The role of Russо-Byzantine antiquities collectors in the formation of museum collections at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries

Abstract

In the context of Russо-Byzantine minor arts, hoards of the Kievan Rus’ era represent a unique group of material culture artifacts, which are being thoroughly examined by academic science — archaeology and art history. The history of museum affairs have accumulated a number of studies on individual private collections, where the hoards were presented to some extent. However, there is a demand for a comprehensive coverage of the entire complex of hoards as the result of a “collecting fever” in the Russian Empire at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries. The culture of this period, addressed to the styles of past eras, made objets d’art of Byzantium, Ancient Russia and neighboring cultures to be desirable items of collecting, which contributed to the activation of the antiquities market. When the antiquities used to be implemented into the private collectors’ milieu, certain tendencies of their existence in this milieu inevitably arose. This article makes an attempt to highlight beneficial and negative aspects of such tendencies, especially for humanitarian science and museum work. Among the personalities, such as A. S. and P. S. Uvarovs, D. Ya. Samokvasov, B. I. and V. N. Khanenko, V. V. Tarnovsky, A. A. Bobrinsky, A. V. Zvenigorodsky, M P. Botkin, J. P. Morgan — two groups are distinguished according to their motivations and approaches: professional archaeologists and connoisseurs of antiquities. Characteristics of structure and acquisitions of their collections in the context of archaeological excavations are given; their further history of existence and the role in the museumification of decorative and applied arts monuments are revealed. A number of problematic aspects of the collectors and antique dealers’ activity is named, such as the growth of the forgery market, the fragmentation of monuments, which used to be single complexes, as well as the issue of national values restitution.