Christian Julius Leopold Karl, Freiherr von Ehrenfels, was born in Rodaun near Vienna. He grew up in his father’s castle in Brunn am Walde (see Valent 2016 for more biographical details on Ehrenfels’ youth). Though he was the eldest son and accordingly the rightful heir to the family estate, he decided in 1882, when he was 23 years old, to give away his birthright to his younger brother and to devote himself entirely to philosophy, poetry, and music. At first Ehrenfels went to Vienna in 1877 to undertake agricultural studies, but in the winter semester 1879/80 he enrolled at the university where he began his studies in philosophy with Franz Brentano, Thomas Masaryk, and the young Alexius Meinong, while also attending lectures of Franz Exner, Ludwig Boltzmann, and Ernst Mach (Valent 2016, 179). At the same time he also began to study composition with Anton Bruckner. As an enthusiastic follower of Richard Wagner he was to write librettos for Wagnerian-style music dramas. Ehrenfels then also links his loss of Christian faith to the start of his academic studies and the discovery of Wagner (Höfer 2017, 25). In 1882 Ehrenfels undertook a “pilgrimage” to Bayreuth in order to attend the first performance of Wagner’s Parzifal. This visit triggered both the end of his uncritical personal admiration of Wagner (though not of his art) and the insight that his own musical abilities were inadequate, ending his lessons with Bruckner (Höfer 2017, 26). 