“Pasja zbierania. Kolekcja R. Janiaka”

[The Passion of Collecting. Collection of R. Janiak]

by Ryszard de Latour

CD version

Warszawa-Kielce 2007

In the 2007 a huge exhibition took place in one of the Warsaw museums, presenting private collection belonging to Mr. Ryszard Janiak. He’s got absolutely amazing collection of arms and decorative arts from 16th-19th century, including breathtaking sabres, armors, firearms and more, from such countries as Poland (amazing examples of karabelas – around 20 pieces!, hussars sabres, hussars armors), Ottoman empire, Persia, Western Europe and even Japan.
For the exhibition purposes there was a huge catalogue printed, containing over 700 objects, on over 600 pages, with paralell Polish and ENGLISH text (with one exception – basic descriptions of objects are in Polish but all commentaries and additional notes are translated). The book looked really great and grandiosely:

Janiak01

Janiak02small

Janiak03

Unfortunatelly the book was printed in a limited number of copies and was sold immediatelly – now, if you’re lucky enough, you can find it as second handed for the prices around 160-200 USD!

Fortunately the publisher decided to introduce a CD with this great catalogue and additional appendix, including two PDF files, with even more objects! So overall there are about 400 military pieces and hundreds of other historical pieces!