Salzburg merchants and friends of the Mozarts. The head of the Ranftl family, Mathia Joseph (Salzburg, 23 February 1718-Salzburg, 19 January 1805) was an almost exact contemporary of Leopold Mozart and a keen botanist on the side; he was partly responsible for the arrangement of the botanical garden at Schloss Leopoldkron. Mathias Joseph marrieed Maria Anna Balbina (?-Salzburg, 25 December 1788) on 13 November 1747. Their children are frequently mentioned in the Mozart family letters: Franz Anton Mathias (Salzburg, 8 September 1749-Salzburg, 12 October 1820), who eventually took over the family business and may have been the violoncellist in an amateur orchestra founded in 1778 by Count Johann Rudolph Czernin; Joseph Andreas (Salzburg, 30 November 1750-Frauenchiemsee, 3 October 1785), a priest ("P. Rupert") at the Benedictine monastery at Seeon; Maria Anna Rosalia Ermentrudis (?-?), who married into the Hagenauer family; and Mathia Konrad (Salzburg, 26 November 1751-Kitzbühel, 16 May 1815), who joined the Dominican order as "Fr. Vinzenz." Lit.: Schuler, Mozarts Salzburger Freunde und Bekannte, 21; Ammerer and Angermüller, Salzburger Mozart Lexikon, 379-380.