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Joseph William Ernest, Prince of Fürstenberg-Stühlingen

1699–1762

Born
12 Apr 1699, Augsburg
Country of birth
Holy Roman Empire, today Germany
Died
29 Apr 1762, Vienna
facts
6
sources
1
images and files
0

Facts and their sources

Tap a fact to see where it comes from.

  • Birth12 Apr 1699, AugsburgProbableDisputed1 competing claim1 source
  • Death29 Apr 1762, ViennaProbable1 source

A life in time

  1. Born · Augsburg

    Birth, Augsburg

  2. Child born: Princess Marie Henriette Josepha of Fürstenberg-Stühlingen

    Birth

  3. Died · Vienna

    Death, Vienna

What was it like?

The world around Augsburg, 1699: who ruled, who else was alive, how people lived. This is general history, not a record about the family, and every item shows where it comes from.

Joseph was born around the same time as Nicolaus Zinzendorf, Giovanni Battista Sammartini, and Charles Jennens.

Born around the same time

  • Nicolaus Zinzendorf

    1700 · German protestant religious and social reformer, bishop of the Moravian Church (1700-1760)

  • Giovanni Battista Sammartini

    1700 · Italian composer

  • Charles Jennens

    1700 · English landowner and art patron (1700–1773)

  • Margherita Durastanti

    1700 · Italian singer

  • Daniel Bernoulli

    1700 · Swiss mathematician and physicist (1700-1782)

  • Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli

    1700 · Italian architect (1700-1771)

Fashion

Men's multi-functional hat design

The Winkelmann hat for men featured an integrated fabric bag designed to carry items like a prayer book, bread, and a hip flask.

The Tiphoike hooded cloak

The Tiphoike was a distinctive black hooded cloak worn over the head that functioned as a status symbol, with length and adornment varying between social classes.

Music

Church and celebrations used town pipers

In early modern German towns, town pipers’ wind instruments were used at church services and also for special occasions such as weddings or house concerts.

Popular wedding dance needed the fiddle

In Weseke, a record from 1662 calls a local musician “Fidicen” (violinist) whose fiddle provided the energy for festivities, and wedding celebrations were incomplete without dancing.

Getting around

Water Transport on the Danube

Travel by water was vital, with cargo boats like the Ordinari sailing weekly from Regensburg to Vienna, a journey of 450 kilometers that took at least a week. While downstream travel was faster, upstream journeys were labor-intensive, often requiring horses to tow the boats.

Around 1700–1724

River Travel by Ordinari Boats

Water transport was often more cost-effective; for example, the Ordinari boat from Regensburg to Vienna took at least a week to cover about 450 kilometers. Passengers often spent their nights on land during these boat journeys.

Daily life

Difficult and contaminated water access

Getting drinkable water was labor-intensive, often involving fetching it from ditches or rivers that were also used for sewage disposal. Nearby wells were frequently contaminated by sewage as well.

Poor lighting in winter homes

During the winter, homes were lit by poor-quality light from resin torches, tallow candles, or oil lamps with open flames.

Food

Alcoholic beverages replaced water for safety

People rarely drank water due to contamination risks, relying instead on wine or beer, which were considered safer because of the fermentation process. Milk was almost exclusively for small children, as most of it was processed into butter and cheese for storage.

Porridge was the primary warm meal

Porridge made from oats or millet was the most important warm meal, often prepared in large batches and reheated, which gave it a tough, semi-solid consistency. People typically ate directly from a common bowl at the center of the table using their hands or a wooden spoon.

Prices and wages
Around 1700–1700

Daily wages of laborers around 1700

Around 1700, a carpenter earned 8 groschen per day, while a day-laborer earned 7 groschen per day.

Around 1700–1700

Food and luxury prices around 1700

In the early 18th century, a pound of beef cost about 1.5 groschen, and a bottle of champagne was 1 thaler and 3 groschen.

Work

Common Jobs in Rural Villages

Most common occupations were in agriculture, including fullholders, smallholders, and landless laborers like cottars (Seldner) and day laborers who often combined farming with small-scale craft or wage work. Female labor was essential and included tasks like spinning, sewing, agricultural labor, and working as live-in maidservants.

Memorable Facts: Wages and Quotas

Female servants often earned very low wages, with a 1631 list showing they received only about 3.8 Gulden annually, which was 42 percent of the average male servant's wage. Additionally, compulsory labor duties often included specific quotas, such as women being required to spin 6 pounds of flax per year.

News and letters
Around 1700–1701

Thurn and Taxis Managed Imperial Mail

By the early 18th century, relay systems allowed mail to be handed off to fresh riders at post houses, enabling travel day and night. The Thurn and Taxis family operated the Imperial postal service, which by 1701 maintained its center in Frankfurt am Main.

Around 1693–1693

Cost of sending a letter in 1693

In 1693, sending a standard letter from Güstrow to Hamburg cost 4 Schilling (ßl.).

During their lifetime

  1. 1699

    Treaty of Karlowitz

    The Treaty of Karlowitz was signed, confirming Habsburg acquisition of almost all of Hungary and marking the recovery of the territory.

  2. 1704

    Kuruc raids devastate Austrian lands in 1704

    The Kuruc uprising caused significant disruption as rebels repeatedly invaded the archduchy, likely devastating areas like Gramatneusiedl between March and June 1704.

  3. 1709

    Great famine after the 1709 winter

    A severe winter caused the Bodensee to freeze completely, leading to widespread crop failures and famine across Europe.

  4. 1713

    Last major plague epidemic of 1713-1714

    A severe plague epidemic, the last in the region, struck the archduchy from January 1713 to February 1714, claiming approximately 8,000 lives in Vienna.

  5. 1717

    Christmas flood kills 11,000 people

    A major storm surge on Christmas claimed over 11,000 lives along the German North Sea coast.

  6. 1717

    Compulsory education introduced in Prussia

    Prussia introduced compulsory education for children between the ages of five and twelve.

Family

Spouses

Children

Ancestors and children

Open the full tree

Four generations back to the right, the children to the left. The number beside a child counts the generations of descendants known after them.