Rottiers Collection - Third Collection

Third Collection

The third collection was not a privately gathered collection of antiquities by Rottiers, but the result of an Aegean expedition financed by the Dutch government. The express purpose of the expedition was for Rottiers to collect art and other antiquities. During the expedition Rottiers organizes a small excavation on Melos, makes an elaborate study of the medieval architecture on Rhodes, and eventually does deliver antiquities to the Leiden museum in several shipments. By that time Rottiers' credibility was in serious doubt though, and his frequent complaints and apparent abuse of government funding did not help. The final evaluation of the expedition was mainly negative, as Rottiers had promised to deliver a lot and ended up doing just one excavation of only 10 days, spending a lot of time on medieval architecture and had not bought any first class antiquities.