Alexandru Tzigara-Samurcaș (; also known as Al. Tzigara, Tzigara-Sumurcaș, Tzigara-Samurcash, Tzigara-Samurkasch or Țigara-Samurcaș; April 4, 1872 – April 30, 1952) was a Romanian art historian, ethnographer, museologist and cultural journalist, also known as local champion of art conservation, Romanian Police leader and pioneer radio broadcaster. Tzigara was a member of the Junimea literary society, holding positions at the National School of Fine Arts, the University of Bucharest and lastly the University of Cernăuți. During his youth, he was secretary to Carol I, the King of Romania. Close to the royal family, he also served as head of the Carol I Academic Foundation, where he set up a large collection of photographic plates. Tzigara achieved fame in 1906 as founder of the "National Museum", nucleus of the present-day Museum of the Romanian Peasant, but was also involved in arranging and preserving the Theodor Aman art fund.
During World War I, Tzigara-Samurcaș irritated Romanian public opinion by accepting to serve in a puppet administration set up by the Central Powers. Although his conduct was considered benign by the legitimate government, it drew him accusations of collaborationism from within academia, and aggravated his long-standing conflict with historian Nicolae Iorga. Tzigara was prevented from advancing in his university career over the interwar period, but compensated for this mishap with other achievements: he was a delegate to several world fairs, the first-ever lecturer on Radio Romania's staff, the editor in chief of Convorbiri Literare magazine, and, shortly before retirement, a corresponding member of the Academy. His post-World War II years were spent in obscurity, owing to his ideological incompatibility with the Romanian communist regime.
Alexandru Tzigara-Samurcaș was alleged to be Carol I's illegitimate son, a rumor fueled by his closeness to court. He was himself the father of artist , and father in law of folklorist Marcu Berza.
Biography
Origins and early life Tzigara-Samurcaș was born on , "Între Orient și Occident – Arhiva de imagine Alexandru Tzigara-Samurcaș", in Cultura, March 19, 2011 Mihai Plămădeală, "Arhiva Alexandru Tzigara-Samurcaș", in Observator Cultural, Issue 519, April 2010 though some records have "March 1".George Vlad, "Panoramic. Urme memoriale din Bucureștiul de altădată. Casele lui Al. Tzigara-Samurcaș", in Revista Muzeelor și Monumentelor. Muzee, Issue 6/1976, p. 91 His exact place of birth was a since-demolished house on Scaune Street, downtown Bucharest. This was to be his childhood home, making him neighbors with physician Wilhelm Kremnitz and his wife, the poet Mite Kremnitz. A popular rumor has Alexandru as the illegitimate son of Domnitor Carol I, the future King of Romania, to whom he was especially close in later years.Șerban Cioculescu, "Breviar. Ioan Massoff, Între viață și teatru", in România Literară, Issue 24/1985, p. 7 Z. Ornea, "Mărturisirile lui Tzigara-Samurcaș", in România Literară, Issue 3/2000 Vasile Docea, "La curtea iubirilor reprimate", in Tribuna, Issue 41/2004, p. 12Boia, p. 327; Nastasă (2010), p. 89 Historian Lucian Boia gives some credit to this piece of oral history, and notes that Tzigara, like the Kremnitzes, had "an unusually tight relationship" with the royal family.Boia, p. 327 According to literary historian Șerban Cioculescu, Tzigara's royal descent was "Pulcinella's secret"; museologist Hunor Boér also calls Tzigara "an illegitimate member of the House of Hohenzollern".Hunor Boér, "Könyvtár a Székely Nemzeti Múzeumban", in Művelődés, Issue 4/1998, p. 24
Reporter Ioan Massoff confessed that he once asked Tzigara about this rumor, but that this was regarded as a "faux-pas". Researcher Zigu Ornea contrarily notes that Tzigara may have been spreading the story around, and concludes: "This legend is naturally hard to verify but, in any case, it is a possible one, since Tzigara-Samurcaș was born in 1872 and Carol I was present on our throne, as Domnitor, from 1866." Like Boia, Ornea notes that Tzigara's close relationship with the king, the king's repeated interventions on his behalf "every time [Tzigara's career] got stuck", and his contacts with the Kremnitzes (including Mite, Carol's alleged mistress) were some additional clues to a royal bloodline. Historian Vasile Docea criticizes Ornea's verdict, noting that it relies on questionable sources, and argues that, far from embracing this legend, Tzigara spoke "with evident pride" about his Tzigara roots. According to historian Lucian Nastasă, Docea effectively "disproved" the rumor of Alexandru Tzigara-Samurcașs royal descent.Nastasă (2010), p. 89
Alexandru's mother and Carol's alleged mistress was Elena Samurcaș, married to Toma Tzigara. Research into his maternal genealogy led the art historian to conclude that he was of noble Greek and Italo-Greek descent: his supposed ancestor was Spatharios Zotos Tzigaras, buried in Venice at San Giorgio dei Greci (1599).Rădulescu (2000), pp. 343–344 The Samurcaș family had aristocratic blood, being related to the boyar nobility of Wallachia: the art historian's paternal line made him a relative of the Kretzulescu, Rallet, Bengescu and Crețeanu boyar families.Nastasă (2007), p. 162; (2010), pp. 89, 331 His maternal great-grandfather was Grigore Bengescu, a government minister of the United Principalities.Barbu Brezianu, "Salon parizian", in Ramuri, Vol. II, Issue 3, March 1965, p. 12 Also of boyar rank, Alexandru's Samurcaș ancestors had a history on both sides of the Southern Carpathians, in Wallachia and in then-Austrian-ruled Transylvania. Active during the Age of Revolution, Wallachian Vornic Constantin Samurcaș took part in Eterist agitation,Rădulescu (2000), p. 350 but later, fleeing the 1821 rural uprising, settled in Kronstadt (Brașov) to spy for the Austrians. Dumitru Hîncu, "Al. Tzigara-Samurcaș – Din amintirile primului vorbitor la Radio românesc", in România Literară, Issue 42/2007 Another ancestor, Postelnic Alecu Samurcaș, was a linguist, known for his work in the Greek language.Nastasă (2010), p. 90 The meeting of two branches was recorded in the coat of arms that Tzigara-Samurcaș fashioned for himself, showing the spatha of Zotos Tzigaras, alongside a sable (Romanian: samur) and a stylized eyebrow.
Alexandru was baptized into the Romanian Orthodox Church. Alexandru Barnea, "Moartea lui Carol I", in Ziarul Financiar, October 20, 2006 A while after Toma Tzigara's death, he was adopted by his childless uncle Ioan Alecu Samurcaș (he officially took the name Tzigara-Samurcaș years later, in 1899); he was also helped with his education by the Kremnitzes, who taught him German, introduced him to high society circles, and regarded him as a son.Nastasă (2010), pp. 89–90, 347 Ioan, a career diplomat and personal friend of the poet Mihai Eminescu, took Alexandru and his three sisters into his home at Icoanei Street 174. He later bequeathed Alexandru his letters to and from Eminescu, which archivists see as having great documentary value.
The young man's first contacts with history and folk art came by means of his extended family, which collected and preserved documents and art objects.Rădulescu (2000), p. 344 After graduating from the Matei Basarab High School and taking his Baccalaureate, he enlisted at the University of Bucharest Faculty of Letters, Historical Section. It was here that the young man was acquainted with his first mentors: writer-collector Alexandru Odobescu and archeologist Grigore Tocilescu, the latter of whom ensured Tzigara's employment as custodian for the National Museum of Antiquities. He was a critic of the museum's underdevelopment under Tocilescu's management, and wrote that the disorganized collection comprised an Egyptian mummy, copies of frescoes from the Cathedral Church in Curtea de Argeș, items from the Pietroasele Treasure, and works of Precolumbian art, alongside a scale model of the Eiffel Tower. Andrei Pippidi, "Casa Macca", in Dilema Veche, Issue 265, March 2009
Early academic career From 1893,Boia, p. 327. See also Luceafărul (1914), p. 265 the young graduate was in the German Empire, where he studied at the University of Berlin and LMU Munich, taking his Ph.D. in Munich with a dissertation on the Baroque painter Simon Vouet. He received his diploma, magna cum laude.Luceafărul (1914), p. 265 Tzigara-Samurcaș returned to his home country and, following a dispute with Tocilescu, gave up his position at the Antiquities Museum. He later specialized in museology in Paris, hearing lectures at the École des Beaux-Arts and working for city museums, before returning to Germany, where he studied with the preeminent Brunswickian curator Wilhelm von Bode.
Back in Romania, Tzigara unsuccessfully applied for the Archeology Chair created at the University of Iași, but lost; according to scholar and diarist Teohari Antonescu, who emerged as the victor, the competition was rigged in his own favor, even though Tzigara "had the good sense to come prepared."Nastasă (2007), p. 372 From 1899, he was librarian of the Carol I Academic Foundation and Professor of Aesthetics and Art History at the National School of Fine Arts.Luceafărul (1914), pp. 265–266; Boia, p. 327 As Tzigara later acknowledged, his introduction to royalty came through a relationship with the Kremnitzes. This period saw the start of Tzigara's close relationship with Carol, whom the art historian later called "my most generous protector" and "the sovereign par excellence". Received into royal circles, he was a confidant of the Queen Consort and cultural patron, Elisabeth of Wied, whom he called "the animator of Romanian art".Ciupală, p. 98 For a while, he was her private secretary, helping her fulfill her literary ambitions under the Carmen Sylva signature.Nastasă (2007), pp. 162–163. See also Filitti, p. 625 Tzigara's recollections speak with enthusiasm about Elisabeth's works, as well as about the king's dislike for her interests in spiritism or philosophy, and discuss Carol's enduring affection for Mite Kremnitz.
In order to support his lectures at the Fine Arts School, Tzigara began gathering photographic plates, a collection which grew in size over the following decades. It includes images of European monuments and works of art, as well as samples of Romanian architecture (in some cases, the only surviving images of since-demolished buildings) and copies of maps. The images of local life are considered of particular importance, since they document the Westernization and modernization of Romania's landscape. Mostly anonymous works, they most likely include some of Tzigara's own photographs. A few of them were inventoried by Editura Casa Școalelor, and some were published, in Tzigara's lifetime, by Buletinul Comisiunii Monumentelor Istorice or other Romanian scientific magazines. His image projections at the Carol I Foundation, supporting a students' elective course on sculpture and painting, became one of the better-known student summer activities. Andrei Pippidi, "Amintirile unui arhitect", in Dilema Veche, Issue 216, April 2008
The young scholar was at the time also interested in the development of decorative arts, which he wanted to reflect the local tradition of handicrafts and notions of national specificity.Vlasiu, pp. 51–52 According to art historian Ioana Vlasiu, Tzigara and painter-researcher Abgar Baltazar were in part responsible for fusing local folk art and international primitivism with Art Nouveau, thus paving the way for the Neo-Brâncovenesc school of decorators and architects.Vlasiu, passim The interest in decorative works was a special focus of his visits to England and France—the South Kensington Museum impressed him greatly, as did the workshops of Eugène Grasset and Horace Lecoq de Boisbaudran.
Junimea debut