Sigmund Freud's precious antiquities at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem

I have examined Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) before. But the Freud of the Rings Exhib­it­ion in 2018-9 in Jerusalem was some­thing new. Curator Morag Wilhelm of the Israel Museum was cat­al­oguing a col­l­ect­ion of rings in the Mus­eum’s reposit­ory and found one donated by Eva Rosen­feld. Wilhelm found that in 1913 Freud presented each member of his Inner Circle or Ring of followers with a unique ring.

Freud got his post-doctorate in 1885 and estab­lished psychoanalysis by the early 1890s. But because his theories had not yet been off­ic­ially recog­nised by Austria authorities, Freud wanted to maint­ain a degree of secrecy about his work. Thus his In­n­er Circle had to respect his wishes; the rings rep­res­ented a special bond by which the owners pledged their loyalty to Freud’s mission. 

Members of Freud’s group (top above), 
7th International Psychoanalytic Congress Berlin 1922. 
Standing: Otto Rank, Karl Abraham, Max Eitingon, Ernest Jones; 
Seated: Sigmund Freud, Sándor Ferenczi, and Hanns Sachs 

Israel Museum

After his father Jacob’s death in 1896, Freud began to collect ob­jects from the ancient world. Indiv­id­uals who start­ed created coll­ections, he said, were attempting to res­tore a sense of order into their lives! In Freud’s case, the need for order might have come with the bereavement.

In the Exhibition catalogue, Wil­helm noted that when Freud started with antiquit­ies, objects were still easily collected. Thou­sands of anc­ient objects arrived in Eur­opean antique sales and were snapped up cheaply by priv­ate coll­ect­ors. This was part of Eur­op­e’s in­famous colonial legacy where eg Fr­ance and Brit­ain plundered excavated sites. It was only when the great European museums were founded that arch­aeology became schol­ar­ly.

Freud was passionate about acquiring ancient engraved objects con­nected to Roman mythology. These items had their designs engraved onto gemstones that were then set in pre­cious ring-shaped metals. The focal point of the Jerusalem Exhib­ition were the 6 rings that Wilhelm located. 

Some of the antique rings that Freud gave to students

Note that Freud carefully selected each ring he gifted; the meaning of each image reflected the nature of his relation­ship with each recip­ient. Making these rings so special was: 

1] their ass­ociation with the Father of Psychoanalysis 

2] they were powerful objects that est­ab­lished identity in a hierar­ch­ical organisation of trusted psychoanalysts and

3] they actively excluded Carl Jung.

When Freud first established his Inner Circle in the psycho-anal­ysis move­ment, he surrounded himself with Jewish analysts. All the signet rings were given to Jewish members of his Inner Circle, ex­cept for the much loved Ernest Jones.

Eva Rosenfeld was a New York-born psychoanalyst but spent her youth in Ber­lin where her father was a theatrical producer. Her father died when she was 15 so she left school and became a so­c­ial worker. In 1911 she married lawyer-cous­in Valentin Rosenfeld and moved to Vienna, so Valentin could attend lectures by Freud.

Eva moved into psycho­an­alysis via Valentin. After her divorce, Eva un­d­er­went psychoanalysis with Freud himself and became a close friend of Freud’s daughter Anna. In 1936 Eva moved to Lon­don where she re­mained close to the Freuds, until she ident­ified with Melanie Klein's independ­ent school; this caused a rift between Eva and the Freuds. 

Prof Sigmund Freud had surprised Eva Rosenfeld with the precious gift of his ring decades earlier. When she turned 86, she wished to leave the ring to their original home country. Her ring triggered the 2019 Exhibition.

Another important ring recipient was Max Eit­ing­on. Born in Belarus to a wealthy Jewish family, his fam­ily moved to Leipzig and then to Hei­d­elberg Uni. He studied medicine in Leip­zig and finally arrived in Vienna after studying psychiatry at Carl Jung’s Zurich clinic. He was the first clinic­ian to do analysis and training with Freud, establishing Berlin’s first psychoanal­ytic out-pat­ient clin­ic.

In the 1920s Eitington’s educational institution in Berlin attracted Jewish socialist educators from Palestine, people who sought to link socialist ideology to Freud’s psy­cho­an­al­ytical tools. There were only two psychoan­alysts in Palestine then: David Eder, Chaim Weizmann’s right hand man and Dorian Feigenbaum who ran the only psychiat­ric hospital in Jerusalem. Eit­ington emigrated to Israel in May 1934 where he established the Psychoan­alytic Inst­it­ute in Jerusalem. This was a turn­ing point in the acceptance of psychoanalysis as an authorised treatment.

Freud spent his career exposing his patients’ countless psychic lay­ers. So was it a coincidence that by the time of his death, a year after leaving Vienna for London, he had amassed 2,000+ art treasures from ancient king­doms in Egypt, Greece, Rome, India and China? The Jerusalem Exhibit­ion displayed the 6 rings and also highlight­ed these other items from Freud’s collection. Wil­helm’s careful research in London and Vienna incorporated the ancient ob­jects and displayed them in the Israel Museum. The back-drop to the Exhibit consisted of wall coverings inspired by the fam­ous oriental rugs that adorned Freud’s consulting couches both in Vienna and London. 

Freud's collection of antiquities, 

Freud Museum, London

Viewers noted the statuette of the deity Thoth. Thoth was the an­cient Eg­ypt­ian moon god and patron of medicine, writing & magic in Egyptian mythol­ogy. The baboon-shape was positioned on Freud’s desk so Freud could rit­ual­ly stroke the statuette’s head. In fact read how Freud’s massive art coll­ection influenced his theories (and not vice versa).

Another intriguing display object was a gift from one of the ring recipients, Marie Bonaparte aka Princess George of Greece and Denmark. Her wealth con­tributed to the popularity of psychoanalysis and she helped Freud to escape from the Nazis by paying for his exit pap­ers. Bonaparte herself be­c­ame a succ­essful psychoanalyst, specialising in women’s sexual dysfunction. 

The bronze statuette of the goddess Venus depicted a naked young woman. The goddess of love and beauty held the ends of her hair in one hand and a mir­ror in which she gazed at her own reflection. Freud ascribed a narcis­s­istic element to women whose exaggerated investment in their ext­er­nal appearances was to compensate for the social restrict­ions placed upon them.