Boros István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 50. (Budapest 1958)
Boros, I.: Kálmán Kittenberger and the Hungarian National Museum - Museum of Natural History
the richest and, from the point of view of the variety of fauna, the most interesting areas of the continent. He collected and hunted in 1902—1906 in the primordial forests of the Kilimanjaro and in the neighbouring styeps and savannas ; then in 1906—1907 in the Danakil area, starting from Assab on the Red Sea ; and in the styep counties (Ruwana —Serengeti) of the eastern shores of the Victoria Nyanza in 1908—-1912. From 1913 to 1919 he worked in Eastern Uganda, yet only for half a year, since at the beginning of world war I., he was interned, and then deported to India, and he arrived back home only after the end of the war. In 1925—1926, he hunted in Uganda again, first near the Nile, then in the western territories in the forests around the Ruwenzori ; finally, in 1928—1929, he was again hunting in Western Uganda, studying the life of big game and birds. Even before his first journey, he made an agreement with the director of the Zoological Department of the National Museum at that time, Dr. G. Horváth, in accordance of which he had to collect animals in compliance with the scientific demands and for a corresponding indemnity for the Museum. And, up to 1914, oftenest several times annually, his material did arrive in large cases : skillfully prepared mammalian and bird skins, but mainly invertebrate animals : spiders, myriapods, scorpions, mites, crustaceans, mollusks, etc., and a diversity of insects. As could be ascertained from his correspondance and from our inventory books, only 213 mammals were received in the Museum, — much less than were bagged. To wit, he was compelled to sell the majority of the big game to rich foreign museums, mainly the British Museum, since from the poor repayments of the National Museum he was unable either to obtain the expensive equipment or to organize and maintain his expeditions. He often spoke of it that he did this against his better intentions and beliefs. Even so, his mammalian material sent to our Museum, in which, apart from the smaller rodents, there are hyaenas, big cats, antilops, buffalos, monkeys and two chimpanzees, is still the best African material of our Mammalian Collection. Among them, the only zoological rarity is the Giant Wart Hog (Hylochoerus meinertzhageni) . He enriched our collections with 2500 birds. For scientific researches, he sent eminently fine series, mainly from the genera Francolinus, Oedicnemus, Cursorius, Vinago, Caprimulgus, Apus, Riparia, Cinnyris, Crater opus, Campephaga, Cisticola, Bradypterus, Sporopipes, Laniarius, Chlorophoenus, Lagonosticta. Of them, according to Gy. Madarász, one of the ornithologists at the turn of the century of our Museum, several forms were found to be new for science, and, as can be established from literature, 5 subspecies : Cisticola brachyptera Katonae Mad., Cisticola constans pictipennis Mad., Cisticola chiniana humilis Mad., Bradypterus baboecola elgonensis Mad., and Sporopipes frontalis cinerascens Mad., are still considered valid to date. The number of amphibians and reptiles originating from his collections also attains several hundreds or nearly a thousand, but, unfortunately, we could not establish the exact data due to the destruction of our inventory books in 1956. Though L. Méhely used this material for his osteological examinations, no one worked it out faunistically and systematically. It is sure, however, that he collected and sent back home almost all better known representatives of the rich East African herpetofauna. However, as I have mentioned above, he mainly collected invertebrates, according to his instructions received from the Museum. And that too, pre-
