Showing 21 results

Homefield, Send, Surrey - In her letter of 28 Oct. she shares that her son [Arnold Paice?], one of the first white settlers in Kenya, states that the Kikuyu do not keep pigs or sacrifice them, as mentioned in 'Folk-Lore in the Old Testament', and wonders if the reference from C. W. Hobley is correct; she thanks him for his reply on 10 November.

Second letter accompanied by the envelope.

Hotel Lutetia, Paris. Dated 31 December 1921 - Is in Paris, where he gave a lecture at the Sorbonne in front of 700 people; is having a bust made by Bourdelle who will present it to the Museum of the Luxembourg; Lilly's translation of 'Adonis' is out and she is busy getting other books translated; has been asked to write the preface to Malinowski's Trobriand book and [C. W.] Hobley's book.

Chale, High View Road, Sidcup - Two letters accompanied by an envelope with a note in Frazer's hand, 'fertilization of women by the fig-tree (for Ovid, Fasti II)'. The first is dated 5 Aug. 1927: Hobley has referred to his 'Bantu Beliefs' and found a paragraph on magical remedies for sterility taken from the A-Kamba; gives the page reference for the Kikuyu custom; had forgotten he had written in 1910 and when he gathered notes he used another source for his information; will bring him 'Slaves and Ivory' by Darley. In the letter of 11 Sept. he apologises for the delay, as he had to go away for his health, answers two questions from his book about an ewe which has not borne a kid, and the Mukea, Mukeuyia, or muttakwa tree; mentions the information in 1910 was obtained from a chief visiting his house in Nairobi, where a great fig tree grew, and remembers the elders showing how the woman was tied to the tree, and the white sap.

Chale, High View Road, Sidcup - Wrote to Juxon Barton of his old staff to learn more of fertility ceremonies, and Barton writes that he has written Frazer directly; he may be going to the Continent for a week, but when he returns he will call and chat about the material. Accompanied by the envelope.

Trinity College, Cambridge. Dated 15 December 1907 - Is glad he has arrived safely at Mombasa; has accepted the chair of Social Anthropology at the University of Liverpool, which has no salary but no responsibilities, plans to lecture on totemism; has a plan of promoting anthropological research from Liverpool, would like to fund an eighteen month expedition to Western Australia by [Baldwin] Spencer and [Francis] Gillen and would like to fund Roscoe so that he could give himself wholly to anthropological work in Central Africa; asks how long he is committed to the C.M.S., and thinks they have not kept faith with him; asks if he would work exclusively in anthropology, and for details on where and when he would work in Central Africa and for what money; his stepdaughter [Lilly Grove] is doing well at her school in Bristol as a French teacher and will join them for Christmas; hopes Mr [Geoffrey Francis?] Archer will send more notes on the Lake Rudolph tribes; [Alfred] Hollis, [C. W.] Hobley, and Lord Mountmorres (via Dr Richard Caton) have distributed a large number of anthropological questions.

Chale, Sidcup, Kent - Thanks him for his letter and replies to the enquiries made about fertility ceremonies; is glad to hear he has finished the Ovid commentaries; has written to [E. N.] Fallaize and believes he will arrange for publication; corrects the title Frazer uses for Juxon Barton, he is an Assistant Secretary to the Government in the Secretariat at Nairobi; hopes his trip abroad allows him to weather the English winter.

Xerox photocopies of over 240 letters, many of them of originals housed in other institutions. The letters are written by Frazer to multiple recipients with a few exceptions: eight are written by Lilly Frazer (to Miss Buckley, Sir Edmund Gosse, Bronisław Malinowski, and W. H. D. Rouse); one is from Henry Jackson to Frazer and five more are from others to others (two from Macmillan & Co. to Hermann Diels, one from Sir Francis Galton to Sir Clements Markham forwarding a letter from Frazer, one unrelated letter from John Sampson to Francis Jenkinson, and one memo from Otto Stapf to Sir David Prain). Five letters include covering letters from the institutions providing the copies. In addition, there are copies of a typescript draft of Frazer's article 'Our Debt to France', the draft of an address on the founding of the Frazer lectureships, and a translation of an article.

Recipients, with the number of letters present if more than five: Aksel Andersson, Terence Armstrong, Spencer Baird, Andrew Bennett, Arthur Bigge (Lord Stamfordham), Miss Buckley (of the Loeb Classical Library), Sir Ernest Budge, John Bullbrook, Francis Burkitt, Edward Clodd, Francis Cornford (16 letters), Otto Crusius, Sir Edwin Deller (6 letters), Hermann Diels (10 letters), Samson Eitrem, S. J. Evis, Jesse Fewkes, Douglas Freshfield, Sir Francis Galton (14 letters), Ernest Gardner, Charles-Marie Garnier (6 letters), Sir Edmund Gosse (42 letters), A. C. Haddon, Sir William Hardy (6 letters), Carl Lehmann-Haupt, C. W. Hobley, A. W. Howitt (7 letters), Mary Howitt, Henry Jackson, Francis Jenkinson (8 letters), Oskar Kallas, Sir Arthur Keith, William F. J. Knight, John Mackay, Bronisław Malinowski (9 letters), William Maxwell, A. G. W. Murray, G. G. A. Murray, Sir John Myres, Theodor Nöldeke, Karl Pearson, Sir David Prain (8 letters), Edward Rapson, A. G. Ross, Sir William Rothenstein, W. H. D. Rouse, Gustave Rudler, Charles Edward Sayle, Solomon Schechter (7 letters), Douglas Sladen, William Thalbitzer, Sir J. J. Thomson (21 letters), Sir D'Arcy Thompson, Hermann Usener, Sir Emery Walker, and Alfred Rayney Waller (6 letters).

No. 1 Brick Court, Temple, London E.C.4. Dated 3 March 1922 - Gives the reference in 'Man' where [John] Roscoe's account of the temporary annual king of Bunyoro appears; will be most pleased to go to Oxford to hear his lecture; has just finished reading proofs of Malinowski's new book on the 'Kula' of the Trobriand Islanders ['Argonauts of the Western Pacific'?]; and [Charles] Hobley's new 'Bantu Beliefs and Magic', both interesting and valuable.

Album of 39 cuttings about or mentioning Frazer, including news items about his honorary doctorate from the University of Athens; with reviews of 'Aftermath', including one by R. R. Marett in the 'Observer', and two books for which he wrote introductions: 'Bantu Beliefs and Magic' by C. W. Hobley and 'The Native Tribes of Central Australia' by Baldwin Spencer and F. J. Gillen; also, an obituary of George William Macfarlane and a news item about putting a plaque on Edward Clodd's house.

Chale, High View Road, Sidcup - Re: Lady Frazer's question about the Kikuyu sacrificing pigs, Mrs Paice's son [Arnold Paice?] is right, they do not, as they have none to sacrifice; congratulates him on the completion of the 'Fasti', will go look up Kikuyu fertility customs; could he influence the Government to subsidize a study of the North and South Kavirondo people: they are changing quickly and a wealth of valuable material will soon disappear.

Accompanied by the envelope.

The Grove, Sutton Coldfield. Dated 8/9/08 - In answer to Frazer's question, the Murru [Moru?] and the Kavirondo children follow their father's clan; discusses shield patterns shaved on the heads of clans of Nilotic Ja-Tuo [Jaluo?].

The Grove, Sutton Coldfield. Dated June 15/08 - Will send his paper on the A. Kamba as requested; asks if [Sir William] Ridgeway forwarded Hobley's notes on [the Masai], which included information on marriage laws.

Chale, High View Road, Sidcup - Gives permission to Frazer to reproduce Frazer's preface to 'Bantu Beliefs and Magic' elsewhere; is meeting the Council of the Royal Anthropological Institute and will urge training in anthropology for administrative officers in Africa.

The Grove, Sutton Coldfield. Dated June 28/08 - Is sending some of his MSS by book post; [Sir William] Ridgeway has the photograph illlustrations.

Chale, High View Road, Sidcup - Congratulates Frazer and notes that anthropology and ethnology have been accorded an official status, much as geology was when Sir Archibald Geikie was awarded the Order of Merit; feels that anthropology needs some sort of stimulus: a great amount of material is being collected but isn't being used as it could be, wonders what Frazer's opinion is.

Nairobi, Brit. East Africa. Dated 21/6/09 - Has been reading 'Folk-Lore in the Old Testament' in ['Anthropological Essays presented to Edward Burnett Tylor'] and mentions some East African customs and beliefs, and information on carved stone figures in Hindu temples obtained from his friend [James Nelson] Fraser, head of the Secondary Training College in Bombay.

Nairobi, B.E.A. Dated 13/10/09 - Will be seeing Col. Roosvelt [Theodore Roosevelt] and will give him the booklet of queries [Frazer's anthropological questions]; suggests asking the Cambridge Press for the chapter on Masai marriage in his ['Ethnology of Akamba and other East African Tribes']; Hon. K. [Kenneth?] Dundas, studying the Bantu Kavirondo, has discovered the elders always kill the hereditary head chief when he is near his end.

Nairobi, B.E. Africa. Dated July 27/10 - Showed his letters to Col. [Theodore] Roosevelt and wonders if he visited Frazer; has come across two Kikuyu customs relating to 'thahu', a kind of curse, and the use of fig trees as a cure for barrenness; is displeased with the slowness of the University Press.

St. Ermins Hotel, St. James's Park, S.W. Dated 11th June 1914 - Reminds him to insist on proofs in slip from the University Press: 'Tell them that if they don't, I will use unclerical language which you could not resort to'; thinks his idea of holding his book with Hutchinson over until his return from Africa is a good one; discusses his plan of travel [for the proposed expedition], wonders if he could visit the Bageshu of Mount Elgen, suggests books to read (Hobley and Routledge on the Kikuyu); discusses funding for outfitting the expedition.

Nairobi. Dated Sept. 26 '09 - Is glad his notes and that of [Kenneth] Dundas have been useful; has seen [C. W.]Hobley's chapter on social organization and points out their difference of opinion about intermarriage, which also different from [Moritz] Merker's; is sorry he missed [John] Roscoe, Hobley saw him for a minute on his way to the coast.

Woodfield, Quarry Road, Oxted - His wife has been in hospital for 3 months and is slowly recovering at home; hopes they have received the new edition of his book 'Bantu Beliefs'.