Adam Kirkor i Muzeum Starożytności w świetle krakowskich archiwaliów

ENAlthough the activity of the Vilnius Museum of Antiquities and the Vilnius Temporary Archaeological Commission lasted only for a decade, it has been attracting a great deal of research attention. Among the most distinct figures of the Vilnius Museum of Antiquities and the Vilnius Temporary Archaeological Commission, one of its most active and productive members, Adam Honory Kirkor (1818-1886), should be distinguished. In 1856, only a year after Emperor Alexander II adopted the Statute of the Vilnius Museum of Antiquities and the Vilnius Temporary Archaeological Commission, he was the first to describe the activity of these institutions in his book Przechadzki po Wilnie i jego okolicach (“Walks around Vilnius and Its Environs”, Vilnius, 1856, second supplemented edition, 1859). Kirkor was one of the most outstanding employees of these institutions, an assistant to Count Eustachy Tyszkiewicz (1814-1873) and the curator of museum exhibitions. He not only published the proceedings of the Commission and catalogues of museum exhibits, but also expanded the collections of the Vilnius Museum of Antiquities with new exhibits, which he himself excavated in graves and tumuli. Thus, a decade of intense work in the Vilnius Temporary Archaeological Commission above all determined that Kirkors name became known not only in Vilnius, but also in Saint Petersburg and Moscow, where his publications were acclaimed by Russian scholars, and he himself was conferred the title of a corresponding member of the Russian Imperial Geographic Society. The experience acquired while working with Tyszkiewicz had another practical aspect.Having found himself in Cracow due to various twists of fate, he immediately noticed that there was no institution responsible for the scientific, public and cultural life in the city. Thus, referring to the knowledge and skills acquired during his work in the Vilnius Museum of Antiquities and the Vilnius Temporary Archaeological Commission, he contributed to the founding of the Academy of Sciences and Arts (Akademia Umiejętności) in Cracow in 1872. Having spent fourteen years of his highly active life in Cracow and having intensely excavated archaeological monuments in Galicia, on 23 November 1886 Kirkor died suddenly of heart attack. He left quite many manuscripts, notes and letters. Today, this archive is held at the Jagiellonian Library in Cracow and, along with the valuable heritage of the scientific secretary of the Vilnius Temporary Archaeological Commission, Maurycy Krupowicz (1823-1890), is an important source of research into the activity of the Vilnius Museum of Antiquities. Kirkor’s rich heritage includes a separate file titled Muzeum w Wilnie Eustachego Tyszkiewicza (The Museum of Eustachy Tyszkiewicz in Vilnius), containing “The Material of Kirkor’s Activity in the Vilnius Archaeological Commission and the Museum of Antiquities from 1855 to 1865” (Materiały do udziału A. Kirkorą w pracach Wileńskiej Archeologicznej Komisji i Muzeum Starożytności 1855-1865). These are 105 archival pages, the majority of which are Kirkors manuscripts. The present research is an attempt to overview the content of the file and to show the importance of work in these institutions in Kirkor’s life and career. [From the publication]