Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed!

Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Printable Version

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Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Daniel S Peterson - 05-01-2002

Unfortunately, I have just learned that the famous (and perhaps world's largest collection of ancient and medieval arms and armor assembled by the late Axel Gutmann of Berlin is to be sold by auction rather than maintained in a single collection accessible to the public (as I believe he would have wanted). Most of the Roman collection is now familiar from the two books co-authored by Born/Junkelmann, but this is only the "tip of the iceberg", for the collection was also composed of all varieties of ancient and medieval weapons and armor. I believe it will be auctioned by the German firm Hermann Historica though stuff of this caliber should be on Sotheby's. Are there any millionaire Lottery winnners out there on RAT who want to keep this collection together?

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Praefectusclassis - 05-01-2002

That would be an enormous shame. Do you have any idea of the market value of the ancient collection? It's probably too much for any state-funded museum, right? Greets 
 
Jasper

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Anonymous - 05-01-2002

For a look at (part of?) the Guttman collection and several other interesting pieces. It will be auctioned tomorrow, may 2nd... 
 
www.hermann-historica.com/ 
Edited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showLocalUserPublicProfile?login=antoninuslucretius>Antoninus Lucretius</A> at: 5/1/02 5:33:46 pm

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Anonymous - 05-01-2002

Guess it's too late to start a fund raiser for buying it eh? How come there isn't any billionaire Roman reenactors? jeez.... 
 
It's too bad that historical pieces couldn't be under some kind of protection from the government in a case like this....so that they would automatically go to a museum if not being passed to another relative or something. Kind of pisses me off that people are selfish and don't want to share. Cuz you know if that stuff gets bought, no one will ever see it again likely... 
 
I wish I had superpowers..... Tiberius Lantanius Magnus 
CO/Optio, 
Legio XXX "Ulpia Victrix" 
(Matt)

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Anonymous - 05-01-2002

IF the pieces announced on the auctioneer's homepage for May 2nd are all the Guttmann family gave to them, THEN we can stop holding our breath, because the "Sammlung Alte Waffen" (collection of old arms and armour) is not the main part of what Dr Guttmann has collected, but, as we learn from the homepage, only a few of his (mostly earlier) acquisitions "to furnish the so-called 'gothic room' in his villa". 
 
Dan, do you have information about whether the (much more precious) pieces published in the "Sammlung Axel Guttmann" series are to be sold, too? If so, they surely will give them to Sotheby's or so. 
 
About the "market value" (hate that expression in connection with archaeological finds, because in the same moment an artifact gets a market value, it normally has lost its scientific value): the best roman helmets in this collection will hardly go under hundred thousand Dollars each; the greek ones are usually between twenty and fifty thousend Dollars to start with at an auction. 
 
Greetings, 
 
Martin Edited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/umagisternavis.showPublicProfile?language=EN>Magister Navis</A> at: 5/2/02 7:28:03 pm

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Praefectusclassis - 05-02-2002

Market value of these pieces is indeed a dirty word Martin. I was just curious if I'd had to win the lottery once or twice. Greets 
 
Jasper

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Anonymous - 05-02-2002

I kind of suspected that looking at the pictures on the site: nothing out of the ordinary there; medieval swords spearheads and other very well known stuff. No exceptional piece of equipment. Maybe there will be another auction for the rest of the collection. We should stay tuned since they have excellent pictures on that auction site. I spent an hour looking at the chalcidian helmet. 
And while we're on photographs, I will take this opportunity to inform our reenactor friends that --as a rule-- the pixes they put on their sites are definitely up to par with the excellence of their reconstructions... <!--

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Daniel S Peterson - 05-04-2002

Okay guys, maybe its a false alarm. The person who gave me the information seems to have jumped to conclusions. As I mentioned previously "Hermann Historica" is not a big player in this business which gave me my initial doubts. It was my understanding that Axel Gutman's request was that the collection remain intact and available for public display. Maybe to fullfill his wishes some of the unimportant "decorators" need to be liquidated. I heard a quote that the "core" ancient collection has a value of over 6 million dollars. Martin, though the Greek helmets are generally cheaper than the important Roman ones, perhaps the most extraordinary and valuble helmet of all is the the very early Greek one with the horsehead crest. One of the monographs was dedicated practically just to this, and one other early greek "Kegelhelm". 
 
If there were a "single best home" for this collection, I think it would be the RGZM in Mainz, given the wide period the collection covers. As the majority in the RGZM collection are copies, it would be great to have more real pieces, and there would be no better place when conservation of the objects is concerned. Dan.

wow - Anonymous - 05-12-2002

All I can really say is wow and throw in my well wishes for such a fine preservation of history.

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Anonymous - 07-04-2002

Hi Dan, 
 
have a intact Corinthian helmet, sunday i get a intact roman helmet with 85 % silver plated, intact, 
 
Regards 
 
Rudi

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Anonymous - 07-05-2002

What's that supposed to mean?!? 
 
Greetings, 
 
Martin

Re: Roman/Ancient Armor Collection to be Sold/Dispersed! - Anonymous - 07-17-2002

you get A REAL ROMAN HELMET!!! 
 
You must be one of the most happy people in the field... 
 
Tell us more!!! 
 
late roman? early roman? with cheekpieces? from another collection, from a dig? known item? 
 
We can't wait, 
 
Sebastianus

unpublished helmet? - Daniel S Peterson - 07-28-2002

Rudi, I'd love to see a picture of this new helmet. As you may know, I am working with a friend who is an excellent artist to document as many different Roman helmets as possible and eventually expand to other types of equipment. I believe over 50 have been painted so far. We are going the artwork route because so many museums don't reply when asked to have permission to publish photographs of their collections. 
 
I hear about a new helmet in private collections about once a month now, most are pretty average though, Montefortino or Coolus styles little different from ones already published. 
 
Dan

Re: unpublished helmet? - richsc - 07-28-2002

I was dropping my son off at Dulles to join up with Rob Garbisch and Terry Nix on that tour going on these next two weeks, and one of them mentioned an elderly private collector in the UK with 100 Roman helmets that they hoped to go visit. I forgot the name already (senior moment) but I do hope they get in to see whomever that is. Dan, are you aware of that fellow? Seems like an astounding number of helmets for any collection anywhere. 
 
BTW, you'll get to meet son Scott as I understand you're giving them a tour this week? Make sure he's polite. Richard Campbell, Legio XX.
http://www.geocities.com/richsc53/studies/

Germany trip and helmet guy. - Daniel S Peterson - 07-31-2002

Rich, the guy with the 100 helmets is the dead guy, so don't think they'll be seeing him. I saw the whole tour group yesterday. I gave them the Saalburg tour... even got the keys to go into all the "special places". Hats off to Dr. Schallmeyer. Althugh he couldn't be there, he let the group have free admission as they do for achaeologists. 
 
Dan