The Collection of Deers' Horns at the Royal Castle of Moritzburg

Abstract

THE King of Saxony's Hunting Lodge of Moritzburg lies some three hours' journey north from Dresden; it is built on an island in a little lake embowered amid the Friedewald. It was built between the years 1542 and 1589, under the Electors Moritz (1541-1553), August (1553-1586), and Christian I. (1586-1591), after the plans of the first of these Electors, apparently by the architect Hans von Dehn-Rothfelser, and it has been enlarged and renovated from time to time chiefly under the Electors John George I. (1611-1656), and John George IV. (1691-1694), and August II. King of Poland (1694-1763). It contains some two hundred rooms and seven halls, in which latter are arranged the series of pictures relating to hunting, and a collection of horns of all sorts. For this latter the Castle may thank the celebrity which it has among all sporting characters and zoologists. The walls of the large Banqueting Hall, which is 20.25 m. long, 10.50 m. wide, and 11.60 m. in height, are adorned with a collection of seventy-one noble horns of deer, of which none are under four-and-twenty points; while in the Audience Hall is preserved a collection of forty-two more or less extraordinary or monstrous horns, amongst which is the celebrated pair with sixty-six points.

Die Hirschgeweih-sammlung im Königlichen Schlosse zu Moritzburg bei Dresden, mit aller höchster Genehmigung und Unterstützung Seiner Magestät des Königs Albert von Sachsen.

Herausgegeben von Dr. Adolf Bernhard Meyer K. S. Hofrath und Director des K. Zoologischen Museums zu Dresden. (Dresden: Wilhelm Hoffmann, 1883.)