Prof. Edward Westermarck

Abstract

EDWARD WESTERMARCK, whose death at the age of seventy-seven is reported from Finland, must always rank as one of the world's great anthropologists; and, moreover, in view of the fact that his first and perhaps most famous work “The History of Human Marriage” appeared so early as 1891, only one year later than “The Golden Bough”, he can be counted among the actual pioneers of anthropology in its social aspect. Born in 1862 at Helsingfors, he might be said to be connected since his birth with its University, his father being the bursar and his mother a daughter of the librarian; and here, having graduated and taken his doctorate with a thesis on primitive marriage, he became lecturer and afterwards professor of philosophy; only deserting his alma mater after the War of 1914–18, when he was appointed by a liberated Finland to organize as Rector a new Swedishspeaking university at Abo.