Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.2002, Qupperneq 16

14
A DANE AND THE DAWNING OF FAROESE ARCHAEOLOGY
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Fig. 3. Map of the Faroe Islands with places
mentioned in the text. Map: Irene Seiten.
ner from the Faroese Parliament. But still
there was little progress in the acquisition
of items and the following year the com-
mittee could state that there were more
members than items. The money from the
Løgting had not been spent.
This deadlock, however, was broken
with the appointment as chairman of Ras-
mus Rasmussen (1871-1962), a highschool
teacher. In corporation with Andreas Chris-
tian Evensen (1874-1917), a clergyman, he
had travelled the islands and acquired a
rather high number of items. Unfortunately,
by doing this they had spent so much mon-
ey that the initiative had become in deep
debt. The effort of Rasmussen, however, re-
mained short-lived, but Evensen took over
and followed this line.
This private initiative formalised its
work in 1916 with the establishing of
Føroya Forngripafelag, the ‘Antiquarian
Society of the Faroe Islands’, to which the
collection was transfeired. The aim of the
Society was to acquire and store items as
well as to provide support for the preserva-
tion of a proper collection of artefacts and
antiquities. Evensen served as chairman of
the society until his death the following
year.
There can only be thrown sparse light on
the efforts of the Society over the following
years, but in 1928 it was reorganised. Dur-
ing the following years personalities such
as Mads Andreas Jacobsen (1891-1944), a
librarian, Hans Andreas Djurhuus (1883-
1951), a teacher and writer, his wife Petra
Djurhuus (1892-1975) and others put a lot
of their energy and effort into the Society.
The latter was actually educated in conser-
vation during a stay in Copenhagen 1929-
1930 (Andreassen 1997, 51; Djurhuus
1944, 116). In 1931 the society acquired
space under the roof of Bókasavnið, the li-
brary in Tórshavn where a permanent dis-
play was housed until the late 1980s. The
establishing of this small museum formed
the initial step to what later became Føroya
Fornminnissavn, the National Museum of
the Faroe Islands.