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Antiquarianism, the History of
Objects, and the History of Art
before Winckelmann
1 Johann Joachim Winckelmann, Geschichte der Kunst des Altertums (Sdmtliche Werke 3,
ed. Joseph Eisebein) (Donaueschingen, 1825), 10-11: "Die Geschichte der Kunst des Altertums,
welche ich zu schreiben unternommen habe, ist keine bloBe Erzdihlung der Zeitfolge und der
Verinderung in derselben, sondem ich nehme das Wort Geschichte in der weitern Bedeutung,
dasselbe in der griechische Sprache hat, und meine Absicht ist, einen Versuch eines Lehrgebdiudes
zu liefern...Das Wesen der Kunst aber ist in diesem sowohl, als in jedem Theile, der vornehmste
Endzweck, in welches die Geschichte der Kiinstler wenig Einflul8 hat, und diese, welche von
anderen zusammengetragen worden, hat man also hier nicht zu suchen ... diejenigen, welche von
523
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524 Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann
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Antiquarianism 525
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526 Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann
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Antiquarianism 527
Nevertheless, Sandrart's ac
Winckelmann's and that of his
in a way that echoes what Winc
and some nineteenth-century G
subsequent interpretations w
emphasized the shortcomin
Sandrart's erudition (Gelehrsamk
Waetzoldt Sandrart's erudition
condition which would only c
dard works such as Udo Kulterm
described Sandrart as the Vasar
the German painter-historian is
of Vasari and of his Netherlan
tant essay Roberto Salvini treat
historiographers begun by hi
noted that Sandrart's writing w
Christian Klemm, author of
has elaborated these themes i
volumes of a facsimile edition of the Teutsche Academie. Klemm recounts
Sandrart's sources and his role in the continuation and translation of the tradi-
tion of artists' biographies, and he also relates him to the intellectual currents of
his time. Klemm thereby recognizes some of the newer historiographical con-
tent found in Sandrart's book, including the presence of antiquarian materials
not found in earlier works that may be related to the historiography of art.
Klemm also traces the impact on the text of Sigismund von Birken, the
Nuremberg poet and member of the order of the Pegnitzschiifer, and relates the
composition of Sandrart's compendium to the tradition of the polyhistors.20
Yet like Waetzoldt's comparison of Sandrart's to other contemporary schol-
arly accomplishments of the seventeenth century, this is not to be regarded as a
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528 Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann
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Antiquarianism 529
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530 Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann
All the famed [writers] who have experience with history have made
known to the world how highly necessary is the study and knowledge
of medals, because they alone give the stamp of truth in the history of
the ancients, and more credence is often to be placed in a medal, than
in diverse authors or books. For even though they are no doubt mute,
still their forms and reverses speak with more certainty. They settle
accounts in dubious matters, they light upon history with pure truth,
and they never are silent. Indeed, with their temper they outlast every-
thing imaginable, and show at the same time pure truth together with
the excellence and immortality of the art of imagery in a small piece of
metal. Therefore the most excellent scholars have all had recourse to
lessons in metal....34
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Antiquarianism 531
he here, as elsewhere in his bo
count. His interpretation of objec
something that is supposed to
eighteenth-century authors.
Sandrart expanded.the view inhe
ography of art. It has long bee
graphical coverage of artists pa
Germans, as well as to bring th
geographically, to mention the
pean involvement not only with
plified by Athanasius Kircher,
Sandrart moreover includes ac
Sandrart seems to realize more
promise that theorists of univ
struct a history of all the arts
visual arts, as they have subseq
Sandrart's extension of previo
also important, because in this
predecessors. Like Vasari and ot
of the history of painting, sculpt
mulations of artists' lives, espec
when biographical material bec
ognized, Sandrart's account wa
cline of art to the second Nica
basing this judgment in humanist
But Sandrart did more than that;
in Europe. He filled in the hist
thirteenth century, when, as i
artists usually begin with the b
Parisian schools like that of St. M
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532 Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann
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Antiquarianism 533
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Figure 1: Ancient Vases, from Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach,
Entwurff einer historischen Architektur, Frankfurt, 1725 (2nd edition),
courtesy Marquand Library, Princeton University.
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Antiquarianism 535
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536 Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann
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Antiquarianism 537
A posthumous publication b
tinguish copies or fakes from
ment for a seminar he offered
ing how one could learn by e
history according to the way
what they depict, or their in
studied with him at the time
to date objects on the basis of
This approach to a history of
to the method that Winckelman
relates his instruction in num
pursuits; he uses it to constru
later to develop: he says that
decline of arts in restless and
ered in peaceful times thereafte
are also anticipated by Sandra
Schulze's.
By the 1740s, when Winckelmann left Halle to begin his own career as a
scholar, the term "history of art" (or art history, Geschichte der Kunst or
Kunstgeschichte) had also become current in the German language, not just in
French and English texts mentioned by Winckelmann. Winckelmann admitted
55 Cf. Bickendorf, loc. cit., who notes that the reprinting of Wilthelm's work in Thesaurus
Diptychorum (Rome, 1759) made this "weitgehend vergessene Text" accessible again to the
republic of letters. The existence of treatments of ivories in German dissertations, however,
suggests that the text was known in the earlier eighteenth century in Germany.
56 Justi, Winckelmann und seine Zeitgenossen (Leipzig, 18982), 52-54, and Kaufmann, "An-
tiquarian Connoisseurship and Art History"; and for Baumgarten and Winckelmann see Dilly,
"1738: Vers une topographie de la notion d'art."
57 Johann Heinrich Schulze, Anleitung zur dltern Munzwisssenschaft worin die dazu geh6rigen
Schriften beurtheilet und die Alterthiimer au Miinzen erleutert werden (Halle, 1766).
58 Schulze, Einladungs-Schrift zu einem Collegio Privato iiber die Muntz- Wissenschaft und
die daraus erlaiiternde Griechische und R6mische Alterthiimer (Halle, 1738).
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538 Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann
59 Geschichte der Natur und Kunst. Sammlung von Natur- und Medicin. Wie auch hierzu
geh6rigen Kunst und Literatur-Geschichten, e.g., on the manufacture of paint (1718), 730.
60 Neue Versuche nutzlicher Sammlungen zu der Natur- und Kunst-geschichte sonderlich
von Obersachsen, Schneeberg, 1747ff. See, for example, "Sammlung von Neuen Natur und Kunst-
Erfindungen, und andern Kunst-Stiicken," Neue Versuche, 6 (1749), 493ff; "Kurtze Nachricht,
von dem Leben, des beriihmten Johannes Mariae Nosseni, Churfiirstlichen. Sichs Baumeister,"
Neue Versuche, 1 (1747), 25-31; "M. G. F. Miillers' Bericht, wegen derer am Altar zu
Ehrenfriedersdorff befindlichen merckwiirdigen Alterthiimer. Nebst einer Figur," Neue Versuche,
5 (1748), 371-77.
61 Kern-Historie aller Freien Kunsten und Sch6nen Wissenschaften, Vom Anfang der Welt,
bis auf unsere Zeiten (Leipzig, 1748).
62 See Kurt Karl Eberlein, Die deutsche Litterdrgeschichte der Kunst im 18. Jahrhundert.
Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Kunstwissenschaft (Karlsruhe, 1919), 14, Waetzoldt, Deutsche
Kunsthistoriker, 45ff, and Julius von Schlosser, La Letteratura artistica (Florence, 1967'), 481,
491, also discuss Christ as a forerunner of Winckelmann, and Waetzoldt also discusses his method.
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Antiquarianism 539
art and a history of artists. Th
indicates, according to a framew
nologically according to a history
later tried to provide for ancient
In Christ's teaching and later
in his project. While holding a c
lectured on aspects of sculpture a
ments in various ways to support
construction of a history of ar
tion on artists' monograms, on
earliest standard reference wor
compiled from his observation
graphic collection that Christ
research. The compilation of s
served the interests of a conno
individual works. More than that
grams was meant to provide one
be a history of art based on ep
Beginning in the 1740s the ar
ticipated Winckelmann's ideas i
terial study of Winckelmann
Krubsacius into discussions of W
can be further reassessed. Kru
noted by Winckel-mann, becau
mid-1750s, he was a leading fi
Saxon capital. The most famou
Landhaus, formerly a governme
of the city of Dresden. In 1755
famous Gedanken iiber die Nac
gained further attention in the c
HoJbaumeister, court architect
sequence for an aspiring young
Four years later, in 1759, Kr
Ursprung, Wachstum und Verf
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540 Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann
This essay has discussed but a few figures active in the German-speaking
world, familiar as well as little known, who antedate Winckelmann in their
contributions to the historiography of art. Many other writers who anticipate
aspects of the approach to the study of objects in a historical manner that is
67 Gedanken von dem Ursprung, Wachstum und Verfall der Verzierungen in den sch6nen
Kiinsten (Leipzig, 1759), 21.
68 Ibid., 15-16.
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Antiquarianism 541
associated with Winckelmann
already have been presented to
Winckelmann is actually envisi
here also suggests that a revisi
ture between the supposedly m
cifically its presumed revolutio
arship, including antiquarianism
What then was distinctive ab
many other apparent innovato
already existing concepts and m
ments and objects. He offered
by historical narrative in a uni
the time). He set his discussion
art, according to the redefinition
the eighteenth century by suc
with whose work he was famil
cially in the vernacular, in com
also often been acknowledged,
thing else that made his appro
tures, rather than the original
especially in regard to method
elements which make Winckelmann distinctive.
In any event, Winckelmann came on the scene at a moment that had been
well prepared for him in Germany as elsewhere. This circumstance also helps
account for the generally favorable reception his writings received in his own
time, and that as a consequence established his fame in later ages. It is therefore
not a postmodern urge to deny Winckelmann authorial originality but a desire
to offer a fuller and more balanced story that calls attention to the need for
further reconsideration of the significance of the so-called antiquarian tradi-
tion. Such reconsideration not only helps fill in a chapter in the history of schol-
arship but creates a firmer foundation on which his own contribution to the
origins of discussions of the history of art, and more generally to the supposed
eighteenth-century revolution in historiography, can be assessed.
Princeton University.
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