Albert von Le Coq

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Albert von Le Coq (1860 - 1930) was a German archaeologist and explorer of Central Asia. He was heir to a sizable fortune derived from breweries and wineries scattered throughout Central and Eastern Europe, thus allowing him the luxury of travel and study at the Berlin Ethnological Museum. Serving as assistant to the head of the Museum, Professor Grunwedel, Le Coq helped plan and organize expeditions into the regions of western Asia, specifically areas near the Silk Road. When Grunwedel fell ill before the departure of the second expedition, Le Coq was tapped to lead it. His account of the second and third German Turfan expeditions was published in English in 1928 as "Buried Treasures of Chinese Turkestan".

The expeditions found extensive networks of Buddhist and Manichaean cave temples in what is now north west China. Although many of the manuscripts found in the cave were destroyed during the excavation, von Le Coq speculated that he had discovered a major Manichaean library. Some of the paintings also led him to believe that he had found evidence of an Aryan culture, related to the Franks. With the help of his assistant Bartus, Le Coq carved and sawed away over 360 kilograms (or 305 cases) of artifacts, wall-carvings, and precious icons, which were subsequently shipped to the Berlin Ethnological Museum. Le Coq explains these "borrowings" as a matter of necessity in "Buried Treasures", citing the turbulent nature of Turkestan at the time of the expeditions. The artifacts were put on display at the Berlin Ethnological Museum and were still open to the public when, ironically, in 1944, the museum suffered a direct hit from a British bombing raid, reducing the artifacts to rubble.

Le Coq said that the depictions of figures with apparently blue eyes, red hair and cruciform swords resembled Frankish art:

“Such more striking are representations of red-haired, blue-eyed men with faces of a pronounced European type. We connect these people with the Aryan language found in these parts in so many manuscripts.. These red haired people wear suspenders from their belts.. a remarkable ethnological peculiarity!”

[edit] External links and references

• Die buddhistische Spätantike in Mittelasien -- Die Plastik (Postancient Buddhist Culture in Central Asia -- Sulpture), Berlin 1922: digital version

• Hopkirk, Peter (1980). Foreign Devils on the Silk Road: The Search for the Lost Cities and Treasures of Chinese Central Asia. Amherst: The University of Massachusetts Press. ISBN 0-87023-435-8.