Christian, Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels

[1] Christian was born in Weissenfels on 6 February 1682, the second surviving son of Johann Adolf I, Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels and his first wife, Johanna Magdalena of Saxe-Altenburg.

[2] Christian continued the policy of patronage and promotion of the sciences, education, and culture of his predecessors; in this tradition he created the Seminarium illustre in Weissenfels in 1716.

For his 31st birthday in the year 1713, the composer Johann Sebastian Bach wrote the famous cantata Was mir behagt, ist nur die muntre Jagd, BWV 208 (The lively hunt is all my heart's desire) as occasional music with a pastoral character.

For Christian's 43rd birthday in 1725 Bach wrote the Shepherd cantata Entfliehet, verschwindet, entweichet, ihr Sorgen, BWV 249a (en: "Escape, disappear, disperse, ye sorrows"), its music is lost but survived as the parody setting of the Easter Oratorio.

It was a costly and complex masterpiece of gold forging executed by the brothers Johann Melchior and George Christoph Dinglinger; it took as its artistic inspiration the duke's preference for the hunt.