On 26 June 1920, Rilke dredged up the memory of his first visit to Venice, in a letter to Countess Marie Therese Mirbach-Geldern, née Countess Hoyos: “Venedig will ‘geglaubt’ sein; als ich es zuerst sah, im Jahre 1897, geschahs als Gast eines Amerikaners!” (GB 4:303; Venice has to be “believed”; when I first saw it, in 1897, it was as a guest of an American!). This time he had been in Venice since 11 June, initially staying at the Hotel Europe, then, after the departure of Princess Marie von Thurn und Taxis, in her “mezzanino” in the Palazzo Valmarana. The American thus decorated with an exclamation mark was Nathan Sulzberger (1874–1954) of New York City, whom René had met after arriving in Munich from Prague. Sulzberger came from comfortable circumstances; his father, Ferdinand, was a successful meatpacker. The boy grew up bilingual; after elementary schooling in his native city he had been sent off for further education in Karlsruhe, the Sulzberger ancestral home, and was at that time a student of chemistry at Munich's university.

On 3 November 1896, René presented a copy of Larenopfer to him with a pat dedication:

The next month, on the appearance of Traumgekrönt, René likewise gave it to Sulzberger; these dedicatory verses were a little on the high-and-mighty side: