Ludwig van Beethoven, Skizzenblatt zu nicht ausgeführten Werken, Autograph, Fragment

Unidentified sketches

This fragment contains sketches by Beethoven for unknown works. On the front you can see the beginnings of three movements (Adagio, Presto, Menuetto) for a composition in E-flat major. The leaf was probably part of a sketchbook which is now in Berlin, and which Beethoven used up to around February 1799. The Viennese publisher Tobias Haslinger, who acquired many pieces at the auction of Beethoven's estate, probably owned the complete sketchbook and removed the first gathering (the first four bifolia) to sell it or give it away. Why the leaf was further divided, who cut it up and its actual position in the sketchbook, has not been established to date. (J.R.)