Stepan Alexandrovich Gedeonov

In 1870 the Imperial Hermitage in St Petersburg was offered the collection of Luigi Palma di Cesnola, who was then American consul at Larnaca and also served as Russian consul there². The Hermitage's director was Stepan Gedeonov (1816 to 1878), in post from 1863⁴. Cesnola wrote to Gedeonov in French on 2 January 1870, enclosing photographs and claiming that museums in London and Paris had bought vases from him; Olivier Masson gives London and Berlin, and notes that it was not Cesnola's first letter^1,2.

A first purchase of nine pieces was authorised for 6,000 francs: three painted vases, two male heads, two limestone statues and two terracotta figures³. Marangou has Gedeonov seeking and receiving the minister's permission¹. Karageorghis and Bukina and their co-authors say Cesnola's letter went to the Keeper, Ludolf Stephani, who passed it to Gedeonov and was himself authorised to buy³. After Cesnola's finds at Golgoi he offered everything. On 25 March a letter told him of a Louvre bid, and Gedeonov telegraphed that negotiations with Paris should be avoided because an agent of the Hermitage was leaving at once^1,2. That agent, Johannes Doell, reached Cyprus in June 1870 and catalogued the collection at Larnaca; the catalogue appeared in 1873^1,3.

On 16 August Cesnola set his terms: 80,000 silver roubles for everything, 68,000 for the Golgoi collection alone, and the name Cesnola Collection kept for ever¹. Russia declined and offered about 3,000 roubles for the good pieces^1,3. Masson points out that Gedeonov bore the court title Hofmeister, so that the Hofmeister of the Cesnola literature is the director himself².