Places of Remembrance

(1) Umzug der jungen Graff-Merian-Familie von Frankfurt nach Nürnberg

Johann Andreas Graff, ein begabter Architekturmaler und Kupferstecher, arbeitet in der Frankfurter Werkstatt seines Lehrherrn Jacob Marrell, der mit der Witwe von Matthäus Merian d. Ä. verheiratet ist und in deren Haushalt Maria Sibylla Merian aus ihrer ersten Ehe mit Matthäus Merian d. Ä. lebt. 1665 heiraten der 29-jährige Graff und die
18-jährige Stieftochter von Marrell. 1668 kehrt Graff mit seiner jungen Frau, die 20 Jahre lang „Maria Sibylla Gräffin“ heißen wird, und der im selben Jahr geborenen Tochter Dorothea Maria in seine Heimatstadt Nürnberg zurück. Wahrscheinlich hofft das Ehepaar dort auf bessere Existenzbedingungen nach dem großen wirtschaftlichen Einbruch des 30-jährigen Kriegs.

(2) Karrierestart von Maria Sibylla

Tatsächlich gelingt es der jungen Ehefrau, neben der Haushaltsführung durch viele unterschiedliche Tätigkeiten wie Malen, Zeichnen, Kupferstechen, Sticken und Herstellung von Farben zum Familieneinkommen beizutragen. Sie kann sogar junge Mädchen  im Zeichnen, Malen, Kupferstechen und Sticken unterrichten – ungewöhnlich für eine Frau in ihrer Zeit. Sie wird schnell zu einer geachteten Künstlerin. Noch während ihrer Nürnberger Zeit wird sie von Joachim von Sandrart in seiner „Teutschen Academie“, einer umfassenden, viel gelesenen Künstler-Enzyklopädie, gewürdigt.

(3) Ein eigener Garten für die Familie

One of Maria Sybilla’s favourite students from a Nuremberg patrician family then plays an important role for her future life: She has a great uncle who, thanks to his office as the "Vorderster Losunger" (Mayor) and Vestenpfleger (curator of the castle), can provide a garden for the Graffs. In this garden Maria Sibylla makes a special discovery: "Hochrothe Käferlein" (Little Bright Red Beetles) arouse her especial interest, although these beetles are inconspicuous on first sight and feared as pests by garden lovers. Thanks to her connections to influential Nuremberg families, Maria Sibylla also gains access to many other gardens to collect enough material for her observations of nature.

(4) Erwähnung des Gartens im II. Raupenbuch

Indeed, despite the burden of many "part-time jobs" in the family house "Zur goldenen Sonne" (At the Golden Sun), today Bergstr. 10, she manages to work on her Flower Books and the two Caterpillar Books, enjoying the financial and active support of her husband Graff as etcher and publisher. In the Second Caterpillar Book the metamorphosis of a caterpillar (egg, caterpillar, pupa, beetle), together with the "golden yellow lily" as host plant, is illustrated and described (No. XXI). Even the place where it was found is indicated – "in my garden" – although without an exact location.

This period in Nuremberg comes to an abrupt end after the death of the second husband of Maria Sibylla's mother, her own foster father Jacob Marrell. The Graff-Merian couple obviously feels obliged to assist the widowed mother in Frankfurt, who has not been properly provided for. Between 1683 and 1685 Graff commuted between Frankfurt and Nuremberg, where he could earn money by working for private clients. The further history of this marriage and the separation of this couple is a different story and probably has several different reasons which can no longer be clearly established today.

(5) Verortung des Gartens im Studienbuch

Maria Sibylla does not stay in Frankfurt, but moves together with her mother to her half-brother Caspar Merian in a pious community guided by the tenets of early Christianity, the Labadists in Dutch West Frisia. There, in the secluded castle of Waltha, Maria Sibylla finds time to rearrange and label her pattern drawings.
It is only in this, her own hand-drawn and hand-written study book that she describes the location of the Nuremberg Garden:

"In early July, when I went up to my garden (next to the castle church or imperial chapel in Nuremberg) to look at the flowers and search for the caterpillars, I found ....".

With this double mention "next to the castle church / imperial chapel" the secret is solved: it can only be the small garden which is directly adjacent to the tower of the imperial chapel (today called the "Heidenturm").

(6) Bedeutung des Studienbuchs

She carried on making entries in this study book after her Surinam expedition and apparently kept it until her death in Amsterdam (1717) as an indispensable collection of motifs for her high-quality paintings on silk and parchment. Thanks to the personal details of where, when and with whom she made her finds and how the caterpillars were raised, the study book is also the most important source of autobiographical information about her life, about which she otherwise maintains an almost complete silence.

(7) Verkauf des Studienbuchs nach St. Petersburg

1716/1717 besucht Zar Peter der Große ein zweites Mal Amsterdam und beauftragt seinen Leibarzt, einen hoch gebildeten Schotten, Kunstwerke für seine Sammlungen in seiner neuen Residenz St. Petersburg zu erwerben. Dieser Arzt, Robert Areskin (Erskin), kauft für seine eigene Sammlung das Studienbuch aus dem Nachlass von Maria Sibylla und vermacht es dem Zaren. Kurz nach dem Tod ihrer Mutter übersiedelt die 2. Tochter Dorothea Maria (geb. 1678 in Nürnberg), die schon die Mutter auf die Expedition nach Surinam begleitet hatte, mit ihrem Ehemann Georg Gsell nach St. Petersburg. Dort trägt sie als „Gsellscha“ viel zur Entwick­lung von Wissenschaft und Kunst bei, z. B. durch den Aufbau des ersten öffentlichen Museums u. a. mit 254 Aquarellen ihrer Mutter und dem dort aufbewahrten Studienbuch.

(8) Fund des verschollenen Studienbuchs

After having been forgotten for a long time, the book with the inconspicuous exterior was rediscovered in 1939 in the "Manu Picta" section of the Manuscript Department of the Library of the Academy of Sciences. Despite the years of siege and bombardment of Leningrad by the German Army during World War II, the museum experts responsible for it were able to preserve the Study Book.

(9) Veröffentlichung des Studienbuchs 1976

On the initiative of the young director of the Leipzig Museum of Natural History, Dr. Wolf-Dietrich Beer, an unusual collaboration was successful during the GDR era: the 'Edition Leipzig Verlag', together with the 'Reich Verlag Luzern' was given permission to produce an exemplary facsimile of the original from Leningrad. For this reason alone we are today able to read Maria Sibylla's handwritten note in one of the 1825 copies in existence worldwide and with it the proof of the location of her garden in Nuremberg.

The fact that the Graff-Merian family had a family garden in Nuremberg and the historical evidence for it are based on a remarkable chain of fortunate circumstances. Time and again this connection could have been lost and hung on a "silk (caterpillar) thread". 

(10) The Closed Caretaker's Garden – a Forgotten Historical Heritage

Drawings and etchings prove that the small garden next to the Imperial Chapel existed long before the time of Graff's and Merian’s family garden. Later it was called the "Burgverwaltergarten" (Castle Administrator's Garden) and was privately used by whoever was chief castle official at any given time. Several photos in the City Archive show this idyllic, but not publicly accessible garden. During World War II the garden and the garden wall on the city side were devastated by a bomb crater. The two-storey garden house, which is also historic (it can already be guessed at in a Dürer engraving from 1514), miraculously survived the air raids with only slight damage, which was soon repaired. In the process the open loggia on the ground floor, decorated with a wooden balustrade ("dock balusters"), was replaced by a half-timbered front with two windows.

(11) Geplante Wiedereröffnung als „Hochzeitsgärtlein“

In 2012/13 the Bavarian state government provides the necessary funds for a major investment programme for the general upgrading of the Kaiserburg. One new offer is the chance to be married at the castle: after a civil wedding ceremony in a stylish "wedding room", the garden described above can be used as a "wedding garden", particularly attractive for family photos in front of the picturesque city panorama and for private receptions.

(12) Gestaltung des Gartens als Erinnerungsort an Maria Sibylla Merian

Nach dem Hinweis einer Stadtführerin ändert der zuständige Finanzminister der Bayeri­schen Staatsregierung den geplanten Namen und erläutert in einer Pressekonferenz
Ende Juli 2012 das Konzept der Gestaltung des zukünftigen „Merian-Gartens“.
A few weeks later, at the request of the Nuremberg population, he agrees to expand the name to include her two given names in the title "Maria Sibylla Merian-Garten". Since the big festival at the castle in mid-July 2013, the little garden can be visited on Sundays and Mondays from 2 to 6 pm from April to September inclusive (2-4 p.m. in October, closed in wintertime, status as of 2020). A peephole in the entrance door allows visitors a view into this oasis all year round during general castle opening hours.

It is the most beautiful, authentic place in the world for a public Maria Sibylla Merian Garden, designed with "her" plants - even with some tropical plants in a sunny, sheltered area of the small, 170 square-metre garden. A historical reconstruction was impossible because there are no documents concerning the garden which date from her time. Thus the modern design, with a water basin and several benches, resembles a small land-art monument and its diagonal orientation expands the horizon. The view is directed beyond the city into the wide open spaces, just as Maria Sibylla and her daughters set off from Nuremberg to the world of Amsterdam, Paramaribo and St. Petersburg.

Excerpt from a newspaper interview with Sven-Patric Klameth, gardening instructor with a focus on the preservation of historic gardens at the Bayerische Schlösserverwaltung (Bavarian Castle Administration), in summer 2020

How do you manage the balancing act between existing historic design and new requirements

... Historic gardens are also subject to changes over time. If there are structural changes in the overall layout, the garden usually has to be adapted. ….. Sometimes projects like the Maria Sibylla Merian Garden, which we laid out at Nuremberg Imperial Castle in 2013, are also necessary. We knew that there had always been a garden in this location, but we did not have any meaningful documentation on the design and planting. Here, we consciously decided on a new creation in which we used new materials and forms that contrast with the surrounding architecture.

What is your own most important work?

My task as a conservator of historic gardens is primarily to preserve the historic parks and less to redesign them. That's why my involvement in the Maria Sibylla Merian Garden was a special time for me, one that I look back on with pleasure. It still fills me with pride that we were able to dedicate the garden to Maria Sibylla Merian and at the same time create an additional habitat for insects in the interests of species protection. ... All the plants that we have brought into the garden can be found in Merian's books, and most of them are also found in the local countryside. A bonus is that the show garden offers a special ambience, for example at weddings.