Ethnography Sub-Collection

Soon after separating from the Ethnographic Museum in 1918, the new Czechoslovak Agricultural Museum had purchased from the Ethnographic Society some items from its collections, which thus became the oldest part of the collection, and in particular, the ethnography sub-collection of this predecessor of the National Museum of Agriculture. Over time, the ethnography sub-collection was added to and extended, among other things thanks to collecting activities of the Museum Unions of Agrarian Youth. This was an activity initiated by Dr. Josef Kazimour, who had for many years served as the executive director of the association for the Czechoslovak Museum. Items included in the ethnography sub-collection had been gathered gradually throughout the entire interwar era, alongside objects used in agricultural production. The ‘Collection Department of Farmer’s Life’, as this sub-collection was then called, then received another large boost in the form of numerous items acquired after the Slavic Agricultural Exhibition, which took place in Prague in 1948. During several decades that followed, items were added to the sub-collection only rarely. A significant increase in its size came with the change of the conceptual approach to it, which came in the last decade. In accordance with this new policy, household objects documenting life at the beginning of the twentieth century, including furniture, were then gradually added to the collection. Some of these items were bought from private owners, others were donated to the museum.

Important Items Belonging to the Sub-Collection

Especially notable items include a collection of painted wooden furniture, original traditional costumes with accessories, items related to funerals (funeral ribbons), and items over two hundred years old.