Abstract
No book has ever been written which contains so large a mass of facts as “The Golden Bough.” Nor has any book had its data more thoroughly documented. The bibliography arid index, forming the twelfth and final volume of the work, fill 536 octavo pages. The index, 392 pages, is fuller than the indices to the separate volumes. Every author knows the labour of cross-references; a simple instance here is “propitiation of vermin by farmers,” involving three entries. There are cases of overdoing, a good fault in an index, e.g. “Nat, spirit, in Burma, ii. 46.” “Nat superstition in Burma, ix. 90 n1.” “Nat, spirits in Burma, iii. 90; ix. 175 sq.; propitiation of, ix. 96.” Here a distinction is actually drawn between a singular and a plural. Technical generic terms in foreign languages are, like botanical and zoological terms, etc., printed in italics. But why “Oschophoria,” yet “Aiora” both Greek feasts; and “Farwar-dajan,” yet “Sada,” both Persian feasts; also “Ogboni” and “Belli-Paaro,” African secret societies, yet “Ndembo” and “Hametzes,” also secret societies? But these are minor inconsistencies in a monumental index.
The Golden Bough. A Study in Magic and Religion.
By Sir J. G. Frazer. Vol. xii. Bibliography and General Index. Pp. vii + 536. (London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1915.) Price 20s. net.
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CRAWLEY, A. The Golden Bough A Study in Magic and Religion . Nature 95, 284 (1915). https://doi.org/10.1038/095284a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/095284a0