Ahen the excavations in the footsteps of Homer and the discovery of a hoard, which he declared the “treasure of Priam”, made him known worldwide, Heinrich Schliemann wrote to his old school friend Wilhelm Rust in 1875 about the echo that his discoveries he made eagerly published, experienced in the different countries. In Germany, says Schliemann, “I am constantly being insulted in a horrible way by the envious professors, and especially in Berlin, where I am even often the object of praise in the Kladderadatsch. In England, France and America, on the other hand, the discovery of Troy is fully recognized and regarded as the greatest discovery of all centuries.” When asked how best to make his stunning collection of finds from Hissarlik Hill accessible to the public, Schliemann therefore had the answer: “I will not give them to Germany.”
Schliemann’s finds and the Berlin museum world have a common history that is shaped by luck and splendor as well as catastrophes. In the beginning there was a lot of crunching: Schliemann, who felt badly treated and downright mocked in his home country, of which he had long since ceased to be a citizen, was looking for a permanent place for his archaeological collection. A major presentation at the South Kensington Museum in 1877 brought him so much much-needed recognition that London was well in the running for permanent transmission. However, Schliemann was also thinking about French and American museums, while his Greek wife Sophia begged him that his finds should be exhibited in the land of the heroes of the Trojan War – preferably in a new museum to be built in Athens.
A researcher – and a self-made man
It took the persistent persuasion of his friend Rudolf Virchow to persuade Schliemann to donate the collection to the German nation, which went hand in hand with negotiations about the right location, first in the Kunstgewerbemuseum (today’s Gropiusbau) and then in the newly built Ethnological Museum was found, and about the honors bestowed upon the donor – it should be the Pour le Mérite order, Schliemann demanded, but also “other orders, as many as can be obtained”.
The generously presented collection of formerly almost ten thousand pieces was partly destroyed during the war, partly secured and gradually returned, so that today around 5400 objects are again available in Berlin. Another part was brought to the Soviet Union, kept hidden there for a long time and declared property of the Russian state in 1998. It comprises about five hundred pieces, including essential parts of “Priam’s Treasure”.
This Friday, on the occasion of Schliemann’s 200th birthday (FAZ, January 5), a large exhibition dedicated to the history of Schliemann’s life and collection opens in Berlin. Like the presentation on the Germanic peoples in autumn 2020, it will take place in the sober and elegant James Simon Gallery and at the same time in the rooms of the Neues Museum across the street, which proves to be an advantage for its dramaturgy because of the intended break in the narrative becomes all the clearer. The first part is dedicated to Schliemann’s life before the first excavations, which was full of upheavals, the second focuses on the archaeologist and his finds. Without the researcher, we would probably hardly remember this self-made man of the 19th century, but without the entrepreneur who had achieved fabulous wealth, the archaeologist would not have existed.
Language learning according to your own method
A connection between the two parts is also created by monitors on which the actress Katharina Thalbach, disguised as Schliemann, presents Schliemann’s view of various episodes of his life, preparing the visitor early on for the fact that these stories are staged to a large extent – that Schliemann, whom you already know described as a “pathological liar”, created an image of himself in his books, articles and letters that was often inconclusive in itself and has been refuted in essential parts.
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