West european seal matrices from collection of Nicolay Likhachev

Abstract

The article discusses the corpus of West European seal matrices kept at the Scientific Archives of St. Petersburg Institute of History of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Previously, they were part of a collection of academician N. P. Likhachev (1862–1936). In the course of attribution we have found three matrices which seem to be absolutely identical to those from the museum collection in the town of Bassano del Grappa, Italy, which previously belonged to the Count Antonio Maria Luigi Calzamatta (1827–1905). This enabled a clarification of the earlier history of the two collections, which proved a genealogical connection with the collection of Count Giovanni Lazzara (1621–1690). This collection was so well known that Christina, Queen of Sweden, wanted to buy it. Evidently after the death of Giovanni Lazzara collection was sold to the Cabinet of Louis XIV (The Cabinet of medals of the French National Library). However, this theory is not justified. In another version the collection was bought by Nicolas-Joseph Foucault (1643–1721), politician and honorary member of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres. After changing several owners, Foucault’s collection came in 1727 in the cabinet of medals, except the seals. At the same time, some of the matrices from Lazzara’s collection are kept nowadays in the Bottacin Museum in Padua. Most likely, the seals did not leave Italy, and N. P. Lihachev acquired his matrices there, but not in France. Since he visited Italy often in person, there are no traces of this acquisition in his archives. A brief excursus in the history of the St. Petersburg collection revealed that some of the matrices have survived in two or even three copies. Since a matrix is with only rare exceptions a unique object, the need to verify the authenticity of the matrices became evident. The matrix of Ottokar II, King of Bohemia, was chosen for analysis. Based on the comparison with available images of his stamps, measurements and the study of the reverse of the matrix, it was concluded that we are probably dealing with a copy made in the second half of the 19th century by scientists or antiques dealers. Refs 39.