Written by Bojana Rogelj – Škafar, 1989
Abstract
The topic dealt with in this paper is twofold: it concerns criteria according to which pictorial material can be evaluated and used from the viewpoint of ethnology, and the application of these theoretical conclusions to a concrete example, i.e. graphic works produced in Valvasor’s workshop at Bogenšperk.
This study, belongs to a special branch of ethnology, namely methodology and techniques of ethnological science.
– The attitude of ethnology, “historical ethnology”, and history towards source material in general is examined so as to establish the aforementioned criteria, which are then compared with one another.
– Since it does not seem possible to provide an adequate interpretation of all aspects of motifs and content of pictorial sources by the use of the historical method only, certain other methods of American anthropologists concerned with visual communication are used as well in order to elucidate the relation between the creator of an engraving and the engraving itself. In this context, an engraving can be regarded as a record of culture or an artifact of culture. In the first case an engraving is a record of a researcher, a non-member of a culture, about this culture. In the second case, an engraving is part of a certain culture, part of the symbolic knowledge of this culture. If we take this example of Valvasor’s engravings, they can be considered partly as records of folk culture, and partly as records of non-folk culture, as seen as non-members of folk culture, J. W. Valvasor and his associates. This material, then, is a record of non-members’ culture as well.
Any analysis of pictorial material has to include all the above aspects, and special attention should be paid to the executor, his era, his social background, his views, and his attitude in general towards issues an ethnologist hopes to use as “objective” source material. These can be regarded as such only if all factors mentioned above, particularly the creator’s subjective starting-points for his elaboration of the motif and content of his engraving, are considered. Such a view, of course, rests on the assumption that objective social sciences do not exist as such, that social sciences exist only as a result of theoretical thought and debates which reflect socio-historical circumstances of a given era.
– The circumstances of Valvasor’s time and their impact on the formation of his outlook and his methods are then analyzed. Here it is pointed out that Valvasor was primarily a naturalist and that, by the use of his method, he established a relation between science and the humanities.
– An attempt is made to relate all these findings to the process in which Valvasor’s engravings were produced and attained their final form. The contribution of his collaborators is also taken into account.
– A survey of Valvasor’s graphic work,which appeared in seven publications, is presented in accord with ethnological systematics, and the works are analyzed in terms of the criteria mentioned above. It is emphasized that engravings included in topographical editions and in Die Ehre des Hertzogthums Crain are of special significance, whereas depictions in the three art works are informative in determining Valvasor’s ideas and views.
– Conclusions. When the message of an engraving is identified, it’s essential to define the role of the author and the extent to which the engraving in question is a record of the culture and/or an artifact of that culture. In engravings by the Valvasor circle, focus is placed as a rule on feudal architecture. This is accompanied by marginal scenes, which are of special interest to an ethnologist since they grew out of the creator’s specific interests. From the cultural viewpoint of the executor, for example, depictions of Postojna Caves and of Lake Cerknica are particularly interesting. They show that Valvasor, although one of the leading scientists of his time, could not escape holding the prejudices of his era. A minority of engravings, especially those in die Ehre, represent excellent ethnological records of folk culture of 17th century Slovenia, for they depict elements of culture in a functional context as well as relations between the people so depicted and other elements. The documentary value of these engravings is so great that hardly any comment is necessary.