Ethnographisches Museum in Krakau und sein Begründer Seweryn Udziela

Abstract

History of Slavic Ethnology.

The year 1990 was the 80th anniversary of the founding of the Ethnographic Museum Society in Krakow. The main initiator of the founding of this museum, the creator of its basic collection, curator and later director was Seweryn Udziela (1857-1937). S. Udziela began researching folk culture in the then Western Galicia (the name of the part of Poland occupied by Austria in 1772) and collecting museum collections while still a teacher in the city of Ropczyce. In 1886 he began publishing his ethnographic works. In 1889 he became a member of the Anthropological Commission of the Academy of Arts in Krakow. He worked on the founding of the Ethnological Society and the Ethnographic Museum. In 1914 he acquired a seat for the museum on Wawel Hill. After World War II, the museum acquired a permanent seat in the building of the former town hall in the Kazimierz district. The Ethnographic Museum in Krakow was restored in 1937 under its original name S. Udziela.