Bernhard Gutmann Papers

This collection is arranged in one series - Correspondence. The collection is comprised of 51 letters written by the artist Bernhard Gutmann to his two daughters, Dorothea and Elizabeth, from December 1929 to March 1930 while on a trip to Egypt. His traveling party included his wife Bertha Goldman, Hetty Goldman, and Cyrus Ashton Rollins Sanborn. Hetty Goldman (1881-1972) was the first woman to direct an officially sanctioned archeological excavation.... Cyrus Ashton Rollins Sanborn (1882-1970) was an archaeologist and museum administrator. During the time that he took this trip to Egypt, he was working at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts where he served as librarian, secretary and editor of the Boston Museum Bulletin. It's likely that Gutmann's parents were also present. Lastly, Mr. and Mrs. Jean Capart arrived in Cairo to join the party in January 1930. Jean Capart was a Belgian Egyptologist who was named Honorary Curator of Egyptology at the brooklyn Museum in 1932, and curated the Egyptian galleries which reopened in 1933.

The Gutmann letters are written in print rather than cursive, so that Gutmann’s young daughters would be able to read them. Most of the letters contain a combination of black and white sketches as well as small watercolor paintings of the things Gutmann saw on his travels. The letters contain detailed explanations of what Gutmann experienced of daily life in Cairo and in smaller Egyptian towns, as well as describing his visits to the pyramids and other ancient Egyptian sites. It is an interesting collection on early travel history and specifically perceptions of Egypt by western travelers.

A note: Most of the letters seem to have been written on folded stationary and can be read from right to left instead of left to right.