Ludwig Pollak and the Bibliotheca Hertziana

Tatjana Bartsch

On January 20, 2022, four commemorative stones were laid for Ludwig Pollak, his wife Julia and his two adult children Wolfgang and Susanna in front of the Palazzo Odescalchi in Rome, Pollak's last place of residence in Rome, on the initiative of some members of the BHMPI (photo: Tatjana Bartsch)

On January 20, 2022, four commemorative stones were laid for Ludwig Pollak, his wife Julia and his two adult children Wolfgang and Susanna in front of the Palazzo Odescalchi in Rome, Pollak's last place of residence in Rome, on the initiative of some members of the BHMPI (photo: Tatjana Bartsch)

The well-known archaeologist, art dealer and collector Ludwig Pollak (born September 14, 1868 in Prague, murdered October 23 or 24, 1943 in Auschwitz) had a long and multifaceted relationship with the Bibliotheca Hertziana. He met Henriette Hertz as early as 1892 (“Sie lud mich ein, ihre Antiken zu sehen” – “She invited me to see her antiquities”) and was a regular visitor to Palazzo Zuccari from that point on. His connections with Hertz, the Mond couple, and Ernst Steinmann were not only personal and friendly, but also of a scientific and business nature. The same can be said of the neighbor Count Grigorij Stroganoff, whom Pollak also met in 1892 and for whose collection of antiquities he wrote the catalog. Pollak described himself as the oldest visitor to the Bibliotheca Hertziana since its foundation in January 1913 until April 1935, when Director Leo Bruhns took a supposed misunderstanding as an opportunity to ban the Jewish scholar from the library. Numerous documents from Pollak’s estate and other archives, including his diaries, autobiographical writings, photographs, etc., contain a wealth of information about the institute and its protagonists and expand our knowledge of the first two decades of the Bibliotheca Hertziana’s history.