Cotta - Comments

From LoveToKnow 1911

Are you certain that Ursula Cotta, who took in Martin Luther when he was a student at the Gymnasium, was related to the publishers of Goethe and Schiller?

I've been trying to establish that link myself, but so far haven't had much luck. The earliest proven ancestor of the publishers that I know of was Nikolaus Cotta, born about 1600 in Berg-Giesshubel, Germany. I had planned to research his roots at the Mormon Family History Center, but they've just advised me that the town where he was born is part of Saxony, and Saxony has refused to let them copy their church books.

On the bright side, I've just discovered a book that may tell everything, if I can just get my hands on it. It was written by Christian Franz Paullini in 1694--after the publishing company had been started, but still soon enough after the Reformation for the Luther links to be vivid. It's entitled "De antiqua et nobili familia Cottarum." It's also described in German as "Dissertation Uber die Alte und Vornehme Familie der Cotta," and appears with a date of 1940 along with the Stadtarchiv Eisenach. I just sent an e-mail to that city archive, and I hope they can help me somehow.

I've also done some research on the Italian side of the Alps, and it's a fascinating story. Virtually all the mentions of the Cotta family involve the city of Milan, and it would make sense for a noble family to stay in one place. (That's where everything they own is.) They included, among other things, an Archbishop of Milan, as well as another candidate for Archbishop among a group of four put forward by a reformist Pope, but ignored by the Holy Roman Emperor. The result of that snub was a civil war that bred the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, of "Romeo and Juliet" notoriety, among other things.

My guess is that the Cottas left Italy for Germany sometime not long after 1450, after Innocenzo Cotta, one of the leaders of the Ambrosian Republic, was exiled and deprived of his properties and titles by Francesco Sforza, a career mercenary and self-proclaimed Duke of Milan.

The Cottas seem to have been an old and prominent family well before any of this happened. Among other things, there were consuls of Rome named Cotta.

I'm hoping the book I mentioned above will lay it all out in more detail.

I'm a descendant of the Cottas, by the way.

Bob Winter

P.S.: Richard Kretz (another Cotta descendant to whom I'm deeply indebted for his extensive prior research), are you by any chance one of the people who may stumble across this? We'll have to talk again, if either of us can locate or remember the other one's phone number.