DOI issue:
Nr. 4
DOI article:Artykuły
DOI article:Zadrożny, Tadeusz: Almanach wrocławski na rok 1495 w katalogu Sichergestellte Kunstwerke im Generalgouvernement, czyli o losach polskich zbiorów artystycznych w okresie II wojny ¬światowej*
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.71010#0893
Almanach wrocławski na rok 1495 w katalogu Sichergestellte Kunstwerke
879
Wrocław Almanac for 1495 in the Sichergestellte
Kunstwerke im Generalgouvernement Catalogue.
From the Research into the History of Polish Artistic
Collections during WW II
It is the Wrocław Almanac for 1495 (GW 1502)
from the collection of the Jagiellonian Library in
Kraków (Inc. 1979), included in the Sichergestellte
Kunstwerke im Generalgouvernement Catalogue,
elaborated and printed in the first half of the 1940,
that is discussed in the paper. The Catalogue was not
a publication in circulation, but a sumptuous canvas-
bound volume printed in merely over a hundred
copies, and containing the report of Kajetan Muhl-
mann, fulfilling his mission of the Sonderbeauf-
tragte fur die Erfassung und Sicherung der Kunst-
und Kulturschdtze, namely of the Special Delegate
for the Registration and Securing of Artistic and
Cultural Treasures on the Former Polish Occupied
Territories, from the first stage of his activities and
those of his office from October 1939 to June 1940.
The mission's goal was to catalogue, as well as make
a qualitative selection and secure items valuable
from the point of view of the interest of the German
State from among the Polish artistic collections on
the territory of the General Government, i.e. Polish
occupied territories. According to the introduction
to the Catalogue, the Special Delegate and his co-
workers were supposed to demonstrate their
exceptional efficiency, in merely six months over-
taking all the artistic resources in the occupied
country, while also studying them at the same time.
The author of the Introduction, possibly Kajetan
Muhlmann himself, questioned, or more strictly
speaking, negated an independent development of
Polish art, demonstrating the impact of the German
culture in Eastern Europe. Moreover, he boasted that
all the works recorded in the Catalogue, and of
European standing, regardless of their place of origin,
essentially expressed, also in their character, only the
German spirit, proving the power of German culture.
The undertone of the Introduction, as well as the
used phrases, and the meticulously lavish cover of
the Catalogue prove that it was a purposefully and
unequivocally work of a propaganda, while the
seemingly academic claims they contained were
groundless.
When analyzing the description of the 1495
Wrocław Almanac in the Sichergestellte Kunstwerke
im Generalgouvernement Catalogue, the Author
was determined to thoroughly analyze the external
form of the print, its factual contents, as well as the
woodcut decoration enriching the Almanac. He also
traced all the changes occurring in the bibliographic
records, and subsequent stages of the research into
the item, particularly sensitive to any fake trails that
occasionally appeared, and which subsequently
undertaken by scholars or bibliographers, could
reveal their inspirations. Consistently following his
adopted method, the Author proved that the note by
the German functionary and related to the Wrocław
Almanac was based on the note by Zofia Ameisen
published in 1929 in Volume 69 of the Einblattdrucke
des Funfzehnten Jahrhunderts series, accepted
uncritically, with no verification, merely substantially
reduced. The putting together the descriptions of
other items selected for the Catalogue part dedicated
to graphic art and actually limited to graphic
incunabulistics allows to state that the German
functionary, representative of the office of the
Special Delegate who decided which objects were to
be selected for confiscation, and later elaborated,
and who put together the notes in this section, in all
of the activities was dependant on the earlier
publications by Prof. Ameisen, a custodian at the
Jagiellonian Library, of Jewish descent, at the time
away from Kraków, staying in Luck, thus on the
territories occupied by the Soviets. As has been
ascertained by the paper's Author, the German
functionary Werner Kudlich, administrator of the
Regional Museum in Opawa, a PhD, was appointed a
functionary in the Office of the Special Delegate
while being enrolled in the SS Totenkopf-Standarte
formed at the time in occupied Kraków. Not knowing
the whole collection, he selected those objects that
had been earlier elaborated, so they had already been
noticed, their value confirmed, and what was more, a
ready-made description was available. From the 27
objects selected for confiscation and described in the
Sichergestellte Kunstwerke im Generalgouverne-
ment, which were extremely rare or almost unique
prints, only one incunabulum containing 14 coloured
wood engravings, namely Passio Domini Jesu
Christi secundum quattuor Evangelia [German],
Augsburg: Johann Bamler, 1475, returned to the
Jagiellonian Library after WW II. Others, the rest of
the 27 objects, are still wartime loses.
Translated by Magdalena Iwińska
879
Wrocław Almanac for 1495 in the Sichergestellte
Kunstwerke im Generalgouvernement Catalogue.
From the Research into the History of Polish Artistic
Collections during WW II
It is the Wrocław Almanac for 1495 (GW 1502)
from the collection of the Jagiellonian Library in
Kraków (Inc. 1979), included in the Sichergestellte
Kunstwerke im Generalgouvernement Catalogue,
elaborated and printed in the first half of the 1940,
that is discussed in the paper. The Catalogue was not
a publication in circulation, but a sumptuous canvas-
bound volume printed in merely over a hundred
copies, and containing the report of Kajetan Muhl-
mann, fulfilling his mission of the Sonderbeauf-
tragte fur die Erfassung und Sicherung der Kunst-
und Kulturschdtze, namely of the Special Delegate
for the Registration and Securing of Artistic and
Cultural Treasures on the Former Polish Occupied
Territories, from the first stage of his activities and
those of his office from October 1939 to June 1940.
The mission's goal was to catalogue, as well as make
a qualitative selection and secure items valuable
from the point of view of the interest of the German
State from among the Polish artistic collections on
the territory of the General Government, i.e. Polish
occupied territories. According to the introduction
to the Catalogue, the Special Delegate and his co-
workers were supposed to demonstrate their
exceptional efficiency, in merely six months over-
taking all the artistic resources in the occupied
country, while also studying them at the same time.
The author of the Introduction, possibly Kajetan
Muhlmann himself, questioned, or more strictly
speaking, negated an independent development of
Polish art, demonstrating the impact of the German
culture in Eastern Europe. Moreover, he boasted that
all the works recorded in the Catalogue, and of
European standing, regardless of their place of origin,
essentially expressed, also in their character, only the
German spirit, proving the power of German culture.
The undertone of the Introduction, as well as the
used phrases, and the meticulously lavish cover of
the Catalogue prove that it was a purposefully and
unequivocally work of a propaganda, while the
seemingly academic claims they contained were
groundless.
When analyzing the description of the 1495
Wrocław Almanac in the Sichergestellte Kunstwerke
im Generalgouvernement Catalogue, the Author
was determined to thoroughly analyze the external
form of the print, its factual contents, as well as the
woodcut decoration enriching the Almanac. He also
traced all the changes occurring in the bibliographic
records, and subsequent stages of the research into
the item, particularly sensitive to any fake trails that
occasionally appeared, and which subsequently
undertaken by scholars or bibliographers, could
reveal their inspirations. Consistently following his
adopted method, the Author proved that the note by
the German functionary and related to the Wrocław
Almanac was based on the note by Zofia Ameisen
published in 1929 in Volume 69 of the Einblattdrucke
des Funfzehnten Jahrhunderts series, accepted
uncritically, with no verification, merely substantially
reduced. The putting together the descriptions of
other items selected for the Catalogue part dedicated
to graphic art and actually limited to graphic
incunabulistics allows to state that the German
functionary, representative of the office of the
Special Delegate who decided which objects were to
be selected for confiscation, and later elaborated,
and who put together the notes in this section, in all
of the activities was dependant on the earlier
publications by Prof. Ameisen, a custodian at the
Jagiellonian Library, of Jewish descent, at the time
away from Kraków, staying in Luck, thus on the
territories occupied by the Soviets. As has been
ascertained by the paper's Author, the German
functionary Werner Kudlich, administrator of the
Regional Museum in Opawa, a PhD, was appointed a
functionary in the Office of the Special Delegate
while being enrolled in the SS Totenkopf-Standarte
formed at the time in occupied Kraków. Not knowing
the whole collection, he selected those objects that
had been earlier elaborated, so they had already been
noticed, their value confirmed, and what was more, a
ready-made description was available. From the 27
objects selected for confiscation and described in the
Sichergestellte Kunstwerke im Generalgouverne-
ment, which were extremely rare or almost unique
prints, only one incunabulum containing 14 coloured
wood engravings, namely Passio Domini Jesu
Christi secundum quattuor Evangelia [German],
Augsburg: Johann Bamler, 1475, returned to the
Jagiellonian Library after WW II. Others, the rest of
the 27 objects, are still wartime loses.
Translated by Magdalena Iwińska