August Kestner
Encyclopedia
Georg Christian August Kestner (28 November 1777 in Hanover
Hanover
Hanover or Hannover, on the river Leine, is the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony , Germany and was once by personal union the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, under their title as the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg...

; 5 March 1853 in Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

) was a German diplomat and art collector.

Life

Kestner was the son of civil servant
Civil service
The term civil service has two distinct meanings:* A branch of governmental service in which individuals are employed on the basis of professional merit as proven by competitive examinations....

 Johann Christian Kestner and his wife Charlotte Buff
Charlotte Buff
Charlotte Buff was known to be a love interest of Goethe, whom she rejected to marry the diplomat and art collector Johann Christian Kestner. She mirrors in the central character Lotte of the masterpiece "The Sorrows of Young Werther" of Goethe, in which this extended certain moments of suffering...

. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was a German writer, pictorial artist, biologist, theoretical physicist, and polymath. He is considered the supreme genius of modern German literature. His works span the fields of poetry, drama, prose, philosophy, and science. His Faust has been called the greatest long...

 met and fell in love with Charlotte while she was engaged to Johann. Repeated rejections by Buff partially provided the youthful suffering that Goethe lets experience the hero of his work Die Leiden des jungen Werthers
The Sorrows of Young Werther
The Sorrows of Young Werther is an epistolary and loosely autobiographical novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, first published in 1774; a revised edition of the novel was published in 1787...

(The Sorrows of Young Werther).

From 1796 to 1799 Kestner studied law at the University of Göttingen
Georg-August University of Göttingen
The University of Göttingen , known informally as Georgia Augusta, is a university in the city of Göttingen, Germany.Founded in 1734 by King George II of Great Britain and the Elector of Hanover, it opened for classes in 1737. The University of Göttingen soon grew in size and popularity...

 and was immediately afterwards called up as a Vernehmungsrichter (interrogation judge) at the court in Hanover
Hanover
Hanover or Hannover, on the river Leine, is the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony , Germany and was once by personal union the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, under their title as the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg...

.

In 1803 Kestner was appointed 'secret office-secretary in the civil service'. As such, he made his living from 1818 to 1849, among other things, as an official envoy and Minister-resident in Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

 and Naples
Naples
Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

. Also he was a diplomat
Diplomat
A diplomat is a person appointed by a state to conduct diplomacy with another state or international organization. The main functions of diplomats revolve around the representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the sending state, as well as the promotion of information and...

 of Hanover to the Holy See
Holy See
The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...

 in Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

. As an art lover, he gathered small objects from Egyptian
Art of Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egyptian art is the painting, sculpture, architecture and other arts produced by the civilization in the lower Nile Valley from 5000 BC to 300 AD. Ancient Egyptian art reached a high level in painting and sculpture, and was both highly stylized and symbolic...

 as well as Greco-Roman art. He, Theodor Panofka
Theodor Panofka
Theodor Sigismund Panofka was one of the first scholars to make a systemic study of the pottery of Ancient Greece, and one of the founders of the institution later to become the German Archaeological Institute .-Life:Panofka studied classical philology at Berlin University from 1819...

 and Otto Magnus von Stackelberg
Otto Magnus von Stackelberg (archaeologist)
Count Otto Magnus Baron von Stackelberg was one of the first archaeologists, as well as a writer, painter and art historian.-Early life:...

 founded the "Instituto di Corrispondenza Archeologica" in 1829, later to become the German Archaeological Institute
German Archaeological Institute
The German Archaeological Institute is an institution of research within the field of archaeology , and a "scientific corporation", with parentage of the federal Foreign Office of Germany-Origin:...

, and was in 1838 entrusted with its direction as its secretary-general.

After his retirement from the civil service, Kestner lived in Rome until his death on 5 March 1853.

The Kestner-Museum
Kestner-Museum
Kestner-Museum is a museum in Hanover, Germany, founded in 1889. It was renamed "Museum August Kestner" in December 2007 to avoid confusion with the "Kestnergesellschaft", a local art gallery.-External links:*...

 in Hanover is named after him.

Works

  • Römische Studien (Berlin: Decker, 1850)
  • Sulla: ein Trauerspiel in 5 Aufzügen (Hannover: Zahn, 1855)
  • Über die Nachahmung in der Malerei (Frankfurt a.M., 1818)
  • Wem gehört die Kunst (1830)

Weblinks

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