Mathias (or Matthias) was born in Hainburg, a small town not far from Rohrau. His ancestors were inhabitants of this town, which had a troubled history; notably his paternal grandparents were fatal civilian casualties in the Turkish occupation of the town in 1683. His father, Thomas Haydn, was also a wheelwright. The material prosperity of the family seems to have increased with each generation: the grandfather Kaspar (also a wheelwright) started out as a "Burgknecht", i.e. "a day laborer with a permanent domicile"; the father Thomas built himself a house and was formally a "citizen" of Hainburg; Mathias himself rose to the rank of "Marktricher" in Rohrau and owned farmland as well as a house; and Mathias's son Joseph, the composer, eventually became owner of a very large house in Vienna and died with a large fortune.