• DOI:10.1086/318549
• Corpus ID: 144652797

What Killed August von Kotzebue? The Temptations of Virtue and the Political Theology of German Nationalism, 1789–1819*

@article{Williamson2000WhatKA,
  title={What Killed August von Kotzebue? The Temptations of Virtue and the Political Theology of German Nationalism, 1789–1819*},
  author={George S. Williamson},
  journal={The Journal of Modern History},
  year={2000},
  volume={72},
  pages={890 - 943}
}

• George S. Williamson
• Published 1 December 2000
• Geology
• The Journal of Modern History

Around eleven o’clock, on the morning of March 23, 1819, Karl Sand rang the doorbell of the playwright August von Kotzebue.1 Sand, a student of theology at the University of Jena, had toured Germany for two weeks before arriving in Mannheim that morning. Now, as a maid appeared at the door, Sand announced himself as “Heinrich from Mietau” and asked to see Kotzebue. The maid reported that Kotzebue was unavailable but suggested that Sand return again that afternoon. So he toured the castle gardens and viewed the Rhine River before walking back to the Weinberg Inn for lunch. As he sat in the inn, he struck up conversations with other guests, discussing the Reformation, among other things, with a pair of clergymen. At five o’clock the same afternoon, Sand returned to the home of Kotzebue. A group of three women had come to visit Frau von Kotzebue, so Sand waited in the stairwell before being called in. The fifty-seven-year-old playwright greeted Sand in his living room, and the two briefly engaged in conversation. Suddenly, Sand pulled a dagger from out of his left sleeve and cried, “I take no pride in you at all. Here, you traitor to the fatherland!” He stabbed Kotzebue twice in the breast, cutting through his lung and penetrating the lower part of his heart. Additional blows struck Kotzebue’s jaw, tearing a deep gash in his face. Servants and family members, including Kotzebue’s four-year-old son, rushed into the room, but the playwright was dead in a few minutes. Confused