Zrinski
11-28-2005, 10:04 PM
Found this by accident...I was very surprised to find Haydn was most likely of Croatian origin. :eek: :p
http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Haydn%20and%20folk%20music
"Haydn and Croatian ethnicity
Assuming for the moment that the reverse-transmission theory is wrong, we must ponder why so many specifically Croatian songs crop up in Haydn's music. One possibility is simply that subsequent scholarship has pursued the Croatian connection more assiduously than that to other ethnicities--in fact the very Croatian songs have also been detected in Beethoven's Ludwig van Beethoven (baptized December 17, 1770; died March 26, 1827) was a German composer of classical music, who predominantly lived in Vienna, Austria. He was a major musical figure in the transitional period between the Classical and Romantic eras. Beethoven is widely regarded as one of the greatest of composers.
Background, composition and reception
Beethoven was a lover of nature who spent a great deal of his time on walks in the country. Another possibility is that Haydn simply liked the Croatian songs the best. A third possibility is that Haydn felt the Croatian songs would be most likely to be novel to his listeners, who were mostly of German or Hungarian Magyars are an ethnic group primarily associated with Hungary. In English they are sometimes called Hungarians.
The word Hungarian has also a wider meaning, because – especially in the past – it referred to all inhabitants of the Kingdom of Hungary irrespective of their ethnicity (i.e. not only to the Magyars). Specifically, the Latin term natio hungarica referred to all nobles of the Kingdom of Hungary irrespective of their ethnicity.
Finally, and most controversially, it has been conjectured that Joseph Haydn was himself Croatian Croats (Croatian: Hrvati) are a south Slavic people mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There is a notable Croat diaspora in western Europe, the Americas, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. The Croats are predominantly Catholic and their language is Croatian.
Locations
Croatia is the nation state of the Croats, while in the adjacent Bosnia and Herzegovina they are one of the constitutive nations. That is to say, he was a member of the Croatian ethnic minority residing in eastern Austria. In this view, it was in fact Croatian folk songs that Haydn heard in his childhood home, and during this time he imprinted them forever in his memory. The "Haydn as Croatian" theory was originated by a Croatian ethnologist named Franjo Kuhač, and was propagated (for instance, in various editions of the prestigious Grove Dictionary The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedia (or encyclopedic dictionary) of music and musicians, generally considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject.
It was first published in 1878 as A Dictionary of Music and Musicians in four volumes edited by Sir George Grove with an appendix and index by the musicologist Henry Hadow. Here is some of the evidence that has been adduced.
The village of Rohrau There are several communities and places that have the name Rohrau.
In Austria:
- Rohrau, a town in Lower Austria
- Schloss Rohrau
In Germany:
- Rohrau zu Gärtringen, Baden-Württemberg
...in which Haydn lived for his first six years was apparently a Croatian ethnic enclave. The Croatian language is a language of the western group of South Slavic languages which is used primarily by the Croats. It is one of the standard versions of the Central-South Slavic diasystem.
Croatian is based on the Štokavian dialect (with some influence from Čakavian and Kajkavian) and written with the Latin alphabet.
It is still spoken in the area today. There are also many Croatians named Hajdin (phonetically very similar to German Haydn), or Hajdinjak. Assiduous Wikipedia editors, consulting the online Croatian telephone book, have found 124 entries for Hajdin and 218 entries for Hajdinjak , mostly in the Medjimurje region (Cakovec, Prelog Prelog (Hungarian: Perlak; lat. 46.335 N, long. 16.6155556 E, alt. 125 m) is located in northern Croatia, about 15 km east of Čakovec in Međimurje county. 7,871 people (2001) reside in the Prelog municipality, while 4,288 live in the town itself (2001)."
http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Haydn%20and%20folk%20music
"Haydn and Croatian ethnicity
Assuming for the moment that the reverse-transmission theory is wrong, we must ponder why so many specifically Croatian songs crop up in Haydn's music. One possibility is simply that subsequent scholarship has pursued the Croatian connection more assiduously than that to other ethnicities--in fact the very Croatian songs have also been detected in Beethoven's Ludwig van Beethoven (baptized December 17, 1770; died March 26, 1827) was a German composer of classical music, who predominantly lived in Vienna, Austria. He was a major musical figure in the transitional period between the Classical and Romantic eras. Beethoven is widely regarded as one of the greatest of composers.
Background, composition and reception
Beethoven was a lover of nature who spent a great deal of his time on walks in the country. Another possibility is that Haydn simply liked the Croatian songs the best. A third possibility is that Haydn felt the Croatian songs would be most likely to be novel to his listeners, who were mostly of German or Hungarian Magyars are an ethnic group primarily associated with Hungary. In English they are sometimes called Hungarians.
The word Hungarian has also a wider meaning, because – especially in the past – it referred to all inhabitants of the Kingdom of Hungary irrespective of their ethnicity (i.e. not only to the Magyars). Specifically, the Latin term natio hungarica referred to all nobles of the Kingdom of Hungary irrespective of their ethnicity.
Finally, and most controversially, it has been conjectured that Joseph Haydn was himself Croatian Croats (Croatian: Hrvati) are a south Slavic people mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There is a notable Croat diaspora in western Europe, the Americas, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. The Croats are predominantly Catholic and their language is Croatian.
Locations
Croatia is the nation state of the Croats, while in the adjacent Bosnia and Herzegovina they are one of the constitutive nations. That is to say, he was a member of the Croatian ethnic minority residing in eastern Austria. In this view, it was in fact Croatian folk songs that Haydn heard in his childhood home, and during this time he imprinted them forever in his memory. The "Haydn as Croatian" theory was originated by a Croatian ethnologist named Franjo Kuhač, and was propagated (for instance, in various editions of the prestigious Grove Dictionary The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedia (or encyclopedic dictionary) of music and musicians, generally considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject.
It was first published in 1878 as A Dictionary of Music and Musicians in four volumes edited by Sir George Grove with an appendix and index by the musicologist Henry Hadow. Here is some of the evidence that has been adduced.
The village of Rohrau There are several communities and places that have the name Rohrau.
In Austria:
- Rohrau, a town in Lower Austria
- Schloss Rohrau
In Germany:
- Rohrau zu Gärtringen, Baden-Württemberg
...in which Haydn lived for his first six years was apparently a Croatian ethnic enclave. The Croatian language is a language of the western group of South Slavic languages which is used primarily by the Croats. It is one of the standard versions of the Central-South Slavic diasystem.
Croatian is based on the Štokavian dialect (with some influence from Čakavian and Kajkavian) and written with the Latin alphabet.
It is still spoken in the area today. There are also many Croatians named Hajdin (phonetically very similar to German Haydn), or Hajdinjak. Assiduous Wikipedia editors, consulting the online Croatian telephone book, have found 124 entries for Hajdin and 218 entries for Hajdinjak , mostly in the Medjimurje region (Cakovec, Prelog Prelog (Hungarian: Perlak; lat. 46.335 N, long. 16.6155556 E, alt. 125 m) is located in northern Croatia, about 15 km east of Čakovec in Međimurje county. 7,871 people (2001) reside in the Prelog municipality, while 4,288 live in the town itself (2001)."