Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hello, and welcome
Speaker 1: to the podcast. I'm Holly Fry and I'm Tracy Wilson.
Speaker 1: I promise we'll shut up about it soon. But we're
Speaker 1: going to Paris. We are. I'm sure my friends wish
Speaker 1: I would also shut up about it, because they're like,
Speaker 1: we know you are lucky and you're going to Pariss. Uh,
Speaker 1: you can come with us. There is a tiny amount
Speaker 1: of time that you can still squeak in under the
Speaker 1: wire on your booking. They're also a very limited slots,
Speaker 1: so there's a possibility if you don't move very fast
Speaker 1: that those slots will have been taken by the time
Speaker 1: you get there. So we all sold out. If you
Speaker 1: have been hesitating, now is the time to go check. Yeah.
Speaker 1: April third, last day to do it. Yep, that's it.
Speaker 1: So you have two days left. Uh So today being
Speaker 1: April one, means you've got to jump on it. This
Speaker 1: is not an April fool's joke. You have limited time.
Speaker 1: We're gonna be there from June second to the ninth,
Speaker 1: and we are doing essentially a French Revolution tour of Paris.
Speaker 1: But there's also plenty of free time baked in so
Speaker 1: you can explore on your own. And if you're just
Speaker 1: a single person and you're like, I want to go
Speaker 1: to Europe, but not by myself, you're gonna be on
Speaker 1: the whole group. We're all gonna be together. It's fine.
Speaker 1: Uh So we encourage you come and join us. It's
Speaker 1: going to be a blast. We also are going to
Speaker 1: do a live show in Indianapolis as part of the
Speaker 1: kickoff for the Midwestern Roots Conference that is on July.
Speaker 1: Uh So, if you're interested in getting tickets to that,
Speaker 1: you can go to our website and look at the
Speaker 1: click on the link that says live shows, and that
Speaker 1: will give you the info. If you want to get
Speaker 1: to that Paris information, you can go to our website,
Speaker 1: click on the link that says Paris trip exclamation point
Speaker 1: due to excitement, and that will also give you all
Speaker 1: the info you might need to do that. So we
Speaker 1: hope to see people at both of those events. There
Speaker 1: are more events coming. You'll get that news as we
Speaker 1: have it. But today it's April fools Day. It is
Speaker 1: April Fool's Day. If you're listening on the day that
Speaker 1: the episode came out. Uh, it's one of the days
Speaker 1: of the year that I want to love the most.
Speaker 1: But I find that I am a little bit picky
Speaker 1: about the level of tomfoolery that I get. It has
Speaker 1: to be really good or wah wah. I don't want
Speaker 1: your sad trombone mediocre pranks. I want really good one.
Speaker 1: But because it is April Fool's Day, if you're listening
Speaker 1: to this the day that it publishes, uh, we have
Speaker 1: this auspicious calendar situation. So I thought it would be
Speaker 1: fun to cover a historical hoax. And as I was
Speaker 1: rummaging around for options, by blind luck, I ran across
Speaker 1: one for which the date of April one actually figures
Speaker 1: into the story. And this is the story of the
Speaker 1: Tiara of Cia Taphernes. And this story sort of places
Speaker 1: out in three acts. So first we're gonna talk about
Speaker 1: the Scythians and how their artifacts became highly prized in
Speaker 1: nineteenth century Europe. And then we're going to talk about
Speaker 1: the hoax itself and that all went down. And finally
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about an artist who came into
Speaker 1: fame as a result of his sort of accidental part
Speaker 1: in this whole thing. In eighteen thirty, the archaeological site
Speaker 1: known as cool Oba was discovered excavation started there. So
Speaker 1: this site is on the Crimean Peninsula, six kilometers to
Speaker 1: the west of the modern day city of Kirch and
Speaker 1: it was a burial mound. The cool Oba site really
Speaker 1: fascinated the world when it was discovered because it was
Speaker 1: a Scythian burial site. So the Scythians were in the
Speaker 1: height of their culture from nine hundred to two hundred
Speaker 1: b C. And as a nomadic, tattoo covered warrior culture,
Speaker 1: they touched many areas of Central Asia. Herodotus wrote about
Speaker 1: their fear skills in battle, and they created weapons, particularly bows,
Speaker 1: that were far advanced over those of other cultures. They
Speaker 1: were so fast and mobile that they were able to
Speaker 1: swoop in upon enemy territory and deliver serious damage almost
Speaker 1: before anyone realized what was happening, and then they would
Speaker 1: vanish back into their own territory, leaving destruction in their wake.
Speaker 1: Even though they had a really nomadic culture, Scythiens had
Speaker 1: elaborate burial rituals. Their burial sites were very deep, with
Speaker 1: internal structures down in the pit, almost like cabins, and
Speaker 1: the coffins were placed into these. They wanted the dead
Speaker 1: to have everything they might need in the afterlife, so
Speaker 1: they also sacrificed horses to include in the burial so
Speaker 1: that the deceased would have mounts with them, and then
Speaker 1: all of that in place, the site would be buried
Speaker 1: under a mound. And the Scythians, because of their warrior
Speaker 1: reputation and because there are still many gaps in our
Speaker 1: knowledge about them, remain a source of fascination for historians,
Speaker 1: and in the eighteen thirties, that fascination and the discovery
Speaker 1: of the cool Oba site sparked a huge interest in
Speaker 1: the collection of Scythian artifacts. Many of the items that
Speaker 1: were excavated from Cooloba were beautiful, intricate gold pieces, and
Speaker 1: they ranged in size from small pieces of jewelry to
Speaker 1: larger works of often sculptural art. So there was just
Speaker 1: a scramble to try to attain these pieces, and they
Speaker 1: weren't always being sold through the proper channels to museums.
Speaker 1: They also wound up being sold off to private collectors,
Speaker 1: kind of on the download and the fact that the
Speaker 1: documentation of the artifacts that had been recovered from the
Speaker 1: site wasn't as meticulous as it should have been. I
Speaker 1: meant that the knowledge that was pieced together from this
Speaker 1: effort became just kind of a picture with big missing pieces.
Speaker 1: That meant that it was not clear exactly what had
Speaker 1: been at the site, and that also hindered the analysis
Speaker 1: and the study of the culture itself that might have
Speaker 1: been gained from the discovery if things had been more
Speaker 1: meticulous and regulated. Yeah, I mean even today, like when
Speaker 1: we have spoken with archaeologists, they talked about how imperative
Speaker 1: it is to document everything in catalog everything and its place,
Speaker 1: and in this case that was not happening very well
Speaker 1: at all. It was pretty scratchy and kind of catches
Speaker 1: catch can when things actually got notated. And as a consequence,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of nebulous sort of theoretical stuff that
Speaker 1: people don't have any real evidence to back up. And
Speaker 1: all we have the study of the Cythians are these
Speaker 1: grave sites, which are called Kurgan's by the way, which
Speaker 1: if it makes you think of highlander me too. Because
Speaker 1: of their nomadic culture, they just they didn't have things
Speaker 1: like cities or permanent settlements. So the Kurgans are the
Speaker 1: only physical evidence that's left behind and after Cooloba. There
Speaker 1: were more Kurgan's unearthed more than thirty years after this
Speaker 1: site was discovered. Another one was found at Schertomic in
Speaker 1: sixty eight. Yet another site, this one with multiple mounds,
Speaker 1: was called Seven Brothers and that was found near the
Speaker 1: Kuban River in the eighteen seventies. Both of these excavations
Speaker 1: even more captured the public imagination. Music ems were extremely
Speaker 1: eager to get their hands on artifacts from the city
Speaker 1: and nomads, and it seemed like there could just never
Speaker 1: be enough excavation or discovery to satisfy this demand for artifacts.
Speaker 1: There became this really romanticized and kind of fetishized culture,
Speaker 1: so no matter what was discovered, people wanted more artifacts. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was uh, there was a little, a little bit
Speaker 1: of city and fever going on in nineteenth century Europe.
Speaker 1: And as the nineteenth century was coming to a close
Speaker 1: and all of this fervor was still carrying out, a
Speaker 1: very short article ran in a newspaper in Vienna, and
Speaker 1: this brief write up told the story of a peasant.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you will see this written as though it was
Speaker 1: peasants plural from the Crimea Peninsula who had made an
Speaker 1: astonishing find of historical significance. So important was this item
Speaker 1: that they had found that the discoverer or discoverers fled
Speaker 1: Russia fearing that this thing, which was not detailed, was
Speaker 1: going to be taken away by the government. A few
Speaker 1: months later, the Huckman brothers, who were antiquities dealers, held
Speaker 1: an exhibit in Vienna, Austria, that was in February of
Speaker 1: Their exhibit featured a number of rare items that were
Speaker 1: alleged to have been recently discovered in Russia. Just to
Speaker 1: be clear, a lot of the places that we're talking
Speaker 1: about in this episode, if if we were talking about today,
Speaker 1: that would be Ukraine, but at the time it was Russia. Correct.
Speaker 1: Among these was a tiara, And this is not a
Speaker 1: tira like you would think of in the modern sense
Speaker 1: of the word, with some kind of delicate or maybe
Speaker 1: ornate little diadem. It was a small domed helmet that
Speaker 1: was seven inches or seventeen point eight centimeters tall. It
Speaker 1: weighs about a pound, and it's made of solid gold. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it was ornate, just not in the way we
Speaker 1: would think of say a tierra. We might see on
Speaker 1: um one of the lovely wives of the princes of England.
Speaker 1: So the widest band of decoration on this era show
Speaker 1: scenes from the Iliad in carved relief, and then the
Speaker 1: lower band, which is not quite as as wide or tall,
Speaker 1: depending on how you want to describe it, show scenes
Speaker 1: of life in the Scythian culture. And there's also an
Speaker 1: inscription inside the tiara in Greek indicating that it is
Speaker 1: a gift from the people of the Crimean city of
Speaker 1: Olbia to the king of the Scythians Ciataphernese. It was
Speaker 1: a fascinating piece and it was shopped around by a
Speaker 1: dealer by the name of Vogel with the story of
Speaker 1: this clandestine journey out of Crimea, and he told this
Speaker 1: story to several museums in Europe. Vienna's Imperial Court Museum
Speaker 1: did not want this artifact, neither did the British Museum,
Speaker 1: but the Louver did want it and did not hesitate
Speaker 1: when it was offered the opportunity to acquire it. So
Speaker 1: on April one, eight six, the Louver bought this tiara
Speaker 1: for two hundred thousand francs. Yeah, that's the April first
Speaker 1: tie in. It doesn't go any further than that. It
Speaker 1: just is a nice bit of happenstance and kind of prophetic. Yes.
Speaker 1: So now, the reason that the British Museum and the
Speaker 1: Imperial Court Museum would pass on what sounds like an
Speaker 1: amazing find is pretty simple. Both institutions believed that it
Speaker 1: was a fake uh in the case of the British Museum,
Speaker 1: there had not even been an inspection. Simply the claim
Speaker 1: that it was from Olbia had a roused suspicion in
Speaker 1: London because that had often been used by forgers as
Speaker 1: a city of origin for fake antiquities. It was at
Speaker 1: this point roughly the antiquities trade version of saying you
Speaker 1: have a girlfriend in Niagara falls that no one has met,
Speaker 1: and that perception that a tiara was not genuine wasn't
Speaker 1: exactly a secret. As a consequent, the press and France
Speaker 1: started running stories questioning the authenticity of this new acquisition
Speaker 1: at the Louver, and the museum's reputation was also in question,
Speaker 1: so this started a very public battle over the whole issue.
Speaker 1: On August eighth of the periodical The Nation ran an
Speaker 1: article titled the Disputed Tiara in the Louver, written by
Speaker 1: French archaeologist Solomon Rainoch. It opened with the following paragraph quote.
Speaker 1: Seldom has public attention been roused as it is just
Speaker 1: now by a question of archaeological criticism. The Tiara of
Speaker 1: Piataphernes and the gorgeous necklace purchased together with it for
Speaker 1: the large sum of two thousand francs, have become a
Speaker 1: favorite topic of conversation. People talk about them and judge
Speaker 1: them who had never heard the existence of Olbia, nor
Speaker 1: of the extension of Greek civilization to the northern shores
Speaker 1: of the Black Sea. Of course, as the daily papers
Speaker 1: have taken the matter in hand, much nonsense has already
Speaker 1: been printed about the Tiara, and it is probable, the
Speaker 1: debate having only just begun, that we shall hear a
Speaker 1: great deal more of it. There was a lot of
Speaker 1: squabbling that erupted around this tierra, and we will get
Speaker 1: into some more of it in just a moment, but
Speaker 1: first we will pause for a quick sponsor break. There
Speaker 1: were many nix who said that the Tira was a forgery.
Speaker 1: Um a professor of Vasolowski of St. Petersburg and German
Speaker 1: archaeologist at Alfred Wangler were two of the most prominent
Speaker 1: professor of Vassolowski, who taught Byzantine in Turkish History at
Speaker 1: the University of St. Petersburg was actually the first to
Speaker 1: publish a claim that the tiarra was fake. Vasulovsky had
Speaker 1: a good reputation, and even one of the supporters of
Speaker 1: the tierra as a true relic wrote, quote, Professor of
Speaker 1: Vassolowski is not an urchin. He cannot have written such
Speaker 1: a note without having serious reasons to give. Fort Wangler
Speaker 1: made the case that the tiara of Sayataphanes was incongruous
Speaker 1: with other genuine city and finds from Crimea because it
Speaker 1: was dated much later. The vast majority of items that
Speaker 1: had been excavated up to that point where from the
Speaker 1: fourth and fifth centuries b c e. And this one
Speaker 1: was supposedly from the third century BC. Fort Wangler's position
Speaker 1: was questioned because it was common knowledge that fake antiquities
Speaker 1: were coming out of Crimea, but he admitted he had
Speaker 1: not seen any of them himself. Yes, And people were
Speaker 1: kind of like, so you say it's a fake just
Speaker 1: based on like the numbers, but you have never seen
Speaker 1: a fake to know whether or not this compares to them. Uh.
Speaker 1: The August issue of Cosmopolis featured an article by Adolf
Speaker 1: Ford Wrongler dismissing any possibility that this tira could be
Speaker 1: a genuine third century BC artifact, and then the next
Speaker 1: month a counter to that article was published, written by
Speaker 1: the Louvers curator of Greek and Roman antiquities, Monsieur Fosse,
Speaker 1: and so began a year's long back and forth between
Speaker 1: believers and detractors. Critics brought up the pretty glaring fact
Speaker 1: that this piece looked way too pristine to date back
Speaker 1: to the time of the Citians. There was virtually none
Speaker 1: of the damage that you would anticipate when examining something
Speaker 1: that old. Ford. Wangler did concede that some of the
Speaker 1: tiara was legitimately old. He thought that the two brass
Speaker 1: nails that were used in its construction were indeed antique.
Speaker 1: Even outside the louver there were people who believed that
Speaker 1: the tiara was the real deal. That article that I
Speaker 1: quoted just before the Break from the Nation goes on
Speaker 1: to state quite plainly that the author believed that the
Speaker 1: tiara and the necklace it was purchased with both were
Speaker 1: quote perfectly genuine antiques. And the trs backstory grew and
Speaker 1: gained more detail as its status was hashed out, including
Speaker 1: in that article so, according to Rhinock, the item came
Speaker 1: into the possession of a dealer at Otakov, who tried
Speaker 1: to sell it to account Tuskevitch before moving to Lemberg
Speaker 1: and then to Vienna for the exhibit that we mentioned earlier.
Speaker 1: Renach made the case that no one questioned the tr
Speaker 1: is authenticity when it was on display, and that it
Speaker 1: was only once money got involved that people started claiming
Speaker 1: it was a fake. He also said that he had
Speaker 1: been on hand for the meeting at the Louver where
Speaker 1: the purchase was approved, and that the committee present did
Speaker 1: very carefully consider the possibility of a forgery, given the
Speaker 1: knowledge that crime and fakes were becoming more and more commonplace.
Speaker 1: He also pointed out that a lot of the Tiaras
Speaker 1: detractors changed their minds once they had seen this piece
Speaker 1: in person. Ryknoch went on to mention that the French
Speaker 1: public was prone to dismissing their countrymen as experts in
Speaker 1: anything and deferring to foreign scholars. When he shifted from
Speaker 1: his critique a third Wonglar to discussing Vesselovski quote, the
Speaker 1: public at large believed in the Russians assertion first because
Speaker 1: a Russian in contemporary France is something more than an
Speaker 1: ordinary mortal. And secondly, because our public is always ready
Speaker 1: to believe that the officials of its own country are
Speaker 1: lazy or ignorant. I love that quote. I did so
Speaker 1: because Vesslovski was Russian and Ford Wongler was German. The
Speaker 1: Louve dismissed their writings on the matter that this was
Speaker 1: just an issue of national jealousy. This perfect and tidy
Speaker 1: nature of the piece had been the primary clue to
Speaker 1: its youth for its critics, but the lou claimed that
Speaker 1: made it all the more special as part of their
Speaker 1: collection because they had this relic that was in Christine condition.
Speaker 1: The press continued to skewer the museum, though for more
Speaker 1: than six years, over its insistence that the Tira was
Speaker 1: the real deal. Eventually, an editor at the newspaper Lan Trengs,
Speaker 1: again named on Re Rochefort, made the case to the
Speaker 1: museum that everything would be settled if they just launched
Speaker 1: to throw investigation and determined the trs origin and as
Speaker 1: that was going on, the Tiara and whether it was
Speaker 1: a forgery was international news, and what had initially begun
Speaker 1: as a debate in antiquity circles over these six years
Speaker 1: eventually reached even the smallest towns in the world, and
Speaker 1: that spread of information was what brought about a revelation
Speaker 1: in the matter in the form of a jeweler from
Speaker 1: Russia named lift Shoots. When this jeweler heard about the
Speaker 1: inquiry into the helmet's history, he remembered seeing a colleague
Speaker 1: working on a piece that really matched this tiara. His
Speaker 1: account of having seen the creation of the item that
Speaker 1: had been the center of so many public disagreements was
Speaker 1: printed in the newspaper let in Paris, and the man
Speaker 1: that he named as the creator was Israel Rushmovsky, because
Speaker 1: he had a reputation for excellent work. Rushmowsky actually had
Speaker 1: briefly come up as a possible antiquities forger several years
Speaker 1: before all of this. In even a man named Monsieur
Speaker 1: de Stern allegedly visited Odessa, where Rushmovsky lived, and started
Speaker 1: a rumor that this man was creating forgeries. Rushmowsky wrote
Speaker 1: a letter to the journald Dabad firmly asserting that he
Speaker 1: was doing no such thing, and that letter was published
Speaker 1: on October three of eight But none of this had
Speaker 1: connected the artist to the tiara. It was just a
Speaker 1: case of a general accusation being leveled based on the
Speaker 1: fact that Rushmowsky was a very skilled metal smith working
Speaker 1: in an area that was well known at that point
Speaker 1: for producing forgery. The naming of a specific artist and
Speaker 1: a witness claiming that the Tira was fake was just explosive.
Speaker 1: Monsieur Ronde de vi Fos made a formal request to
Speaker 1: the French Minister of Public Instruction for permission to pull
Speaker 1: the Tiara out of the collection and do a full inquiry.
Speaker 1: The minister granted the request and ordered a judicial inquiry
Speaker 1: as well. Once Rushmowsky's name was in the mix in
Speaker 1: the Tira controversy, the Louve brought him to Paris for
Speaker 1: questioning as well, and as Rushmowsky told his tale of
Speaker 1: creating this intricate helmet, it implicated the Hawkman brothers. Rushmowsky
Speaker 1: said that the Hawkman's had approached him about creating the
Speaker 1: Tiara as a commission, claiming that they wanted it as
Speaker 1: a gift for a friend who was an archaeologist, and
Speaker 1: he was given reference material books featuring Greco Sydney and
Speaker 1: discoveries to base his design on. He was paid eighteen
Speaker 1: hundred roubles for this work. It is unclear what, if anything,
Speaker 1: by the way, happened to the Hawkman's as a result
Speaker 1: of all of this. They may have been long gone
Speaker 1: because their name doesn't seem to come up in any
Speaker 1: accounts of what happened with this whole story. After this,
Speaker 1: Rusmovsky described in detail the design and construction process he
Speaker 1: had used to create the faux artifact. He made it
Speaker 1: in three separate pieces that were fitted together and soldered
Speaker 1: in a way that was really carefully hiding the seams.
Speaker 1: Then he used a hammer to create some dents in
Speaker 1: the piece. Although he was really skilled and exacting in
Speaker 1: his work, these were the exact details that an expert
Speaker 1: would have noticed and factored into an analysis of the piece.
Speaker 1: One of the characteristics of the dents, which was cited
Speaker 1: as being an indicator of a fake, was the fact
Speaker 1: that none of the denting damage had been done to
Speaker 1: any of the detailed sections, only the pieces that didn't
Speaker 1: have any design on them. And then there wasn't any
Speaker 1: weathering other than the minor dings here and there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the backstory that was kind of being used when this
Speaker 1: was sold was like, oh, those dents are from like
Speaker 1: a moldering crypt falling apart, and it's like, really, because
Speaker 1: they have great aim. Um, you would think that an
Speaker 1: artist coming forward and describing exactly how he made this
Speaker 1: forgery would close the case, but it did not. Not
Speaker 1: quite yet. We're going to tell you what happened next
Speaker 1: and how all of this impacted Rushmowsky's life. After we
Speaker 1: hear a quick word from one of the sponsors that
Speaker 1: keep stuff you missed in history class going. While the
Speaker 1: artist admitting to the work that he had done on
Speaker 1: this forgery would seem to be a fairly conclusive bit
Speaker 1: of testimony, the Louver wanted more proof, so Rushmovski was
Speaker 1: given a sheet of gold and asked to create a
Speaker 1: piece of a fake city and Tiara basically create another one,
Speaker 1: And before witnesses he did exactly that, and that proved
Speaker 1: the embarrassing fact that the Louver had bought and defended
Speaker 1: a forgery. To be fair. When compared to other forgeries,
Speaker 1: Rushmovski's work was so far superior and more convincing in
Speaker 1: simply trying to make the best possible commission that he could,
Speaker 1: he had outdone those who had actually been trying to
Speaker 1: pass off their work as ancient as all of this
Speaker 1: information about the hoax was circulating through the press around
Speaker 1: the globe, so with something else, and that was a
Speaker 1: universal admiration for Rushmowsky's work. Since he hadn't known that
Speaker 1: his creation was going to be shopped around as a
Speaker 1: historically significant find, and since he had been entirely forthright
Speaker 1: under questioning, his reputation was not harmed, so people didn't
Speaker 1: brand him a forger. That was sort of an unintended
Speaker 1: side effect of his making this thing. His work was
Speaker 1: described in articles as quote a very fine piece of
Speaker 1: Goldsmithery Rushmowsky sort of smartly brought one of his other
Speaker 1: works to Paris when he traveled there on the business
Speaker 1: of the Tiara of Sayataphanes, so that he could enter
Speaker 1: that other piece into the nineteen o three Paris Salon
Speaker 1: Exhibition of Decorative Arts. That piece that he brought is
Speaker 1: probably one that you have seen photos of because it
Speaker 1: occasionally gets passed around on social media kind of every
Speaker 1: couple of years. It's a tiny, tiny skeleton made of gold.
Speaker 1: It's only three point five inches long, it's about nine centimeters,
Speaker 1: but it has more than one hundred fifty parts and
Speaker 1: it's fully articulated. Even the jaw moves and it is
Speaker 1: highly detailed. The skeleton took him almost five years to make.
Speaker 1: He worked on it from eighteen ninety two to eighteen
Speaker 1: ninety six, and then once he was done with it,
Speaker 1: he thought it needed a proper encasement. So to hold
Speaker 1: this skeleton, he also made a tiny ornate coffin out
Speaker 1: of silver with a blue velvet lining. He worked on
Speaker 1: that for the next five years, and then made additional
Speaker 1: edits over several more years after the three salon. The
Speaker 1: coffin that the skeleton goes in is so small. It's
Speaker 1: four and three eight inches long, which is eleven point
Speaker 1: two centimeters. It's so beautiful. It's one of those things.
Speaker 1: Have you run into it on social media years So
Speaker 1: maybe it's just me because I run in um, you know,
Speaker 1: HALLOWEENI Gothy spooky circles, but um, it always comes up.
Speaker 1: And I've had it sent to me many times where
Speaker 1: people are like, this is right up your alley. I'm
Speaker 1: like it is. Um. It is so spectacularly beautiful and
Speaker 1: Rushmowsky was awarded a gold medal at the exhibition in Paris,
Speaker 1: and moreover, he gained the attention and favor of a
Speaker 1: number of wealthy art patrons, including the Baron James de Rothschild,
Speaker 1: and when Rushmowski headed home to Odessa, he took with
Speaker 1: him several commissions for more of his astonishing and beautiful work.
Speaker 1: From nineteen o three to nineteen o six, programs destroyed
Speaker 1: much of the Jewish community in Russia. Hundreds of Jews
Speaker 1: were killed during a program in Odessa in nineteen o five.
Speaker 1: Ruslmovsky and his family managed to survive. But when he
Speaker 1: returned to Paris in nineteen o six too once again
Speaker 1: exhibit his work in the Salon, he had an eye
Speaker 1: toward the future. He really felt that he needed to
Speaker 1: get his family out of Russia for their safety, and
Speaker 1: he wanted to really kate to Paris. Yes, since he
Speaker 1: already had kind of a client base developing there, it
Speaker 1: just seemed like the smartest move. But it still took
Speaker 1: several years for Rushmowsky to execute his plan and get
Speaker 1: everything arranged, but in nineteen ten finally he and his
Speaker 1: family permanently moved to Paris. He wrote his memoir in
Speaker 1: Yiddish uh and those were published in the late nineteen twenties,
Speaker 1: and then he died in Paris in nineteen thirty four
Speaker 1: at the age of seventy four. Before he died, the
Speaker 1: artist created a miniature headstone for himself and his wife,
Speaker 1: in which he engraved a happy man was I in life?
Speaker 1: Peace and quiet, Bread and clothing were always found in
Speaker 1: my home. I loved my work, my wife, and my home.
Speaker 1: Even after my death, my spirit will prevail as the
Speaker 1: work of my hands that I have left behind. The
Speaker 1: skeleton that Rushmovsky made changed hands from one collector to
Speaker 1: another over the years. In both it and the t
Speaker 1: r Oh were included in an exhibit in Jerusalem titled
Speaker 1: The Secret of the in Tiara Works by Israel Rosbowski.
Speaker 1: On April twenty nine of two thousand thirteen, that tiny
Speaker 1: skeleton was auctioned by Saucepies and it was expected to
Speaker 1: sell for a hundred and fifty thousand to two hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty thousand dollars, but when the bidding was all done,
Speaker 1: it went for three hundred and sixty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: The Louve did not get rid of the Tiara of
Speaker 1: Saatophanes after it was revealed to be a forgery. Initially,
Speaker 1: they kept it tucked away in the museum archive. It
Speaker 1: was widely presumed that it would never see the light
Speaker 1: of day again, but in the years since then, its
Speaker 1: status as a famous fake has led to some public
Speaker 1: interest in seeing it. In nineteen fifty four, the Louve
Speaker 1: turned the institution's embarrassment into an exhibit and included the
Speaker 1: tiara in their salon of fakes that they assembled for
Speaker 1: a limited run. Yeah, they're also I didn't write down
Speaker 1: the number, but I think there were eight fake Mona
Speaker 1: Lisa's included in that exhibit as well, um, which I
Speaker 1: thought was a pretty good pr move. Actually, the Louver
Speaker 1: does mentioned the tira briefly on its website as of
Speaker 1: today in its section on the history of the institution.
Speaker 1: In its section titled Sadness of the bellapoc Is, the
Speaker 1: note quote too unfortunate incidents seem to sum up this
Speaker 1: difficult period. The purchase of the tiara of Saya Taphanes,
Speaker 1: which proved to be a fake, and the theft of
Speaker 1: the Mona Lisa in nineteen eleven embarrassing at the time,
Speaker 1: but I feel like because everyone recognizes what a beautiful
Speaker 1: piece of work it was at this point a hundred
Speaker 1: plus years later, people are like, no, that's a valid
Speaker 1: museum piece. Now I wish I wish we had a
Speaker 1: better picture of it available to put on our website.
Speaker 1: Uh were the ones that we have access to our
Speaker 1: don't They're not particularly crisp, so they don't show all
Speaker 1: the beautiful detail. Yeah, there are better pictures of it
Speaker 1: floating around the internet, but we do not have rights
Speaker 1: to use them. So if you want to see more
Speaker 1: of it in its full gold glory, you can do that.
Speaker 1: The British Museum also has a copy of it that
Speaker 1: has some pretty detailed photographs on their website. So uh yeah.
Speaker 1: It's a interesting thing to think about an artist accidentally
Speaker 1: being so good at his work that he makes it
Speaker 1: very easy for a museum to be fooled without ever
Speaker 1: intending to do so. He just wanted to make the
Speaker 1: best possible gift for that archaeologist that was imaginary that
Speaker 1: he could, and uh yeah, it's a consequence all kinds
Speaker 1: of craziness erupted and fights and people. It's very very funny.
Speaker 1: Um that Reichmon article that I refer to talks about like,
Speaker 1: you know, the deplorable articles of other people that will
Speaker 1: not accept that this is the real thing. It's very funny.
Speaker 1: People got very very head up over this whole. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this whole, and it reminds me a little bit of
Speaker 1: the pilt down Man. Uma. How fun it was fun.
Speaker 1: But also you know, it's it's uh disheartening that human
Speaker 1: nature is what it is sometimes, but it was it
Speaker 1: was fun to read articles about the pilt down Man
Speaker 1: that was just people talking with utter confidence about what
Speaker 1: this meant from a scientific perspective when it was in
Speaker 1: fact completely fake. Yeah. I mean there are are long
Speaker 1: discussions even now about like what percentage of of pieces
Speaker 1: in museums are forgeries, because odds are this is you know,
Speaker 1: one of of many that passed over the years. There
Speaker 1: are museums that have purchased pieces that you know, have
Speaker 1: turned out to be um forgeries, or there are lots
Speaker 1: of pieces that we probably don't even know our forgeries.
Speaker 1: Um and there are plenty in contention all day, every
Speaker 1: day as we speak. But again, so gorgeous that, in
Speaker 1: my opinion, it belongs in a museum anyway. Um. We're
Speaker 1: doing a little bit of a very brief postcard round
Speaker 1: up for for listener mail today. Nice just because I
Speaker 1: want to get a couple you know included when I can,
Speaker 1: because Like I said, we get many, many many. I
Speaker 1: feel bad that we can only read them here and there.
Speaker 1: The first one is very short. It's from our listener Kate,
Speaker 1: who writes, Deer, Holly and Tracy, my family is currently
Speaker 1: enjoying our spring break in Savannah. The city is filled
Speaker 1: with so much history. Any chance of future episodes featuring
Speaker 1: Savannah maybe um. Our list is very long, and I
Speaker 1: think I have some Savannah stuff online. But you never
Speaker 1: know when we'll get to it, or if we'll find
Speaker 1: enough information to merit a full episode. Uh. We always try. Uh.
Speaker 1: The other one is from our listener may Have, and
Speaker 1: she writes, Deer, Holly and Tracy, sorry for not getting
Speaker 1: around to this sooner. Don't apologize you got around to
Speaker 1: it eventually. That's better than I do most of the time.
Speaker 1: I have been all over the world this year. I
Speaker 1: meant to send a postcard to you from Edinburgh and Dublin.
Speaker 1: Your podcast has gotten me through many a long layover
Speaker 1: during my travels. I particularly love your podcast on Mary,
Speaker 1: Queen of Scott's Uh. In Edinburgh, I saw where she
Speaker 1: gave birth to James the first It was such a
Speaker 1: small room. This postcard comes from Russell also known as
Speaker 1: the Hellhole of the Pacific, and then she describes some
Speaker 1: of the the interesting historical sites that are there. She
Speaker 1: also asked about, um, if we're doing any podcasts on
Speaker 1: that area. We did one on the one Tangy Treaty.
Speaker 1: Is that a two parter? I'm trying to remember it
Speaker 1: is only one? Okay, uh yeah, so that's in there
Speaker 1: if you want to look it up maybe. Um. She
Speaker 1: also says thank you for making my favorite podcast. That
Speaker 1: is so sweet, and thank you again to this beautiful
Speaker 1: postcard from New Zealand. I want to go. Um. If
Speaker 1: you would like to write to us, you can do
Speaker 1: so at History podcast at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: You can also find us everywhere on social media as
Speaker 1: missed in History and online at mist in history dot com.
Speaker 1: You would like to subscribe to the show, I think
Speaker 1: that sounds like a great idea. You can do that
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Speaker 1: wherever you listen to podcasts. Stuffy Missed in History Class
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