Sorbian Museum
The Sorbian Museum , Upper Sorbian , is located in the Salzhaus on the Ortenburg in Bautzen . With around 23,000 inventoried items, it is the most important museum facility for the culture and history of the Sorbs .
history
In the course of the general nationalization tendencies in Europe since the beginning of the 19th century, the emergence of a Sorbian national movement was also evident. The scientific-cultural society Maćica Serbska , founded in Bautzen, carried out ethnographic and historical research in addition to the publication of books . As early as 1856, the goal of building a Sorbian museum was laid down in a program at some point.
For the exhibition of Saxon handicrafts and arts and crafts in Dresden in 1896 , exhibits were collected and so the Sorbs presented a kind of museum there in the so-called "Wendish village". When the Wendish House was inaugurated on the Lauengraben in Bautzen in 1904, the Wendish (Sorbian) Museum opened on the 3rd floor at the same time. When the Wendish House was closed by the National Socialists in 1937, this also meant the end of the Sorbian exhibition. In 1942 the collection was included in the Bautzen City Museum . In 1957 a museum for Sorbian history and folklore was founded in Hoyerswerda . In the course of the gradual return of the exhibits from the former Wendish Museum, the Sorbian Museum was moved back to Bautzen. In 1976, the salt house on the Ortenburg was set as the new domicile, as the old Wendish house had been destroyed in the course of the heavy fighting around Bautzen in 1945 . Until 1988 the Sorbian Museum belonged to the Association of Museums of the City of Bautzen. After the exhibition had been redesigned, the museum was reopened as an independent museum in June 1989.
The Salzhaus museum building
The present museum building was erected in 1782 as a salt store and converted into its present form in 1869. From 1835 the Royal Saxon Court of Appeal acted here as the supreme judicial authority of Upper Lusatia and the Royal District Office. Due to the fact that the first house of the Sorbs was destroyed in 1945, the building was selected in 1976 as a worthy structural framework for the Sorbian Museum, although historically it actually had no reference to the Sorbs and even as the seat of the Gestapo and during the Nazi era initially served as a residential building in GDR times. In 2003 the building was extensively restored.
exhibition
The exhibition gives an overview of the history of the Sorbs and their diverse folk culture in Upper and Lower Lusatia. The focus is on the Sorbian language and literature and the Sorbian visual arts. Cultural events take place regularly in the ballroom of the museum.
Web links
Coordinates: 51 ° 11 ′ 0.4 ″ N , 14 ° 25 ′ 9.6 ″ E