Bolko von Richthofen

Who was Bolko von Richthofen?

Bolko von Richthofen was a German archaeologist and a distant relative of the family of Manfred von Richthofen, the "Red Baron". He is sometimes confused with his distant cousin and namesake, Karl Bolko von Richthofen – the youngest brother of the fighter ace.

Richthofen was born in Mertschütz, Silesia, and fought in World War I. After the war ended, he participated as a Freikorps volunteer during the Silesian Uprisings. In the early post-war period he entered tertiary studies and quickly became an eminent scholar.

He is well known for a bitter dispute about the ethnicity of the Lusatian and Pomeranian cultures with the Polish archaeologist Józef Kostrzewski.

In 1964 he received the Bundesverdienstkreuz. He died in Seehausen am Staffelsee, Bavaria.