August Freiherr von Haxthausen

August Franz Ludwig Maria, Baron von Haxthausen, was born in Bökendorf, near Brakel, in Westphalia, on 3 February 1792, and died in Hannover on 31 December 1866. Trained as a geologist, mineralogist and jurist, he went on to distinguish himself as an agrarian historian, which led him to travel extensively through Prussia and Russia. He belongs to the generation of German Romantics who took an interest in folk song, an enthusiasm his family shared with the tales and legends collected by the Brothers Grimm.

After the revolution of 1848 he abandoned his political career to devote himself to theosophical, geological and musical studies, and to the collection of folk songs. He planned a major work on German folk singing, to which the Grimms and Joseph Görres were to contribute, but the plan was never carried out. The only material he published during his lifetime was his sacred songs, under the title Geistliche Volkslieder mit ihren ursprünglichen Weisen (Paderborn, 1850). The rest of his material, specifically the pieces gathered in Westphalia, appeared twelve years after his death, edited by A. Reifferscheid under the title Westfälische Volkslieder (Heilbronn, 1879).

In editing his collections he sought a scientifically accurate text, free of alterations, that could at the same time be used for practical performance. His work is thus an early landmark in the rigorous study of German musical folklore.