The company "Carl Tesdorpf Weinhandel zu Lübeck" was founded in 1678 by the future mayor of Lübeck, Peter Hinrich Tesdorpf (1648-1723). He came from a long-established, respected Lübeck patrician family, which had been active in the Hanseatic city for many centuries with excellent connections in cultural and political circles. The family provided numerous senators and mayors and is inextricably linked with the history of the city of Lübeck. The trading house also supplied Napoleon (1769-1821), among others. During this time, the French stored their red wine in barrique barrels in Lübeck's maritime climate and discovered that it matured better here than at home. Thus a new wine was born, which has become a household name to this day under the name Rotspon.
The Lübeck-born writer Thomas Mann (1875-1955) was closely associated with the Tesdorpf family. Krafft Tesdorpf was appointed guardian after the death of his father. In the writer's famous novel "Buddenbrooks", Rotspon and the Tesdorpfs are immortalised as "wine merchants Kistenmaker". To this day, the company is still based in the legendary Mengstraße, just a few metres from the Buddenbrookhaus. The house became an absolute top address and Lübeck developed into one of the most important trading centres for wine. Tesdorpf supplied all the great merchants of the north, the Scandinavian royal courts, the Tsar's court in St. Petersburg and the Prussian kings and emperors in Berlin and Potsdam.
A special feature was and is a close relationship with the Bordeaux trading centre and the Bordeaux wine trade. In 1782, Hinrich Tesdorpf married Susanne Schyler, the daughter of the Schröder and Schÿler wine dynasty in Bordeaux (owners of Château Kirwan). Today, many first-class wines from many European countries and the New World are offered. The product range includes around 400 top-quality wines from renowned producers. Spirits, specialities such as sherry vinegar, olive oil and wine & food accessories are also on offer. The company was taken over by Hawesko in 1999, but is still managed by a descendant of the family, Carl Johann Tesdorpf. See also under largest wine companies in the world.
Portrait: By Balthasar Denner, Public domain, Link
Building: By MrsMyer, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link
