There used to be a time when, within the context of bank employee hierarchy in British banking (and that also included our own system here in Malta), if a bank clerk managed to make his way up to earning the right to sign his own name on bank documents in full representation of his employing bank – the then much coveted “B” and later “A” signature – that would be occasion for honour and celebration. As he moved even further up in rank his personal name and signature on documents of course meant even more.
Not so in the famous 330-year-old family bank that still graces Frankfurt’s financial community – the Bankhaus Metzler. Recipients of business letters or contracts from the bank are often amazed to note that all documents from the managing directors bear the handwritten name of the firm, rather than the signature of one or more individuals. A practice that was common for hundreds of years is now in Germany continued in the general business correspondence of only a few firms, even if Article 17, Section 1 of their Commercial Code generally allows it. But no other bank uses it.
This history of Bankhaus Metzler, inevitably also including stories of the von Metzler family, is a veritable gem from Stefan Ohmeis. The present partners of what is today B. Metzler seel Sohn & Co entertained our group from the European Association of Banking History, at their beautiful country house in Bonames, on the outskirts of Frankfurt. On the front cover of Ohmeis’s book is a lovely old picture of this building whose origins go back to the early Middle Ages when a Franconian manor (Saalhof) was located on this site.
The founder of the Metzler dynasty was Benjamin Metzler. Born in 1650 in Kranzahl in Saxony, he was the fifth of 10 children and descended from an old family of clergymen. At the age of 13 he left his home for the trading centre of Nuremberg to complete a commercial apprenticeship in a firm of merchants, and then moved to Frankfurt in 1671. There is no record of the firm’s founding date, but it happened just before he married Katharina Voss and fathered five children.
That first Metzler never had it easy. His firm dealt in linens, woollens, yarn, flax, bonnets, neckties, and such stuff. It lived through the June 1719 fire which destroyed some 430 houses in 15 streets in the old Geissgasse part of Frankfurt, and also survived the turbulent times when Ludwig XIV was waging war against Holland, when there was a ban on trade with France, when the Turks besieged Vienna, and when the 1685 Edict of Nantes (which had granted Huguenots full civic rights) had been rescinded. Nevertheless, when that original Metzler died he left his wife a considerable fortune.
After Benjamin came Christina Barbara, and then Friedrich (often referred to as “Friedrich the Great”). This is when we come across banking and exchange business starting to become signposts of the firm’s future. The book is indeed a personality-by-personality chronicle of the people who made the bank what it is today, a highly respected German merchant bank. Each and every one of the Metzlers in this chronicle is a story in himself. Peter Heinrich Metzler, born in 1744 in Bordeaux, was a brother of the later Privy Councillor of Commerce Friedrich Metzler, and on his engagement he gave up his family name to take up that of his bride Katherine von Bethmann.
Then there was Emma Metzler (1827-1880) who made a name as a popular hostess and “successful letter writer”. Johann Wilhelm Metzler (1755-1837) became Mayor of Frankfurt. There were two Albert von Metzlers, one was a city councillor, and the other (far sighted banker cum fascinating personality) you would be pardoned for saying he is Alan Greenspan’s twin brother. And so on and so forth: the portraits at the back of the book run into some 18 famous Metzlers, all of whom in their own way made their contribution to the bank’s life.
Throughout its long history Bankhaus Metzler has contributed much to Germany even beyond banking. The bank created what is known as ‘Nice on the Main’, a major contribution to the beautifying of Frankfurt’s “Cote d’Azur”. The Metzler Villa at Am Schaumainkai 15 is a Museum of Applied Arts. They were the founders, 300 years ago, of the J.B. Metzler Publishing House, and were closely involved with the Stadel Institute of Art and the Senckenberg Natural Science Research Society. In Offenbach there is their elegant residence with garden and bathing house known as the Metzler Bathing Temple. And, to cap it all, I don’t think that there are many more bankers who can claim to be the family with the closest link to the Goethe family. Johannn Wolfgang von Goethe and Friedrich Metzler met in 1761 and remained friends throughout their lives.
This book is, despite its small size, also rich on detail. At the back there is a full year-by-year synthetic chronology of events in the family’s history, a full list of all the Metzlers who at some time or others were proprietors or partners in the firm (together with the dates when they served in its management), details of the bank’s places of business in Frankfurt, Munich, Stuttgart, Dusseldorf, Cologne, the Unites States, Luxembourg, Ireland, Italy and Japan, and a genealogical table of the von Metzler families. For banking and commercial history buffs it is certainly a very valuable addition.
Dr Consiglio lectures in the Department of Banking & Finance at The University of Malta
Ohmeis, Stefan (2006) – Insights, History and stories of Bankhaus Metzler –pp 96 - (Merkur gmbh, Frankfurt)