Frits-Holm-Chinas-Foremost-Monument-the-Chingchiaopei

Frits Vilhelm Holm (c. 1881
, ''The New York Times'', July 12, 1908, Sunday. Section: Magazine Section, Page SM6. (In this article he is referred to as "26-year-old") – May 1930) was a Danish scholar and adventurer. His books usually gave his name as simply Frits Holm or Frits V. Holm, while US newspapers of the time usually misspelled his name as Fritz von Holm, sometimes claiming that he was a member of the European nobility. Holm is best known for his attempt, in 1907, to "obtain" the famous Nestorian Stele - an ancient Christian monument of

Xi'an Xi'an ( , ; ; Chinese: ), frequently spelled as Xian and also known by other names, is the capital of Shaanxi Province. A sub-provincial city on the Guanzhong Plain, the city is the third most populous city in Western China, after Chongqi ...

, in Northwestern China, and sell it to a Western museum. Alerted to his activities (nicknamed by later writers the "Holm-Nestorian expedition to Xi'an"), the local authorities moved the monument from its outdoor location on the western outskirts of the city, and into the

Stele Forest The Stele Forest or Beilin Museum is a museum for steles and stone sculptures in Beilin District in Xi'an, Northwest China. The museum, which is housed in a former Confucian Temple, has housed a growing collection of Steles since 1087. By 194 ...

museum. In order not to leave China empty-handed, the disappointed Holm had an exact copy of the stele made for him in Xi'an. He had the replica stele taken by cart to the

Yellow River The Yellow River or Huang He (Chinese: , Mandarin: ''Huáng hé'' ) is the second-longest river in China, after the Yangtze River, and the sixth-longest river system in the world at the estimated length of . Originating in the Bayan Ha ...

, then by small boat down the not very navigable Yellow River to the nearest train station at

Zhengzhou Zhengzhou (; ), also spelt Zheng Zhou and alternatively romanized as Chengchow, is the capital and largest city of Henan Province in the central part of the People's Republic of China. Located in north-central Henan, it is one of the Nationa ...

, and then by train to the major

Yangtze The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ; ) is the longest river in Asia, the third-longest in the world, and the longest in the world to flow entirely within one country. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains (Tibetan Plateau) and flows ...

River port of

Hankou Hankou, alternately romanized as Hankow (), was one of the three towns (the other two were Wuchang and Hanyang) merged to become modern-day Wuhan city, the capital of the Hubei province, China. It stands north of the Han and Yangtze Rivers whe ...

(now in

Wuhan Wuhan (, ; ; ) is the capital of Hubei Province in the People's Republic of China. It is the largest city in Hubei and the most populous city in Central China, with a population of over eleven million, the ninth-most populous Chinese city a ...

). Instead of London's

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

, as he supposedly originally intended, Holm had the replica stele shipped to New York, planning to sell it to the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

. The museum's director

Caspar Purdon Clarke Sir Caspar Purdon Clarke (21 December 1846 – 29 March 1911) was an English architect and museum director. Early years Born in 1846, Clarke was the second son of Edward Marmaduke Clarke and Mary Agnes Close. He was educated at Gaultier's Sch ...

, however, was less than enthusiastic about purchasing "so large a stone ... of no artistic value". Nonetheless, the replica stele was exhibited in the museum "on loan" from Holm for about 10 years. . Holm's original report can be found in , and also in more popular form in Eventually, in 1917, Mr. George Leary, a wealthy New Yorker, purchased the replica stele and sent it to

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus ( legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

, as a gift to the Pope. On October 9, 1919, Holm married Marguerite MacDonough Green in New York. She was the only child of the late Warren L. Green, the president of the

American Bank Note Company ABCorp is an American corporation providing contract manufacturing and related services to the authentication, payment and secure access business sectors. Its history dates back to 1795 as a secure engraver and printer, and assisting the newl ...

. Holm died in May 1930 from pneumonia.FV HOLM DEAD; DANISH EXPLORER; Succumbs to Pneumonia--...
New York Times - Mar 10, 1930

Notes

References

* *. Originally published by: Hutchinson & Co, London, 1924. * {{DEFAULTSORT:Holm, Frits Danish explorers Danish sinologists 20th-century Danish philologists History of Xi'an Impostors 1880s births 1930 deaths