Mozart Letters and Documents – Online Edition

The correspondence of the Mozart family is among the most important treasures in the cultural heritage of the world. The letters provide not only glimpses into the daily life of this family of musicians, but the collection is at the same time a valuable source for the history of music in 18th-century Europe.

The majority of the autographs is preserved in the Bibliothca Mozartiana of the Salzburg Mozarteum Foundation, including around 200 of Mozart’s original letters, and around 300 letters written by his father Leopold. The other sources can be found in archives and libraries worldwide and in private hands, too.

The correspondence of Wolfgang Amadé Mozart and his family, which has been published in print, from 1962 on, in the complete edition by Wilhelm A. Bauer and Otto Erich Deutsch, is being continuously revised according to the sources. Gaps are filled and the publication of the correspondence up to 1858, which Bauer/Deutsch (BD) had published only partially and in excerpts, is systematically continued. In addition, more letters and documents of the Mozart family and on the institutional history preserved in the archives of the Mozarteum Foundation are going to be published on a large scale.

The texts are presented in diplomatic transcripts, and, wherever possible, combined with digital images.

In the rendition of the letters in htm format, a distinction is made between the original document text (in the case of letters, the version the writer prepared for mailing) and annotations in the manuscript by later hands (numberings, signatures, stamps/seals, commentaries about the provenance, the writer, etc.).

The user is provided with a printable version of the main body (in the case of letters including the address) in PDF format without the annotations by later hands.

The project is supported by the Packard Humanities Institute (PHI), Los Altos/CA.