Biographical Memoirs Volume 48 (1976) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
Samuel Kirkland Lothrop
Samuel Kirkland Lothrop
Pages 252-273
The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.
From page 253... ...
His great-grandfather, for whom he was named, was a leading Unitarian minister of his time and is represented ire library card files by almost as many author carcis as his greatgrandson. Young Samuel spent his childhood in Massachusetts and Puerto Rico, his father having sugar interests on that island at the turn of the century.
|
From page 254... ...
Next to Tozzer, Kidder was an important influence in Lothrop's archaeological education and general training. Following this summer's work, Lothrop traveled extensively in Central America and in Puerto Rico as an associate of the Peabody Museum of Harvard, visiting sites, making small excavations, and studying collections.
|
From page 255... ...
During this period Sam explored widely in Latin America and established himself as the outstanding overall Latin American authority in archaeology. Very much of an "internationalist" by nature, he became a good friend of the Argentine archaeologists of the time, particularly the late Fernando Marquez Miranda; and through these relationships, he was one of the very few North Americans who was ever invited to conduct excavations in Argentine territory.
|
From page 256... ...
Indeed, his out-of-pocket monetary contributions to archaeology were much greater than his formal income from that subject; but, fully a professional in his dedication to archaeology and anthropology, Sam Lothrop always prized his curatorial status at the museum, to which he was very loyal. His first important archaeological job of the 1930s was to take over as Field Director of the Peabody Museum's exciting archaeological dig at the Sitio Conte, in the Cocle Department of Central Panama.
|
From page 257... ...
His two volumes on the Cocle culture, Cocle; An Archaeological Study of Central Panama, published in 1937 and 1942, are masterpieces of archaeological description and presentation. He was always extraordinarily careful with his illustrative material—both photographic and line and stipple drawings; and in the Cocle volumes he did himself, and American archaeology, proud with superlative work of this sort by topflight professional photographers and artists.
|
From page 258... ...
In 1951 he was elected to membership in the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, and in Great Britain he was honored by being made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute. He was also a longtime fellow or member of the American Anthropological Association, the Society for American Archaeology, the Societe des Americanistes de Paris, and many other European or Latin American scientific bodies.
|
From page 259... ...
Weeks, even months, would pass in this manner, with little or no descriptive observations being made by the archaeologist. Finally, at the end of this laboratory session, carried out at the Peabody Museum at Harvard, would come a relatively brief period of writing and note-taking.
|
From page 260... ...
A few years prior to his death, when Sam left New York City, he transferred the library to his spacious home in Belmont, Massachusetts. The entire library was left to the Peabody Museum of Harvard in his will.
|
From page 261... ...
This refers not so much to the connotations of cutting one's way along jungle trails (although Sam did some of this) as to appraising, describing, and laying the groundwork for the archaeology of many South and Central American regions.
|
From page 262... ...
In recent years younger workers have entered this field, and we are coming to know much more about the archaeolgy of these Central American republics than formerly; but Sam laid much of the groundwork, and he was instrumental in encouraging Doris Stone and others who have followed him in Isthmian studies. On the theoretical side, Lothrop's outstanding contribution was in the linking of archaeology and ethnohistory, again especially with the data of lower Central America.
|
From page 263... ...
At least many of his shorter papers dealt with themes of probable relationships in styles and technologies as these were found across great distances of South and Central America; but he "rode no particular horse" in insisting on special diffusionistic interpretations of American cultural history. He was particularistic and immersed in the data, and he knew these data very well.
|
From page 264... ...
Man, 23:97-98. The Peabody Museum houses a significant number of Samuel Kirkland Lothrop's unpublished notes, photographs, and site plans related to his work in British Honduras, highland Guatemala, Panama, Puerto Rico, and other areas of Central and South America.
|
From page 265... ...
The Museum Central American expedition, 1924. Indian Notes, 2: 12-23.
|
From page 266... ...
Concord, N.H. The Museum Central American Expedition, 1925-1926.
|
From page 267... ...
Ancient culture brought to light; Panama graves yield the golden relics of a race long vanished. New York Times Magazine, vol.
|
From page 268... ...
Publications of the Frederick Webb Hodge Anniversary Publication Fund, vol.
|
From page 269... ...
Compiler and editor. The Canoe Indians of Tierra del Fuego.
|
From page 270... ...
In. Handbook of South American Indians, vol.
|
From page 271... ...
Pre-Columbian Art. Robert Woods Bliss Collection.
|
From page 272... ...
Prakolumbische Kunst aus Mexiko und Mittelamerika. (Catalogue of an exhibition held at the Historisches Museum Frankfurt am Main, May-September, 1960)
|
Key Terms
This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More
information on Chapter Skim is available.