A state of respite
Reflections on the past and present research into magical gems and ancient magic
MúzeumCafé 31.
An international conference took place on 16-18 February this year at the Fine Arts Museum in Budapest under the title Magical Gems in their Context. The themes covered collecting magical gems, the history and trends of their scientific analysis, the concept of magic and the connections with organised religion. Participants included Árpád Miklós Nagy, head of the Fine Arts Museum’s Antique Collection and conference organiser, academician László Török, archaeologist and Nubiologist, and Professor György Németh, a classics scholar and head of ELTE’s Ancient History Department. Árpád Miklós Nagy stressed the role of Ferenc Pulszky, who had exceptional knowledge of cut stones, being a collector and an occasional researcher of gems. However, the tradition associated with him was discontinued and playing a role in that was an event which disrupted not only the antiquities market but the entire world of classical archaeology. What happened was that in the 1870s the Poniatowski collection was auctioned off, but it turned out that it was almost entirely made to order, a composition designed to fit the prince’s sophisticated taste. The news was such a shock for private collectors and museums alike that the collection of gems suffered serious difficulties right up to the beginning of the 20th century. Thus it was necessary to start again in Pulszky’s footsteps. That this was successful was partly due to a monograph written jointly by János Györgyn Szilágyi and Walter Endrei about one of the fine post-antique gems in the Antique Collection, and in the main due to the scientific work of Tamás Gesztelyi of Debrecen. Speaking about magical gems, György Németh stressed that they shouldn’t be examined in isolation, only together with magical papyri and curse tablets.