Johanna Mestorfs handskrivna museijournal

En primärkälla till kunskap om 1800-talets kvinnliga museipersonals vardag samt treperiodsystemets reception i Kiel

Abstract

Johanna Mestorf’s handwritten museum journal is a rare first-hand source to the many and various antiquarian practices, policies, and gender issues of the late 19th century. During her decades of research on Mestorf, the historian/antiquarian Dr Dagmar Unverhau discovered the journal in the archive of Archaologisches Landesmuseum, Kiel. This is a separate tome in a three-volume publication on Mestorf’s work and life. Johanna Mestorf (1828–1909) was exceptional as a 19th-century female autodidact scholar. On her way to a position of influence in archaeology, she was brave and knew which official authorities to turn to. Among her mentors were Sven Nilsson, J. J. Worsaae, and Rudolf Virchow. On 1 October 1873, Mestorf was proclaimed Custodin at the Kiel Museum. In 1891 she became its director. Later she was appointed the second female professor in Prussia, and Doctor honoris causa in medicine. The handwritten journal opens in 1874 and provides a comprehensive account of Mestorf’s everyday work, on how to survive the strategies of oppression from the official leader of the museum, Handelmann, and on her strategies for achieving her ambitions concerning the museum. A most remarkable point is the detailed descriptions of how the Three-Age System was implemented at the museum. This was accomplished through Mestorf’s own decision, in opposition to Handelman, and by her own hands-on rearrangement of the antiquities. Unverhau’s work was first made known to Swedish colleagues by Pavel Nicklasson’s review (2018).