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But before going further into the composition of this little manuscript brochure, which bears the title Trophaeum Mariano-Cellense, I must relate a part of its contents, which I take from the preface.

On September 5, 1677, the painter Christoph Haizmann, a Bavarian, was brought to Mariazell, with a letter of introduction from the village priest of Pottenbrunn (in lower Austria) not far away.¹ The letter states that the man had been staying in Pottenbrunn for some months, pursuing his occupation of painting. On August 29, while in the church there, he had been seized with frightful convulsions. As these convulsions recurred during the following days, he had been examined by the Praefectus Dominii Pottenbrunnensis with a view to discovering what it was that was oppressing him and whether perhaps he had entered into illicit traffic with the Evil Spirit.² Upon this, the man had admitted that nine years before, when he was in a state of despondency about his art and doubtful whether he could support himself, he had yielded to the Devil, who had tempted him nine times, and that he had given him his bond in writing to belong to him in body and soul after a period of nine years. This period would expire on the twenty-fourth day of the current month.³ The letter went on to say that the unfortunate man had repented and was convinced that only the grace of the Mother of God at Mariazell could save him, by compelling the Evil One to deliver up the bond, which had been written in blood. For this reason the village priest ventured to recommend miserum hunc hominem omni auxilio destitutum to the benevolence of the Fathers of Mariazell.

So far the narrative of Leopoldus Braun, the village priest of Pottenbrunn, dated September 1, 1677.

¹ No mention is anywhere made of the painter’s age. The context suggests that he was a man of between thirty and forty, probably nearer the lower figure. He died, as we shall see, in 1700.

² We will merely note in passing the possibility that this interrogation inspired in the sufferer - ‘suggested’ to him - the phantasy of his pact with the Devil.

³ Quorum et finis 24 mensis hujus futurus appropinquat.