Opened in 1864 by A.E. Lutsenko, director of the Kerch Museum, this extraordinarily unique kurgan contains paintings of funerary practices performed by women, associated with the Eleusinian cult. Although plundered of artefacts, the painted walls feature an especially vivid painting of Demeter, the Greek goddess of agriculture, circa 330 BCE.
Theme: Classical Antiquity
Armavir was chosen as the capital of Armenia in 331 BC, when the Orontid Dynasty declared its independence from the Achaemenid Empire. Archeological inscriptions have been found in the Elamite language about Gilgamesh, in addition to Hesoid’s poetry and quotes from Euripides. Cleopatra also figures into this history; King Tigranes II sent an expedition to Palestine to attack, and brought many Jews back in captivity to settle in Armavir. Conquerors include the Seleucids, Parthians, Roman Empire, Sassanids and then Byzantine Empire before the Arabs claimed it in 645.
This Scythian kurgan was stumbled upon by the Voronezh Infantry detachment quarrying rock for building in 1830. Known as Царский курган, or the Royal Kurgan, it was one of the most important examples of architecture, mixing a Scythian exterior with a Greek interior. The great size of the tomb led to the assumption that someone of stature had found his place of eternal peace, as Anton Ashik, another who excavated it in the 1830s, romanticized the kurgan. Unfortunately, the kurgan was not well guarded and much of the wealth was looted.
Site of both an ancient Greek colony and the place where Vladimir I was baptized. It remains an active archeological dig-site, with a museum in situ.
Trained in classical philology at St. Petersburg University, Sergei then took a position there, rising to the positions of Secretary of the Faculty, 1905-1909 and rector, 1911-1912. A specialist in Greece, he taught everything from its history to epigraphy. From 1894-1905 he taught ancient Greek art in the Academy of Arts. He also headed the classical section of the IRAO. He also translated and edited a number of classical Greek authors. After 1917 he remained and assumed a position of leadership at the former IAK, now the Institute of the History of Material Culture of the Soviet Academy of Sciences. He was a victim of the Siege of Leningrad during the Second World War.
Minister of Education Sergei Uvarov invited the Leipzig-educated Stefani to head the department of classical philology at Dorpat University in 1846. Trained in Greek epigraphy, Stefani moved to St. Petersburg four years later, to the Hermitage, where he studied artefacts sent from the Black Sea littoral. His methodology of not interpreting beyond what was in his hand influenced his students to be scrupulous and careful about what claims they could make.
A scion of one of Russia’s most distinguished families, Sergei Grigorevich began his career in service to the state fighting against Napoleon and rode into Paris in victory. An adjutant to Tsars Alexander I and Nicholas I, he then distinguished himself in the Russo-Turkish Wars of 1828. His interest in archeology began as chairman of the Moscow Society of History and Antiquities in 1836, which directed his focus toward the Greek and Scythian finds in Crimea and New Russia. When Alexander II decided to found an Archeological Commission, he named Stroganov to head it, so the latter moved from Moscow to the imperial capital, where he also took up the education of the heirs to the throne. The Uvarovs often found themselves at loggerheads with Stroganov, and Alexei made Moscow his home base after the former moved to Petersburg. Much of their differences can be epitomized by their archeological museums: Stroganov at the Hermitage, which displayed aesthetic elegance, and Uvarov at his Historical Museum, which featured artefacts for their cultural significance.
Although his daughter Marina is far better known to posterity than he, Ivan Vladimirovich probably inspired some of her Silver-Age poetic sensibilities with his interest in philology and antiquities. The family lived for several years in Italy, where Ivan studied Latin epigraphy. He was instrumental in the building of the Museum of Fine Arts named for Alexander III (renamed now for Alexander Pushkin), and served as its first director when it opened in 1912. At his inspiration, the museum included artefacts from Classical Antiquity through the Middle Ages. His brother Dmitrii was deeply involved with the culture of medieval Rus’ at the Moscow Archeological Institute and the Archive of the Ministry of Justice.
The “father of Russian archeology,” Alexei Sergeevich was being educated by his father, the Minister of Education and President of the Academy of Sciences, for a diplomatic posting. Scions of the Razumovskii family, a favorite of Tsaritsa Elizabeth I, the Uvarovs had all the necessary social connections. All Alexei needed was one visit to Pompeii, and he switched careers immediately. An avid numismatist, he wanted to collect more artefacts than just the coins. A founding member of the Russian Archeological Association in St. Petersburg, following a break with Sergei Stroganov of the IAK, he moved to Moscow and formed a rival society. It was Uvarov’s Moscow-based Society that organized the 15 successful archeological congresses, the only sustained academic symposia in Imperial Russia.
A. N. Shvartz served briefly as Minister of Education, under Prime Minister Peter Stolypin, 1908-1910, dismissed from such liberal policies as wanting to open universities to women and increase the quota of Jewish students; he also wanted to close all student organizations, Left and Right, in hopes of depoliticizing them. As an educator, he had curated the educational districts of Moscow, Warsaw, and Riga. His academic specialty was Greek literature and epigraphy. In a side note, he had his colleague I. V. Tsvetaev dismissed from the Rumiantsev Museum over a false accusation of theft.