A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Mara, Gertrude Elizabeth
MARA, GERTRUDE ELIZABETH,
Daughter of Mr. Schmaiing, city musician in Cassel, was born about 1749. When she was seven, she played very well on the violin, and when she was fourteen, she appeared as a singer. Frederic the Great of Prussia, notwithstanding his prejudice against German performers, invited her to Potsdam, in 1770, and gave her an appointment immediately. In 1774, she married Mara, a violon-cello player, a very extravagant man, and he involved her so much in debt, that, in 1786, Frederic withdrew her appointment. from her, and she went to Vienna, Paris, and London, where she was received with great enthusiasm. In 1808 she went to Russia, and while at Moscow she married Florio, her companion since her separation from Mara. By the burning of Moscow she lost most of her property. She passed the latter part of her life, which was very long, at Reval, where she died, in 1833. She possessed extraordinary compass of voice, extending with great ease over three octaves.