Artifex	Carl Traugott Riedel  (1769–)     Alia nomina Karl Traugott Riedel Descriptio German engraver Dies natalis/mortis 1769  after 1832 date QS:P,+1832-00-00T00:00:00Z/7,P1319,+1832-00-00T00:00:00Z/9   Locus natalis Lauba Lusatorum Work period circa 1800 - circa 1832 date QS:P,+1850-00-00T00:00:00Z/7,P1319,+1800-00-00T00:00:00Z/9,P1326,+1832-00-00T00:00:00Z/9,P1480,Q5727902 Work location Lipsia (1803–)  Authority file : Q30302326 VIAF: 20100391 ISNI: 0000000006935166 GND: 103766316 BNF: 14801419v J9U: 987007308481905171 artist QS:P170,Q30302326
Object type	tabula picta object_type QS:P31,Q3305213
Descriptio	Ludwig van Beethoven effigies
Datum	1801 date QS:P571,+1801-00-00T00:00:00Z/9
Medium	painting
Collectus	UnknownUnknown
Source/Photographer	www.answers.com
Other versions

I have never been able to find a source verifying that this picture is authentic. Here is a bit of background. The Beethoven-Haus in Bonn, an authoritative source, gives a picture of an engraving (black and white) that looks rather like this picture. They say it is an engraved portrait made by Riedel "based on an earlier drawing from Vienna portrait artist Gandolph Ernst Stainhauser." You can see this engraving at their website: [1] (and we have a copy of it here on the Commons; see above).

The image above is colored -- who did this? -- and I think it is also much more flattering than the engraving displayed by the Beethoven-Haus (wide eyes, trimmed eyebrows, little smile, rosy cheeks). Could it be a long-post-Beethoven sentimentalized version of the Riedel engraving? Certainly there is precedent for this kind of falsification. And the hypothesis that it is a post-lifetime sentimentalized portrait would explain why it displays a handsome young man when contemporary testimony (see Beethoven-Haus link) tells us that Beethoven was quite ugly.

On the Beethoven page of the English Wikipedia I polled other editors about removing this image from article, and they felt it would be ok, so am gradually removing it from the English Wikipedia, and replacing it with the engraving. I would not presume to edit other Wikipedias. Opus33 (disputatio) 02:41, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

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