The Institute of Archaeology of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków (collection of the former Archaeological Cabinet) and the State Archaeological Museum in Warsaw have in their possession two visually and formally similar pectorals of the Pomeranian Culture (Figs. 1 & 2). The two institutions obtained the artefacts in question at different times and through completely different routes; however, there are indications that the items may have been part of one find. The following text is an attempt at reconstructing the history of both objects and determining the places of their discovery and contents of the features from which they came and is a prelude to a full archaeological analysis of the artefacts.

The Kraków specimen is part of a collection of bronze ornaments presented in April 1871 to Józef Łepkowski (1826–1894), head of the Department of Archaeology and Medieval Art History at the Jagiellonian University and founder of the Archaeological Cabinet. The artefacts were donated by Łepkowski’s friend, Józef Ignacy Kraszewski (1812–1887)—a writer and journalist, political and social activist, as well as historian and archaeology expert. Kraszewski owned a rich collection of historical national memorabilia and antiquities, which, at that time, was stored in Dresden, where he had been living in political exile since 1863.

Kraszewski presented the Archaeological Cabinet with a clasp and twelve “hoops” (rings of a pectoral/pectorals) and five “rings” (open rod bracelets).

According to the information obtained by J. Łepkowski from the donor (documents concerning the collections of the Archaeological Cabinet of the Jagiellonian University are currently stored in the Archives of the Archaeological Museum in Kraków), the bronzes transferred to Kraków were originally received from Teodor Donimirski, the owner and resident of the Buchwałd estate in West Prussia (present-day Bukowo, Sztum County). Kraszewski stayed with Donimirski in 1864, and they continued to exchange letters in the following years. Kraszewski certainly did not acquire the artefacts discussed before mid-1869, as his Dresden collection, to which Łepkowski had access at the beginning of said year, did not yet include the bronzes from Donimirski at that time. The contents of the collection are not known in detail; however, it is known that, among the items recovered during domestic excavations, there were clay pots, numerous stone objects and at least a dozen or so bronze artefacts.

In the first days after receiving the gift, Łepkowski established its more precise place of discovery as Telkwice (recorded as Telkowice)—a hamlet of Buchwałd. He also noted that the items excavated at Donimirski’s estate “were found next to an urn and a bronze vessel” (Fig. 3). The artefacts received consecutive numbers in the Cabinet’s collection. Using the clasp and 11 hoops, Łepkowski re-assembled an “arm-ring”, designated as number 763 (Fig. 8); the remaining loose hoop was marked as number 762, and the other rings were numbered from 764 to 768.

The “arm-ring” reassembled by Łepkowski was published by T. Lu­bomirski—still as an artefact from Buchwałd—in the first volume of “Wiadomości Archeologiczne” issued in 1873 (the article, with editorial errors in the text, included a schematic drawing). The “arm-ring” was presented at the Archaeological Congress in Bologna at the end of 1871. In his report of the event, Alek­san­der Przezdziecki stated (1872, 141, 152) that “it was excavated at Telkowice, near Buchwałd (in the Malbork Province)” and was a gift from J.I. Kraszewski (also present in Bologna), who owned a second similar “arm-ring” (the place of discovery of this second item was not indicated).

The artefacts (as Telkowice) were described in the catalogue of the Archaeological Cabinet under the inventory numbers they received after their admission to the Cabinet’s collection (Fig. 4). The catalogue cards became the basis for the entries in the first comprehensive list of prehistoric artefacts in the collection of the Archaeological Cabinet, compiled in 1931. The assemblage of bronze artefacts from Telkowice was recorded under the numbers in the cards, even though, by that time, some of the elements had been re-numbered. The designations of the artefacts that have been preserved to this day were recorded in 1918 by Józef Kostrzewski (Fig. 5).

The publications from the 1970s indicate the place of discovery of the Kraków “arm-ring” as Telkwice/Telkwitz. They also do not mention either the accompanying artefacts or the other similar specimen in the possession of J.I. Kraszewski.

A change in the information about the discovery of bronze hoards near Sztum was introduced by Gotfryd Ossowski (1835–1897), who researched the prehistory of West Prussia between 1875 and 1879. In the issues of Prusy Królewskie and Mapa archeologiczna Prus Zachodnich, published between 1879 and 1888, he first mentioned that the “neck-ring” (in Ossowski’s nomenclature) from Buchwałd, stored in Kraków, had been found on the grounds of the village of Ramzy. He then stated that Ramzy (he does not specify whether it was Ramzy Wielkie or Ramzy Małe—both villages belonged to the Donimirski family) was the place of discovery of both “neck-rings”, i.e., the Kraków specimen and the one kept by J.I. Kraszewski in Dresden. According to Ossowski, the “neck-rings” were accompanied by numerous bronze wire coils, also kept by Kraszewski. A bracelet in the collection of the Academy of Learning, currently at the Archaeological Museum in Kraków (a glass bead of unknown origin was added to it later), is also said to have come from the same place. Said accessory, formerly owned by the Warsaw-based collector Aleksander Podczaszyński (1822–1876), was recorded in his collection catalogue as Buchwałd (Fig. 6). It is, therefore, likely that it belonged to the same assemblage as the bracelets donated to the University in Kraków. Ossowski does not cite the source of his information, nor does he mention the rings (bracelets) housed at the Archaeological Cabinet and recorded as Telkowice (Telkwice) or the urn and bronze vessel allegedly connected to the find. There is no data on the time and circumstances of the excavation of the bronze items. Therefore, this information cannot be considered fully reliable, although it was probably under Ossowski’s influence that J. Łepkowski included a note in the Cabinet’s files about the change in the location of the find, applicable only to the “neck-ring” (Fig. 8).

As a result of the problems with determining the correct location, number and actual composition of the finds, publications, both those issued close to the time of the discovery itself and later, used the terms “Ramzy” and “Telkwice” in various configurations and often contained contradictions. Consequently, there have been numerous misunderstandings in the identification of the assemblages and the individual artefacts. Today, it can be stated with certainty that the items donated by J.I. Kraszewski in 1871 are stored in the Archaeological Cabinet of the Jagiellonian University under the name “Telkwice”. There is also no doubt that the Warsaw pectoral is the “arm-ring”/“neck-ring” acquired from the Donimirski family and kept in J.I. Kraszewski’s collection in Dresden.

This specimen was obtained by the State Archaeological Museum after World War II, when said institution took over the collections (artefacts and documentation) of the interwar Department of Pre­historic Archaeology (Zakład Archeologii Przedhistorycznej, hereinafter: ZAP) of the University of Warsaw and those of the Erazm Majewski Prehistoric Museum of the Warsaw Scientific Society (Muzeum Przed­historyczne im. Erazma Majewskiego, hereinafter: MPEM). The artefact was part of a chronologically and thematically diverse collection of antiquities of unknown origin, purchased by ZAP in 1938 from the Warsaw journalist Andrzej Ziemięcki (Fig. 11). Shortly after the purchase, the collection was incorporated (along with a group of artefacts from other sources) as a deposit into the MPEM collection. In the list compiled at that time, the pectoral (as a “bronze Hallstatt neck-ring”), handed over in the form of unconnected elements, was labelled as number 1169 (Fig. 9). Currently, it consists of eleven rings decorated following a single pattern and attached to an openwork clasp. Moreover, three loose pectoral rings were recorded under numbers 1170–1172. In the Inventory Book of Museum Items, the artefact had not been recorded until 1974, when the organisation of the collections and documentation received by the Museum as a result of post-war restitution was completed. Thanks to the archival documents kept by the Museum and the Faculty of Archaeology of the University of Warsaw, it was established that the item had been purchased before the war by ZAP. The identification of the pectoral with one of the “neck-rings” from Ramzy was made possible by a photograph from the ZAP collection. It shows the reconstructed pectoral accompanied by several dozen spirals made from thin wire (Fig. 12). The coils are not listed in the inventory of artefacts from Ziemięcki’s collection. The photograph must then have been taken before the collection was sold to ZAP. No other documents related to this collection have been preserved, as they were kept in Andrzej Ziemięcki’s family archive, which was probably destroyed during the war.

Andrzej Ziemięcki inherited his collection of antiquities from his uncle, Teodor Ziemięcki (1845–1916), an archaeologist and art historian active in many fields. In 1883, he became the first curator of the National Museum in Kraków—a position based at Wawel Castle, which he had been advocating for since 1878. He was also a proponent of the establishment of an archaeological museum within the National Museum’s structure, which would collect artefacts from other private and public institutions in Kraków; however, this proposition never came to fruition, even though Ziemięcki sought support from J.I. Kraszewski, among others. There is no evidence that he collected archaeological artefacts himself, although it is likely that he was the person that directly received the assemblage from Malkowice, which Rudolf Jamka identified as part of the collection purchased by ZAP and analysed still before the war. It is also highly probable that Teodor Ziemięcki, and later his nephew, acquired the entire collection of Polish antiquities that had previously belonged to Józef Ignacy Kraszewski. This seems to be confirmed by the estimated and substantive similarity of the inventories of both collections (only some of A. Ziemięcki’s artefacts could be found in the post-war collections of the State Archaeological Museum). Teodor Ziemięcki probably received the collection of archaeological artefacts from the writer’s heirs, and the decision to transfer the items was facilitated by the family and social connections between the Kraszewski and Ziemięcki families.

It can be assumed that the bronze items donated by J.I. Kraszewski to the Archaeological Cabinet of the Jagiellonian University (elements of a pectoral/pectorals and rod bracelets) were indeed excavated at Teodor Donimirski’s estate in Telkwice, although it is not certain if they were all found in one place (Podczaszyński’s bracelet may also have come from the Telkwice bracelet assemblage). J. Łepkowski’s findings had not been challenged or corrected until Godfryd Ossowski’s publications, which questioned the origin of the pectoral as Telkwice, albeit without providing any justification. Ossowski’s reports on the discovery of another pectoral at Ramzy seem more credible; these notes undoubtedly refer to the specimen currently located in Warsaw.