Musicologica Brunensia (Dec 2016)
Josef Alexander Helfert (1820–1910) : ancestor and model for Vladimir and Jaroslav Helfert
Abstract
Josef Alexander Helfert played a significant role in a social and political life of Habsburg Monarchy of the 19th and the beginning of 20th century. He was born in Prague, where he studied law and worked as an active politician in Austrian government from the beginning of 1848 till the sixtieth of 19th century. He worked as a petty secretary for the Ministry of Education and Culture. He markedly contributed to the Austrian educational reform and therefore he was later ennobled and in 1863 became a president of Central Commission for preservation of monuments. He bequeathed a vast literary work, especially from historiography field. His main focus was on history of Austrian state unity from the end of 18th century and throughout the entire 19th century but also on ancient Czech history (e.g. Hus und Hieronymus study). Helfert also dealt with law and education as such, he was an active member in various societies and he was actively engaged in Catholic church. Among his interests were also ethnography, music and history of art. During the periods of growing nationalism and escalating relationships between Czech and German speaking population of the Monarchy, J. A. Helfert remained Czech patriot. But his patriotism was of a provincial character; what mattered to him was not a language but land citizenship. In the same time he stayed loyal and a conservative-thinking citizen of multinational Monarchy ruled by Habsburg dynasty. The study concentrates only on the areas of Helfert's interest that were later carried on by his grandsons Jaroslav (1883–1973, director of Moravian Museum in Brno) and Vladimir (1886– 1945, founder of department of musicology at Brno's University and also founder of a music archive based in Moravian Museum). The work briefly introduces his historiographical heritage, his attempts to detect and preserve monuments and assets and furthermore to detect and treat Czech folk poetry in corporation with Otakar Hostinský. It also includes a note on Helfert's Prague patriotism expressed in an article about Mozart's tradition in Prague. The author also depicts Helfert's contacts with members of aristocracy and catholic community that his grandsons could later benefit from. Towards the end of the study you can find comparison of Josef Alexander's work with work of his grandsons who, as much as their grandfather, tried to detect and protect material and immaterial historical assets. Their contribution is then dated after 1918, in the atmosphere of newly born Czechoslovak Republic.
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