Over the years, Anna Magdalena Bach fulfilled many different roles. Above all, she mothered a large and steadily increasing family. When she married the widower Bach, she took on four small children, and subsequently gave birth to thirteen children over nineteen years, averaging one a year for most of that span. Anna Magdalena and Johann Sebastian selected godparents for their children either from their close family circle or from among good friends. And one such close friend was Christiana Sybilla Bose.
Georg Heinrich Bose
When Johann Sebastian and Anna Magdalena arrived in Leipzig in 1723, they moved into lodgings at the St. Thomas School, directly across from the Bose house. Georg Heinrich Bose, an affluent manufacturer of gold and silver products, had acquired the building in 1710 and turned it into a prestigious Baroque residence. Anna Magdalena and Sybilla Bose enjoyed a particularly close relationship. They regularly met in a park just behind St. Thomas School that had been built for use by women with children.
Johann Sebastian Bach: “Wir danken dir, Gott, wir danken dir” BWV 29
Anna Magdalena gave birth to a daughter in March 1731, and Christiana Sybilla Bose was asked to become a godparent, an honor she shared with the theologian and orientalist Andreas Winckler. The little girl was christened Christiana Dorothea Bach on 18 March 1731, and sadly died on 31 August 1732. When Anna Magdalena was searching for a birthday present for Sybilla, she selected a theological volume and wrote the following inscription. “Upon the birthday of the noble, highly honorable and virtue-blessed maiden Christiana Sybilla Bose, my especially highly esteemed maiden, godmother, and most worthy friend of my heart, Anna Magdalena Bach wishes the best with this small though well-meaning memento.”
The Bose House in Leipzig
That small memento turned out to be a 1,284 page-mediation on suffering, with much of the volume dedicated to the pain of children dying. Sybilla Bose would give birth to a single child, a son, who died shortly after his birth. The historic Bose House is one of the oldest buildings on the square outside St. Thomas, and it presently houses the Leipzig Bach Archive and the Bach Museum.
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