An Antiquarian Gift – a Collection of Perm Animal-Style Plaquettes in Estonian History Museum

Abstract

in 1873, a short notice appeared in the Revalsche Zeitung (no. 256, 02.11.1873), in which the Provincial museum, currently the estonian History museum, introduced the new museum exhibits that had arrived in its collection. Among other new objects in the collection of antiquities was a collection of finds, which were supposedly excavated from the central course of the Pechora river, and had been brought to estonia by Paul von Krusenstern, gifted to Karl ernst von Baer and thereafter donated to the Provincial museum. the collection (Am 196) includes iron and lithic points as well as human and animal-shaped plaquettes. this collection, which is rare and foreign for estonia, has received little attention, and during the past 150 years, only a few objects have been mentioned within the framework of some broader analyses.1 However, the collection as a whole has never been introduced. By 1873 Paul von Krusenstern had visited the Pechora river several times. A thorough descriptive book on the first expedition was pub-