Sophie Leopoldine Wilhelmine von Grotthuis

Sara Grotthuis, born Sara Meyer, also known as Sophie Leopoldine Wilhelmine Baroness von Grotthuis and as Sara Wulff by her first marriage (1763 – 11 December 1828), was one of the most well-known "salonnières" (salon hostesses and patrons of the arts) of the late 18th and early 19th centuries in Berlin.

Biography Sara Grotthuis was born Sara Meyer in Berlin in 1763 as the eldest daughter of the Orthodox Jewish banker Aaron Moses Meyer and his wife Rösel. Through her mother, Sara was the great-granddaughter of Veitel Heine Ephraim, who served Friedrich the Great as a "Münzjude" or mint master. She was the cousin of Rahel Varnhagen von Ense.

The well-known Jewish scholar and Enlightenment thinker Moses Mendelssohn, a close friend of the family, was consulted on Sara's education and upbringing.

In 1778 at the age of 15, Sara was married to the older Jewish businessman Liebmann Wulff. Her parents were in favor of the marriage, and the ceremony was performed by Moses Mendelssohn. It was an unhappy marriage, one that distressed the young Sara. After her husband Wulff died in 1787, Sara moved back in with her parents. She converted to Christianity in 1788. She may have converted back to Judaism for a time, but she was a converted Protestant Christian by the time of her second marriage. Her guests included not only diplomats, writers, and actors but also members of the Prussian nobility like Prince Louis Ferdinand. Moses Mendelssohn, a close friend of the Meyer family, disapproved of Werther and considered Goethe a bad influence on youth. He threw Sara's copy of Werther out a window. Their friendship thus also predated the Goethe-cult created by the brothers August Wilhelm Schlegel and Friedrich Schlegel.

She maintained correspondence with Goethe for years. Goethe sent her unpublished manuscripts to be read in her salon, and sometimes he sent actors to read them, such as the famous actor couple Amalie Wolff-Malcolmi and Pius Alexander Wolff. Grotthuis for her part connected Goethe with certain important figures including Prince Karl Joseph von Ligne, among others.

In addition to Goethe, Grotthuis counted Lessing, Herder, and Prince Karl Joseph von Ligne among her friends. Rahel Varnhagen's husband Karl August Varnhagen von Ense wrote of Sara Grotthuis: "She was flattered by Lessing in her youth and later by Herder, and then she became friends with Frau von Genlis, the Prince of Ligne and Goethe."

Sara Grotthuis' salon ended – like the first salon of her cousin Rahel von Varnhagen – with the Prussian defeat in 1806 and the resulting impoverishment of the Grotthuis family.