JAN KAZIMIERZ JASKANIS (1932–2016) – A SON’S MEMORY OF HIS FATHER

A primeval archaeologist (MA 1955, PhD 1971),an organiser of protection for monuments in the Białystokprovince (1954–1980), Director of the Regional Museumin Białystok (1974–1980) and the State ArchaeologicalMuseum in Warsaw (1980–2000). He dealt with archaeology,museology and the protection of monuments. He alsopopularised related knowledge and linguistic and religiousissues. He established the provincial record of archaeologicalmonuments as well as conservation archives, both ofwhich were then developed at the museum. From 1959 to1975 he was Scientific Secretary to the Yotvingia ScientificExpedition. He was a teacher, an editor and a social activist.He wrote over 200 publications, of which the most importantare The funeral rite of the Western Balts at the endof antiquity (Warsaw, 1974); a critical study of AleksanderBrückner’s work Ancient Lithuania: tribes and gods: historicaland mythological drafts (Olsztyn, 1979, 1984); Cecele.Ein Gräberfeld der Wielbark-Kultur in Ostpolen (Warsaw,1996); Krupice. Ein Gräberfeld der Przeworsk- und Wielbark-Kultur in Ostpolen (Warsaw, 2005), Kurgans of leaders ofthe Wielbark culture at Podlachia (Białystok, 2012); andSwitzerland. The cemetery of the Baltic Sudovian culture innorth–eastern Poland (Warsaw, 2013). He specialised in researchingRoman influence in Central Europe and the prehistoryof north–eastern Poland, the culture of Baltic tribes(including the Yotvingians), Baltiysk and the Slavonicborder, and in the Przeworsk and Wielbark cultures. He discoveredand defined the Cecelska regional group, thus determiningthe late phase of the Wielbark culture, startingfrom the early period of Roman influence to its decline asa result of tribal migrations; their kurgans traced the areasof relocation of the Goths and the Gepids from the BalticSea to the Black Sea. His successful exhibitions included“The Balts – northern neighbours to the Slavs” (displayedin Austria, Bulgaria, Greece, Lithuania, Italy and Germanyseveral times), “Treasures of primeval Poland” (in Padua,Turin, Aquileia, Schollach) and “The prehistory of Warsaw”(Berlin). He was a member of museum councils as well asthe council for museums at the Ministry of Culture andNational Heritage