About the work
Die Ahnfrau (The Ancestress) is a five-act fate tragedy and Grillparzer's stage debut. It premiered on 31 January 1817 at the Theater an der Wien.
Plot
Count Zdenko's daughter Berta loves the bandit leader Jaromir, unaware that he is in fact her brother, long believed lost. When Jaromir kills the count in a fight with the legendary dagger once used to murder the family's ancestress, the curse hanging over the family is fulfilled. Berta and Jaromir both die, ending the bloodline, while the ancestress herself appears over the dead.
Cultural significance
Grillparzer's debut provoked controversy: some newspapers read it as an expression of Christian submission to fate, others considered it a danger to faith. The play largely disappeared from the repertoire but returned to Vienna's Burgtheater in a new 2013 production that met with a mixed response.