Commentary – Negotiating restitutions

The correspondence between the Moravian historian Beda Dudík and the Swedish librarian Gustaf Edvard Klemming spans more than 30 years and reveals a transnational collaboration regarding formerly looted objects in Swedish collections, among other matters relating to manuscript research and collecting. Dudík wrote in German, while Klemming insisted on replying in Swedish most of the times (KB). The two very different scholars – Dudík a well-educated Benedictine, Klemming more or less an amateur philologist – not only remained in contact for decades; their friendship also facilitated the restitution of 21 Bohemian manuscripts, which is discussed in the letters above. This event took place in 1878, when the manuscripts were formally gifted by the Swedish king to the Austrian government. The Royal Library received an exclusive collection of contemporary books in return, and Klemming was personally decorated with an Austrian order (Kongl. bibliotekets handlingar 1, 4–5; Walde 1920, 471).

It all began in June 1851, when Dudík arrived in Stockholm to research formerly looted sources on Moravian history. During the wars of the seventeenth century, Swedish regents and field marshals had managed to confiscate entire archives and libraries in Central and Eastern Europe. Dudík’s mission – carried out on commission from the Committee of the Moravian Estates – was to map and establish the spoil’s historical value, as well as try to negotiate their return, or at least make them more available for non-Swedish scholars. According to a letter published in Brünner Zeitung in 1850, as many as 7,000–8,000 volumes of printed books and manuscripts were still to be found in Sweden. Before arriving in Stockholm, Dudík had already been introduced via diplomatic channels, which granted him access to the Royal Archive and Library (Dudík 1852, 9–11, 14–15). After his arrival, he quickly gained support from the Swedish royal family, perhaps thanks to the Catholic queen Josephine of Leuchtenberg (1807–76). Dudík was granted a private audience with the Queen in mid-July during which religious matters were discussed. Only days after his arrival, she had sent him a welcome gift in the form of a bunch of asparagus (MZA, Brno).

Not only Klemming, but several Swedish officials seem to have willingly assisted Dudík in his work. He was even allowed to bring manuscripts from the Royal Library back to the flat that he rented, so that he could prolong his work days (Dudík 1851, 20). It seems as if Dudík’s presence added some excitement to the officials every-day duties, and the stay in Sweden equally made an impression on Dudík: among his papers and notes from this journey, he carefully preserved a laurel wreath that he had received during a ceremony in Uppsala (MZA, Brno). Dudík’s most significant findings were 40 manuscripts of Bohemian or Moravian origin in the Royal Library. He classified all 40 according to language, 21 as »Bohemian«, (Dudík 1852, 142–288), which reflects that Czech was not fully established as a term nor as an official language at this point in history (Kamusella 2009, 106–107). Findings in other collections were dealt with more sweepingly, and Dudík could still not account for 7,000 to 8,000 books by the time he left. Still, the Swedish journey and the restitution in 1878 are seen as his most important scholarly achievements (Mahel 2015, 439–440).

When Klemming wrote to Dudík in 1875, the former took the initiative to realise earlier plans regarding a possible restitution of the 21 Bohemian manuscripts. His »tentare licet!« should be read as »we could always try!«. He was, nevertheless, expecting compensation in return, and Queen Christina’s (1626–1689) manuscript collection in the Vatican library was on top of his wish list. It was well known that the Queen had taken valuable manuscripts with her when she abdicated and left the Swedish kingdom in 1654. Since looted manuscripts were part of this collection as well, Dudík examined it in 1853 (Dudík 1855). Klemming mentions two previous restitutions to support his desire; the Ottoman Sultan Abdülaziz (1830–1876) had restored four manuscripts, once taken from the Bibliotheca Corviniana in the Hungarian kingdom, to Austria. And Pope Pius VII (1742–1823) had restituted 852 manuscripts from the Bibliotheca Palatina to the University of Heidelberg in 1816. The entire Palatine library had become a spectacular loot during the Thirty Years War in 1622, before being offered to Pope Gregory XV by Maximilian of Bavaria (Bepler 2001, 955). The main part was, and still is, preserved in the Vatican. Dudík responds to Klemming’s request with patience and facts. The latter was doubtlessly asking for something out of reach, however, wishing for Queen Christina’s manuscripts demonstrates that Klemming was in favour of nationalised collections (SBL). This helped Dudík’s case: if the Royal Library’s first objective was to represent Swedish history, the Bohemian manuscripts which very few Swedish scholars could read were simply not useful, which Klemming also expressly writes. It should be noted though that the remaining 19 manuscripts of Bohemian or Moravian origin – in Latin and Germanic languages – that Dudík located in the Royal Library were never a part of this discussion.

National history and nationalised collections were essential motivations for both Klemming’s and Dudík’ actions, nonetheless, their collaboration and wishes emphasise nationalism’s transnational dependencies (c.f. Swenson 2013, 4). Dudík was not the first foreign scholar who came to Sweden in search of spoils, and restitution requests had been made since the end of the seventeenth century (Walde 1920, 455, 460–473). The mission that Dudík received from the Moravian Estates, however, must be understood in relation to the status of historical scholarship in Moravia around 1850. Moravian sources had been intensively collected since the 1830s, and a municipal archive, a Mährisches Landesarchiv, was established in Brünn in 1839. The first official Moravian historiographer, Anton Boczck (1802–47), had expressed his concern for research about the region; while neighbouring Bohemia had already enjoyed six periods of historical scholarship, Moravia had barely had one and was therefore treated like terra incognita in European historiography (Die Regesten der Archive im Markgrafthume Mähren, XIV–XV). Whatever Moravian sources could be located abroad would consequently help Moravia to be recognised.

Nationalism and objects in flux inherently influenced how the latter were perceived, and the Dudík-Klemming collaboration is noteworthy in this regard. Bénédicte Savoy has shown how restituted Napoleonic loot was transformed; when abducted art works returned, they were often incorporated in newly established museums and became objects of national public attention. (Savoy 2011, especially 393–397). Likewise, Dudík’s research and the restitution of 1878 contributed to changing the understanding of the formerly looted manuscripts as new layers of meaning were added to their history. Firstly, Dudík’s work helped to underpin the perception of the Bohemian manuscripts as »Swedish spoils« in Sweden, a category that did not exist during the seventeenth century. It also contributed to introduce the word provenance (proveniens) to the Swedish language (Hagström Molin 2015, 16, 74–75). Long before Dudík’s time, when the Benedictine Bernhard Pez (1683–1735) had made a request about this material in 1731, the discussion only mentioned manuscripts taken from Austrian convents, serving Austrian history (Dudík 1851, 6–7). Dudík’s understanding of them differed, as he acknowledged local provenances from Bohemia and Moravia, and classified some sources as Bohemian, based on language. In 1878, after the 21 manuscripts had been shown to the Austrian Emperor, they were incorporated into the Moravian archive in Brünn, where they are preserved to date. Herein lies a final twist, since at least 14 of the manuscript had been taken from Prague in 1648 (Dudík 1852, 142–197). These manuscripts of Bohemian origin had become Moravian property. Considering the precarious position that Moravia had within European historiography – especially in relation to Bohemia – the restitution of 1878 was a great victory for Moravian history.

Emma Hagström Molin earned her PhD in history of ideas, and is associated with the Chair for the History of Science, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and the Department for History of Science and Ideas at Uppsala University, Sweden. Her doctoral thesis analyses loot in Swedish archives and libraries during the seventeenth century, while her postdoctoral project takes interest in provenance research and historiography during nineteenth-century, mainly through the lens of Beda Dudík’s transnational research.

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