Från: JCK <cainkuelbelelmail.de>
Skickat: den 28 januari 2025 12:28
Till: Information Etnografiska <Infoografiskamuseet.se>
Ämne: To the Curator The Americas
Dear friends,
my name is Jürgen Cain Külbel. I am a retired German journalist.
In 2007 I published a long research report about the golden raft from Siecha, (Muisca, Colombia), in the yearbook of the State Ethnographic Collections of Saxony: NON NOBIS NASCIMUR. Über die Brüderschaft des Konsuls, Bankiers, Kaufmanns und Sammlers Bendix Koppel (1835-1919) mit Alphons Stübel, Wilhelm Reiss und Max Uhle, über seinen Verdienst um die Sammlungen des Museums für Völkerkunde zu Leipzig und die Verstrickung in die Geschichte um das Goldfloß von Siecha
I am currently writing another article about this subject for the Baessler Archive (Scientific Journal of the Ethnological Museum Berlin).
In 2004 I had a short conversation with Mr. Staffan Brunius conerning gold items made by Paul Telge. Telge was a goldsmith from Berlin and in 1883 he gave Mr. M. Retzius some galvanoplastic objects, including possibly objects of the Musica culture.
Mr. Brunius wrote to me in 2004:
Among the archival records at this museum, the Museum of Ethnography, there is information about gold items/objects made by Paul Telge, presented to The Royal Academy of Sciences in 1894. It must be emphasized unterstrichen werden in this context that the Museum of Ethnography traces its roots via The Museum of Natural History to the said academy. In later information compiled zusammengestellt vor prior to about/circa 1965 these 88 gold items, or "galvanoplastiska kopior", are said to be in Chiriqui style. The available original collection (1894.13) document and the later compiled zusammengestellte collections catalogues (that list in acquisition-chronological order all the collections, including their respective individual items/objects) at this museum lack fehlen!, surpringly enough überraschend genug, any information pertaining betreffend to each of these said Telge gold objects. This is one of the extremely few examples of "question marks" that we do have concerning the presence of a specific collection. Former temporary relocations (due a move in the end of the 1920s to a different museum facility/location and also to a former construction project) of all our collections have resulted in that all the collections are still not readily available for detailed inspection. However, we are in the process of unpacking, storing and digitalizing these collections and parallell to this endevour we go through archival documents. We will have your inquiry in focus.
Hence my question: Have you been able to find these objects in the meantime? If so, I would like to have a list of them. If the copy of the gold raft is among them, I would also like to have a photo of it.
Thank you for taking time for me. Have a nice week and best wishes to Stockholm.
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Bestes/all the best
Jürgen Cain Külbel
Berlin
Mobile: +49 (0)177 6137762