Boros István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 8. (Budapest 1957)

Boros, I.: The tragedy of the Hungarian Natural History Museum

ANNALES HISTORICO-NATURALES MUSEI NATIONALIS HUNGARICI Tomus VIII. Series nova 1957 The Tragedy of the Hungarian Natural History Museum By I. BOROS, Budapest On the 24th October 1956 and the days that followed, during the march of events in Budapest now known all over the world, our Museum received a devastating blow such as was never yet received during its history of more then 150 years. In 1809, the Museum was transported to Nagyvárad, before the oncoming armies of Napoleon, then attacking Hungary, and from there it was brought back to the Capital after the lapse of eight months ; also destruction was near in the days of the great flood of Budapest in 1838, a part of the collection having been inundated, but the majority and also the most valuable material was successfully saved ; in January, 1945, in World War II, during the sorely trying days of the siege of Budapest, some shells hit the Museum buildings, and the Mineralogical Collection and the Ornithological Exhibition suffered considerable damages. Yet all these, in constrast to what happened now, were but insignificant episodes which meant no real losses as compared to the richness of its collections. The recent disaster is a downright tragedy ; not only because of the quantity of the material destroyed, but primarily and mainly on the ground of its qualitative aspect. Almost wholly the victims of the conflagration in the main Museum Building became the world-known and rich Mineralogical and Geological Department, containing scientifically priceless treasures, the same as the collections of the adjacent Paleontological Department. Together with these collections, their special libraries, containing largely irreplaceable works (books, periodicals, reprints), inventories, index cards, the desks of the mineralogists and paleontologists, their instruments and manuscripts were all annihilated. Simultaneously and in the same building, the large African mammals and big game trophies (now hardly to be acquired again) of the Mammalogical Collection were burnt to mere ashes : a wide-mouthed rhinoceros, a magnificent elephant bull, chimpanzees, bongos, etc., — the most valuable pieces of the gigantic and spectacular diorama of the African Exhibition. A few days later, the Zoological Collections housed in the Museum building in the Baross Street had the same fate. The alcoholic material of the Ichthyological and Herpetological Collections in this three-floor bulding caught fire and perished in the matter of minutes. Aside of them, wholly consumed were the exceedingly valuable Ornithological and Malacological Collections, the Collection of Lower, mainly Marine Invertebrates, the Dipterological Collection and the very considerable quantity of the comparative bone material of the Mammalogical Collection. The Lepidopterological