally two houses, dating from around 1600, until 1755, when Goethe's father extensively remodelled it into the structure we see today. Goethe writes in his autobiography that his father was careful to preserve the double overhang of the facade, which was not permitted in a new buildings under the codes of 1719 and 1749, emphasising that it was a remodelling of the existing structures and not a new construction. Events February 12 - British colonist James Oglethorpe founds Savannah, Georgia. ... Events January January 1 - Scotland adopts January 1st as being New Years Day February February 17 - Giordano Bruno burned in a stake for heresy July July 2 - Battle of Nieuwpoort: Dutch forces under Maurice of Nassau defeat Spanish forces under Archduke Albert in a battle on the coastal dunes. ... 1755 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... // Events January 23 - The Principality of Liechtenstein is created within the Holy Roman Empire April 25 - Daniel Defoe publishes Robinson Crusoe June 10 - Battle of Glen Shiel Prussia conducts Europes first systematic census Ongoing events Great Northern War (1700-1721) Births November 30 - Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, Princess of... Events While in debtors prison, John Cleland writes Fanny Hill (Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure). ...

After leaving the Goethe family in 1795, the house went through a series of owners, until its purchase in 1863 by Otto Volger, who restored it to the condition the Goethe family had left it in, as a monument to its famous inhabitant. The house was destroyed during Allied bombing on the 22nd May 1944, but was restored after the war between 1947 and 1951, as closely as possible to its original condition and furnishing, giving an insight into what life was like for a reasonably wealthy resident of Frankfurt in the 18th century. It is next door to the Goethe Museum, which opened to the public along with the restored Goethe House in 1954, and nearby are the excavated foundations of the Jewish ghetto, which, along with the Jewish cemetary, gives a further glimpse of the older Frankfurt as Goethe himself would have experienced it. 1795 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... 1863 is a common year starting on Thursday. ... 1944 was a leap year starting on Saturday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1947 was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1951 was a common year starting on Monday; see its calendar. ... 1954 was a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

References

http://www.altfrankfurt.com/Goethe/

External links

• Information on and plan of the house (in German)
• Goethe's autobiography "Out of my life: Poetry and Truth" from Project Gutenberg