Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born on 27th of January 1756 in Salzburg, Austria, the seventh child of Leopold Mozart (1719-1787), a noted musician in his own right. The great musician and composers life is a subject of general knowledge so there's little need to go into detail here, suffice to recap that he was a child prodigy who mastered the harpsichord by four, composed his first symphony by eight and opera by twelve. His father devoted much of his life to nurturing his sons talent, taking him on tour across Europe where he played before monarchs and popes. Mozart's adult years were as productive as they were tumultuous, hired by arch bishops and emperors his flawed personality saw him squander what were golden opportunities.

Mozart's health went into decline in autumn 1791 but in fact he never enjoyed good health, from childhood's hour he suffered seemingly endless maladies, everything from; tonsillitis, bronchitis, pneumonia, typhoid fever, rheumatism to gum disease. Conditions which weren't helped by his excessive drinking and fast living, which only weakened an already frail immune system. He developed a fever and went into a rapid decline, medical incompetence hastened it when bloodletting was prescribed. He suffered a miserable death, in the last days his body became so swollen he was unable to move, the stench of internal organs corrupting emanated from orifices and in the form of black vomit. When merciful death finally occurred his body was so ravaged and bloated doctors didn’t want to go anywhere near it, let alone perform an autopsy on it.

To his admirers the great composers death came as a shock, the symptoms of his final illness perceived by many as indicators of poisoning, the official cause of death provided few answers, the ruling he died of "Severe Military Fever" was so ambiguous it could have meant anything. In Mozart's day infectious disease was common, epidemics such as: Cholera - Typhoid - Typhus - Scarlet Fever - Tuberculosis - Small Pox and Bubonic Plague all did the rounds. The simple fact is the authorities didn't know the exact cause of death, he had obviously died of a disease but it was anyones guess which one it was in the 18th century. Mozart died short of his 36th birthday in the early hours of the 5th December 1791, leaving over 600 works, some considered the greatest achievements in music. He was buried the next day in a communal grave in the St. Marx' Village Cemetery, his third class burial followed a brief memorial service in Vienna, his poverty stricken widow just able to afford the burial but not the expense of a headstone.

Before Mozart had time to go cold in his grave scurrilous rumors concerning the circumstances of his death began circulating, due largely to the abruptness of the young mans demise. It was rumored that he was the victim of a Masonic assassination, that he was poisoned for having revealed Masonic secrets in his opera 'Die Zauberflste'. It was also rumored that he had been poisoned by a money lender, musical rivals even his wife, not since the death of composer Carlo Gesualdo had so many rumors circulated about the circumstances of composers death.

If murder had occurred there were certainly many suspects, he owed a great deal of money to a wide cross section of Viennese society and made many enemies at the Imperial Court. He was also a notorious womanizer, one of his many married mistresses was 23 year old Magdalena Hofdemel, who was widely believed to have given birth to his child. On the day of Mozart's funeral neighbors heard Magdalena argue with her husband, Franz, who cut her throat with a razor blade before slashing his own. The murder suicide believed to have resulted from the circumstances of Mozart's death, the prevailing view being Franz Hofdemel had poisoned the composer in revenge and murdered his wife after she discovered the truth.

Constanze Mozart (1762-1842)

However the most famous and persistent allegation came from Mozart's wife Constanze (1762-1842) whom he married in 1782 against his fathers wishes, she told anyone who'd listed that she believed Court Composer Antonio Salieri (1750-1825) had conspired against her husband, she also claimed he had told her on his deathbed that he believed someone was poisoning him. However Mozart scholars don't consider her statements reliable, having trapped the young composer with great expectations in matrimony via accidental pregnancy she was a selfish, unsympathetic wife who rode his death for every penny it was worth, inventing tragic stories in hope of securing a pension from Emperor Joseph II of Austria. Although she remarried she didn't take her second husbands name and derived a living from recitals of her late husbands music, after which she would tell her audience colorful stories concerning his life, the more colorful the greater interest.

Antonio Salieri (1750-1825)

Salieri denied having conspired against Mozart at the Austrian Court or having had anything to do with his death, however near the end of his life he suffered from nervous breakdowns which resulted in periodic hospitalization, at such times he would make outrageous claims. Perhaps spurred on by Constanze Mozart's accusation, perhaps haunted by the guilt of having spread gossip about Mozart at court due to professional jealousy, he claimed he had killed the great composer but once back to his normal frame of mind would recant. The allegation and Salieri's senile decay formed the basis of Peter Shaffer's play and movie "Amadeus", Mozart certainly never considered him an enemy, in all his correspondence he referred to Salieri in the warmest terms and even asked him to tutor one of his children.

In 1801 the St. Marx' Cemetery Trust had the third class plot in which Mozart and 15 to 20 others were buried retrenched, which was an automatic procedure every 10 years to enable graves to be reused. The cemetery, which opened in 1784, only had room for 7.000 graves and space was always at a premium. Wealthy residents bones were cleaned and placed in a charnel house with their names painted on the skull whereas the bones of the poorer folk were exhumed and crushed, reinterred in the Vienna Zentralfriedhof (Central Cemetery) or disposed of in some other way. Mozart's grave was reopened by Joseph Rothmayer, the same grave digger/sexton who had buried him a decade earlier. Rothmayer said he knew before the burial what Mozart's ultimate fate would be so had tied wire around his corpse neck to enable him to distinguish the remains from the others, knowing the exact location of the body he sought it out and saved the skull from the bone crusher. "Joseph Rothmayer gave it to friend Joseph Radschopf, who in turn gave it to his friend Jacob Hyrtl in 1842. When Hyrtl died in 1868, his brother Joseph inherited the skull. Joseph was a Viennese phrenologist. Upon his death, Joseph's wife held onto to the skull until her death in 1901. It was then bequeathed to the International Mozarteum Foundation in Salzburg. In 1902 until the 1955, the skull was placed on public view in the Foundation's Museum". [1] Where it remains today, although no longer on public display, when it was on display museum staff found it creepy. Prior to being pulled from view museum staff reported strange phenomena they believed emanated from it, staff claiming to have heard music even screams emanating from the cabinet in which it was displayed. There were reports that previous owners also experienced such phenomena, hence why it ended up at the said museum.

The Skull of Mozart?

Ever since the skull appeared doctors and historians have performed forensic autopsies on it, hoping to ascertain how he died and prove or disprove its identity. Overlapping images of the skull with appropriately resized portraits of the composer to highlight similarities or dissimilarities of dental and cranial characteristics, these studies generally confirming that the skull was that of Mozart. A French forensic team examined it looking for signs of illnesses Mozart was known to have suffered from, discovering traces of haematoma which they believed could account for the depression and dizziness he experienced. Although the findings were compelling the Mozarteum would not accept them, the existence of the disputed skull creates a host of ethical dilemma's for them and the verification of it as Mozart's creates even more for them.

Archivist Walter Brauneis of the Office for the Preservation of Historical Monuments in Austria undertook a search for official medical documents concerning Mozart's death, against the odds he found a doctors description of the body. It detailed the appalling state of his teeth, noting that he had only seven, the rest having rotten or fallen out. The skull in Salzburg was reexamined and found to possess 11 teeth. Those who believe the skull is that of Mozart pointed out that the doctor may have counted only the healthy teeth not the badly rotten ones, also noting that the skull's mandible no longer exists. The only way to settle the debate would be to perform DNA analysis on the skull, however there are problems in this. Mozart's children all died childless so there are no descendants, the only avenue for DNA matter is the exhumation of the composers parents, however it's extremely unlikely that the Austrian authorities would sanction it.

The life and death of Mozart has become a repository of a host of myths, which the famous skull has come to symbolize. The simple fact is there's no evidence to suggest anyone murdered Mozart, authorities of the day certainly never considered his death as anything but natural, his widows assertions bluster. Contrary to legend Mozart didn't die over night and alone, his illness spanned weeks and he was attended by his wife and sister throughout. The findings of Dr. Alan MacLeod, who examined all available evidence concerning Mozart's death as part of the symposium Medicine in the Age of Mozart resonate strongly. He stated that, "it's impossible at this point in history to test hypotheses regarding Mozart's illness and death, because we search in the dark. The records are the observations of lay people, physicians of varying abilities, modified by transmission from person to person, a process of questionable accuracy. The most likely prognosis being Mozart died from an infectious disease seriously aggravated by bad medicines and blood letting".

There is certainly a good possibility that the famous skull is that of Mozart, it's very existence is part of a ghoulish tradition. Mozart's then burgeoning peers Beethoven - Liszt - Schubert and Haydn all suffered the same indignity, their skulls stolen by students of phrenology and displayed by collectors. A monument to Mozart was erected in St. Marx' Cemetery on the spot where his bones were originally buried, another in the Vienna Zentralfriedhof where portions of exhumed and pulverized bones were later reinterred, in the final analysis the most honourable thing the International Mozarteum can do is return the skull to its original grave, to bury it with the dignity it hasn't received in over 200 hundred years.

Sources/References:

1. "After the Funeral -The Posthumous Adventures of Famous Corpses" by Edwin Murphy.