Museum für Völkerkunde Leipzig

Originally about 1,800 Cypriot objects, almost all the Weisbach / Ohnefalsch-Richter collection, with war losses (chiefly bronze, lead, glass, gems, jewellery); handed over to the Museum für Deutsche Geschichte in East Berlin in 1974 (Recke) or 1976 (Recke, elsewhere), and since 1992 in the Museum für Vor- und Frühgeschichte, Berlin. (2012)

Recke 2012

1. 1896
   Two Base Ring bull rhyta from the Zschille collection enter the museum; they pass about 1929 to the Grassi Museum für Angewandte Kunst by exchange.

   ZschilleRecke 2012

2. 1896
   Valentin Weisbach relieves Ohnefalsch-Richter's financial embarrassment in July 1896 (Virchow was told by letter of 6 July); Brönner thinks Weisbach first lent money against the antiquities, which passed to him that year once the Berlin Gewerbeausstellung closed. Rupp's review has the collection 'transferred' to a museum in Leipzig in 1896, agent not stated.

   BerlinValentin WeisbachMax Ohnefalsch-RichterRudolf VirchowTatton-Brown 2001, p. 200

3. 1897
   Ohnefalsch-Richter, who had written to the museum's director Hermann Obst since 1890, tells him in 1897 that Weisbach has taken over all his antiquities and is giving them to museums, and starts working on Obst and on Weisbach to have the collection go to Leipzig.

   Max Ohnefalsch-RichterHermann ObstValentin WeisbachTatton-Brown 2001, p. 200

4. 14 December 1898
   Weisbach gives the whole Ohnefalsch-Richter stock, about 1,800 objects including numbered 'Elite', 'Gute' and 'Typen' collections, to the museum by deed of donation. Finds named include Kition-Kamelarga, Lapithos-Sotiros, Limniti, Nicosia-Agia Paraskevi and Pyla. A 44-page handwritten catalogue with selling prices survives in the Leipzig records.

   LeipzigValentin WeisbachMax Ohnefalsch-RichterHermann ObstTatton-Brown 2001, p. 201-202Recke 2012, p. 111-112

5. 1898
   The gift includes the Hathor-head capital from Idalion found clandestinely in 1894; Masson and Hermary record it as in Leipzig before the Second World War and known only from one published photograph.

   Valentin WeisbachMasson & Hermary 1988, p. 9

6. 1898
   A handwritten note says 'Gute Collection B', 243 objects, was handed to the Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum, Mainz, with Virchow as intermediary; no other museum is known to have received a separate collection.

   Rudolf VirchowTatton-Brown 2001, p. 202

7. 1923
   The Leipzig University Antikensammlung takes Cypriot pieces from the museum by exchange (ex Weisbach, bought in 1896 from Ohnefalsch-Richter): 4 stone and 18 ceramic objects, partly lost in 1943.

   Recke 2012

8. 1964–1968
   E. Hoffmann publishes the Ohnefalsch-Richter vases and terracottas (Jahrbuch des Museums für Völkerkunde Leipzig 20, 1964) and the limestone sculptures (vols 23, 24, 25: 1966-68).

   E. HoffmannRecke 2012

9. 1974–1976
   The whole Cypriot holding goes to the Museum für Deutsche Geschichte in East Berlin: 1974 in Recke's catalogue entry, 1976 in his history section.

   Recke 2012

10. 1992
    The collection of the Museum für Deutsche Geschichte, the former Leipzig material, is taken over by the Museum für Vor- und Frühgeschichte, Berlin, and used that year in the Charlottenburg exhibition 'Frühes Zypern zwischen Orient und Okzident'.

    Recke 2012

• Hathor-head capital from Idalion (Masson and Hermary App. I no. 9)

  from Idalionvia Valentin Weisbach1898Masson & Hermary 1988, p. 9

• Bichrome IV jug from Athienou, once in Ohnefalsch-Richter's possession, now Berlin MVF

  MVF XI b 3713from Athienouvia Max Ohnefalsch-Richter1898Merrillees 2017

• Two Base Ring bull rhyta, ex Zschille, later Grassi Museum

  via Zschille1896Recke 2012