Prehistory
In the 1830s-1850s, in
the wake of romanticism, interest in the past and in ancient monuments began to
slowly emerge in Lviv. Newspapers published articles that often related to
architectural objects and encouraged readers to pay attention to the natural
beauty of their native surroundings or contained ethnographic sketches. For
example, a series of articles about Lviv churches prepared by Felicyan Łobeski
and published in the weekly supplement of the Gazeta Lwowska became quite noticeable. Descriptions and images of Galicia's
towns and localities were made by Bogusz Stęczyński, an amateur and traveller,
who emphasized the sad and decayed condition of places with a once-glorious
past, his publisher Kajetan Jabłoński adding that "we don't need to go to our neighbours for beautiful views"
(Stęczyński, 1847). In the publications of Teodor Bilous, a teacher and later a
Ruthenian deputy of the Galician Diet, one can see the disappointment and shame
at the deplorable state of towns and villages, especially the folk architecture
of the Ruthenians and their churches, which, he believed, should be replaced by
strong and lasting architecture (Bilous, 1856). Along with local history
sketches, pure inventions appeared sometimes in the Lwowianin, a newspaper
published by amateur Ludwik Zieliński. After disapproving reviews by famous
Polish scientists August Bielowski and Józef Kraszewski were published in
Poznań and Wilno (now Vilnius) press, the periodical was closed (Charewiczowa,
1938, 54-58).
Exhibition's Idea
In that period, academic
historians rarely turned to the study of material monuments, focusing on the
study of written sources, such as chronicles. Among authors of this kind were
Ruthenian historians Isydor Sharanevych and Vasyl Ilnytskyi, whose works, Ancient Lviv and Ancient Halych, respectively, were published in Lviv in 1861.
Archaeological research, which would compare data from written sources and
evidence of material objects or their remains, became a topic for discussions
two decades later.
In the mid-19th century,
there was no institution specifically dealing with heritage issues in Lviv.
This task was decided to be undertaken by the Ossoliński
National Institute, which had been operating since 1827 primarily as a
library of Polish literature and a publishing house. In the spring of 1861, the
director of the institution, August Bielowski, a historian and professor of the
Franciscan
University, announced that the first exhibition of antiquities would be
held within its walls. In the announcement, he emphasized the importance of
researching monuments of the past in a scientific way as the approach of local
historians was unsystematic and often insufficiently critical.
It was assumed that
private collectors would send monuments and art objects to the institution,
Ossolineum employees would help to professionally describe them and compile a
catalogue, and visitors would have a rare opportunity to see things that were
otherwise inaccessible to the public, closed, for example, in the palaces of
aristocrats. After the end of the exhibition, all objects had to be returned to
their owners. This approach was borrowed from similar exhibitions held in
Warsaw (1856) and Kraków (1859).
It was declared that the
exhibition had charitable, scientific and national aims. "Such a grouping of national monuments...
will refresh and complement the image of the ages in the memory... and will
prove to strangers that we have not only virtues and national feelings, but
also scientific respect for our past..." a newspaper reported after
the first meeting of the exhibition committee in January 1861. The scientific
and national issues were closely intertwined in it; Polish heritage came to the
fore, and the history of the region was presented in inseparable unity with
other parts of the divided Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. "The role of Lviv is... to complement Polish
exhibitions with the topic of Red Ruthenia" (Czytelnia dla młodzieży, 1861, Nr. 23, pp. 181-183).
Among the organizers of
the Lviv exhibition were several persons from the Ossolineum, who later
collaborated with the conservator of monuments Mieczysław Potocki — in
particular, Fr.
Ivan Stupnytskyi and Kazimierz Stadnicki. Józef Lepkowski, a leading
archaeologist from Kraków and co-organizer of the exhibition held there in
1859, was invited for consultation. Since he was unable to participate, Karol Rogawski, who also worked on the
Kraków exhibition, arrived instead. An aristocrat (count) from the village of
Olpiny near Tarnów and a revolutionary who took part in the 1846 events, he was
an amateur archaeologist and a member of the State Council in Vienna. In 1863,
Rogawski was appointed a conservator of monuments; later he had an important
part in the founding of the National Museum in Kraków. Therefore, for Lviv
residents, the Scientific Society in Kraków was a clear reference point,
several organizers of the Lviv exhibition being its members or correspondents.
The organizers hoped that
the exhibition would cause a stir and contribute to the development of interest
in monuments of the past. They tried to attract visitors from the widest
possible circles, as the opening hours and the entrance fee indicate. The
exhibition was open every day and without weekends in the afternoon hours (3-7
p.m.), thus allowing employees to see it. On Sundays, the entry to the
exhibition was the cheapest (10 kreuzers against 30 on other days), potentially
attracting those who would not normally attend such events at all, for example,
workers or maids. It was planned that someone from the organizing committee
would be present at the exposition every day to tell those interested about the
objects on display and provide explanations. The morning hours on Wednesdays
were reserved as a time for visiting scholars, when the director and custodian
of the Institute's stocks were present. On that day, the entrance fee was 1
gulden (Głos, 1861, nr. 91, p. 4). Moreover, the organizers hoped that the
exhibition in Lviv would be an occasion for interested persons from afar to visit the city.
Although the organizers
openly referred to the Kraków and Warsaw exhibitions in their statements, they
did not mention any other similar exhibitions within the Austrian Empire. In
1861, several significant events took place in the empire: first of all, the
Art and Archaeological Exhibition of the Society
of Antiquities (Alterthumsverein)
in Vienna. All crown lands of the empire, including Galicia, were called to
take part. A small number of exhibits, mainly archaeological finds, were sent
to the exhibition by the Ruthenian National House,
an institution that became fully operational only later. No one else from Lviv
took part. In the Central Commission for the Protection of Monuments, this
non-participation was explained by the holding of the Third Exhibition of
Polish Antiquities in Lviv, mentioning in the same context the insignificant
involvement of Hungary, which was also planning its exhibition in Pest in the
spring of 1861. Lviv did not mention Vienna, and Vienna in a similar way
mentioned Lviv with only one word (Mittheilungen, 1861, Heft 1, pp. 21-22). In
Lviv newspapers, one can come across only an exhibition of antiquities in Paris
mentioned, with a note that a similar one was planned in Lviv (Głos, 1861, Nr.
15, p. 4).
The exhibition was
located in the left wing of the Ossolineum
building, in five rooms on the first floor. Each room contained different
types of monuments. In the first one, manuscripts, diplomas, seals,
numismatics, etc. could be seen. In the second room, there were Turkish tents
and carpets, żupans of hetmans Stanisław
Żółkiewski and Stefan Czarniecki, sabers and belts, gold and silver objects,
furniture from the property of Polish kings and "famous men."
In the third room, there
were church items, while the fourth one contained a collection of arms, provided
to a large extent by the magistrate and by the military commandant's office in
Lviv, and other things. In the fifth room, paintings and archaeological finds
were placed (Dziennik literacki, 1861, Nr. 34, p. 276).
Reviews
The result of the
exhibition, as one of the Lviv reviewers wrote, did not justify the
expectations, although it became a significant event for the city’s
intellectual milieu. Among the reasons cited was a low response from collectors,
as well as communication problems: at the time of this event, Lviv did not yet
have a railway connection, which prevented the participation of people from
outside the city. The way the objects were displayed was criticized, it was
mentioned that no artist or photographer took pictures or photos of the
exhibition; the catalogue was inconvenient to use as well.
"I have already seen [similar
exhibitions] in France, England and
Germany... and they only remind us how poor we are," wrote an
anonymous columnist, using the common argument of those times that Lviv and the
region were poor in monuments. Among a number of other remarks, he also noted
the feeling of discomfort caused in him as a visitor by the glorification of
historical heroes and generally considered the focus on the past to be
inappropriate. "While we work in the
sweat of our brows to revive the living, they resurrect the dead. The grave air
blows to me from there, while I want to live and spread life around me"
(Głos, Nr. 117, pp. 1-2).
Another extensive review
in a little-known Lviv newspaper emphasized the special position of Poland
compared to other countries in the West. Allegedly, it was this that determined
the different nature of the exhibition, the ultimate need to attract wide circles
of the population and the seriousness of the attitude to the past (which was
not entertainment). It also highlighted the Lviv magistrate's participation in
the exhibition and the closedness of the Town and County
Records (pol. Akta grodzkie i ziemskie) archive, which was under
the care of the Austrian government and did not participate. The importance of
attracting collectors from outside the city to the Lviv exhibition was
explained by the fact that "...local
collections are too small, because in ancient times Ruthenia was like a
phoenix, constantly reborn from the ashes and fires, and in recent times the
largest preserved collection went under the [state] monopoly" (Czytelnia dla młodzieży, 1861, Nr. 23, pp. 181-183).
Among Ruthenian
(Ukrainian) scholars, who also took part in the preparation of the exhibition,
were Isydor Sharanevych and Vasyl Ilnytskyi, a professor of history at the gymnasium
and its director, who had collaborated with the Ossolineum for a long time. Fr. Ivan
Stupnytskyi, chancellor of the Greek Catholic Church, a collector and a numismatist,
known among Lviv residents as a supporter of the idea of Polish-Ukrainian
cooperation, later a long-term vice-marshal of the Galician Diet, also
participated.
One of the few Ukrainian
newspapers published in Lviv at that time, the Russophile Slovo, did not publish news about the exhibition. This periodical
rarely commented on matters of cultural life, focusing instead on news from the
Galician Diet and the State Council, publishing speeches by Ruthenian
politicians and articles from the province about the injustices suffered by the
Ruthenians of that time, as well as reports concerning the language. In 1861,
it continued to condemn the positions taken towards the Ruthenians by Polish
papers, the Głos and the Przęgląd powszechny, which were the
chief periodicals reporting on the exhibition. Only at the end of the year, a
few months after the exposition was closed, the Slovo published a feuilleton
entitled "Antiquity." The text had a direct reference to the
exhibition only in the first sentence and was written in Aesopian language
about the Polish institution abusing Ruthenian history, similar things going on
since time immemorial and leaving the Ruthenians (Ukrainians) with the
possibility of only minimal participation in a subordinate position (Slovo, Nr.
87, pp. 429-431).
After the exhibition
After the exhibition was
over, in 1862-1863, the Ossolineum had a card catalogue of its library
collections designed and a larger and more comfortable reading room space arranged.
The vacated premises were turned into a museum for antiquities, whose concept
was drawn up by Wincenty
Pol and Fr.
Ivan Stupnytskyi. On this occasion, in October 1864, Pol read a report on
the monuments of Lviv in the Ossolineum and emphasized the need for their
institutional protection. In his opinion, such an institution could be
municipal and this responsibility should be taken on by the City Council. As a
successful example, he cited the City Archive that was "exemplarily organized by our esteemed friend Jan Wagilewicz"
at that time (Pol, 1865, 390). He emphasized the need to establish permanent
institutions on a number of other occasions, including when delivering popular
lectures in Lviv on various topics like history of literature in 1864-1865.
The conservator
Mieczysław Potocki, who, coming to Lviv from his estate in Kotsiubynchyky, had
an opportunity to hear Wincenty Pol's report, took it as a basis for his
further work, as well as the list of Lviv objects Pol compiled, considering
these valuable monuments. Having chosen objects for restoration, he invited Pol
and Stupnytsky to help him in these matters; according to his proposal, the
Central Commission nominated them the Commission's correspondents. It is
possible that during this visit he also got to know the future conservator of
monuments, Karol Rogawski; his correspondence with the latter at the turn of
1865 reveals interesting details and personal motivations of the conservator
regarding his work. In the following year, 1865, it was in the Ossolineum that Potocki
reported on his first achievements in the protection of monuments.
* * *
The Ossolineum never
became a monument protection institution, but the exhibition held there
provided an impetus in this direction. The need for such an institution in
Lviv, whether in the form of a society or in the form of a government service,
was discussed within its walls and in its environment in the 1860s. From the
very beginning, there was a clear focus on the unity of the once divided lands
of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the dominance of the Polish view on
the history of the city and the region, the national and scientific aspects being
closely intertwined.
