Tales from the store: where in the world... (part 4)

By now you must be fully committed to seeing this story through, you've made it to part 4!  If you're only just joining us now, get a little bit of background by looking through the previous posts.

So, at the end of part 3 you were probably thinking - this documentation assistant has done it.  Might as well retire now, this is the pinnacle of your career, nothing can get better than this.  Oh, but it can.

By Tivadar Kormos - Kormos Tivadar – Lambrecht Kálmán:
A remetehegyi sziklafülke és postglaciális faunája. Bp. 1914.,
Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=63081337

I'd managed to discover and associate numerous objects to their original site in Slovakia.  However, on opening the next box I found objects with typewritten labels stating 'Devence Cave' and 'Magyar Pterd'.  A new mystery!

Provisional research (Googling) was getting me nowhere, Devence Cave was unrecognisable.  Nothing was coming up for Slovakia or Hungary, the two areas the other material had been associated with.

Memories from my youth, when I sang in a choir with interesting selections of world music (tangential story, ask me some other time), I knew that 'Magyar' related to Hungary.  Beyond that, I was a little stumped.

Back to the drawing board, I wondered if the excavator Tivadar Kormos might be a common thread.  Hot on the tale, I pursued this line of enquiry.  Who was Tivadar Kormos, where was he from, what did he do and, most importantly, where did he excavate?!

SEGUE *interlude music plays*

By Unknown - [1], Public Domain,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18088163

Tivadar Kormos was a Hungarian geologist, paleontologist and speleologist (and without the '-ist', he was interested in rocks, fossils and caves).  He studied at the University of Budapest (Hungary) with a focus on biology and geology, gaining a doctorate in 1906.  By 1908 he was a geologist at the Hungarian Institute of Geology and by 1914 he'd become a visiting university professor.

SEGUE in a SEGUE This was a turbulent time in Hungarian politics, following the First World War (1914-18) the borders of Austro-Hungarian Empire completely changed, which explains why  "Jászóvár, Hungary" excavated in 1916 was difficult to find.  From 1918, the site was in Slovakia and of course, it also meant place names changed too, becoming the Slovakian "Jaszov".

This turbulent time also had implications for Tivadar.  He was a political man and was an active supporter of the Hungarian Soviet Republic (aka. Republic of the Councils of Hungary).  This resulted in his suspension from the University and Institute of Geology in 1919 - he retired from academia in 1922.



It is yet more tragic, as the Hungarian Soviet Republic only held power from March 1919 - August 1919.

By Tivadar Kormos - A Magyar Királyi Földtani Intézet Évkönyve, 1915. 314.
old., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=59014623

Fortunately Tivadar could still work in private industry as a geologist, and during the 1930s he worked for numerous mining companies.

SEGUE ENDS *small fanfare*

So surely Tivadar Kormos must be the key to the rest of the material in these boxes.  Find out what happened next, in the next instalment!