Wealthy Mozart?

Mozart had a few extra pennies tucked away...

Vienna - For centuries, historians have portrayed Mozart as a poor man, but new documents suggest that the composer wasn't nearly as hard-up for cash as many believed.

Scholars who combed through Austrian archives for an exhibition on Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's later years in Vienna found evidence that he was solidly upper-crust and lived the good life.

Although letters show that Mozart repeatedly borrowed money from friends to pay for his travels and his social obligations, and that his family was forced to move at least 11 times, documents on display at Vienna's prestigious Musikverein museum reveal that he earned about 10 000 florins a year - roughly $4 000 in today's terms.

That would have placed him in the top five percent of wage-earners in late 18th-century Vienna, say experts, who were unable to prove lingering suspicions that gambling debts took a big bite out of Mozart's earnings.

The exhibition, which runs until June 30, is part of a year of special events in Austria celebrating the 250th anniversary of the composer's birth in Salzburg on January 27, 1756.

Mozart lived in Vienna from 1784-87, at the height of his brief but prolific music career. Among the works he composed in the Austrian capital was The Marriage of Figaro. - Sapa-AP