21. Report of the Curator of the Pitt Rivers Museum (Department of Ethnology and Prehistory) for the yesr ending 31 July 1969

Curator of the Pitt Rivers Museum and Head of the Department of Ethnology and Prehistory: B. E. B. Fagg, M.A., Fellow of Linacre College.
University Lecturers in Ethnology: Audrey J. Colson (nee Butt), M.A., D.Phil., Fellow of St. Hugh's College; P.W. Gathercole, M.A., A.M.A., Merton College.
University Lecturers in Prehistoric Archaeologv: D. Britton, M.A., Fellow of St. Cross College; D.A. Roe, M.A., Ph.D., Merton College.
Honorary Assistant Curator: Miss B.M. Blackwood, B.Sc., M.A., Somerville College.
Secretary and Librarian: H.P.G. Unsworth; Assistant Secretary-Librarian: Miss E. Torr; Personal Secretaries: Mrs P.M. Bowler, Mrs. P.A. Ross.
Technical and General: K.H. Walters (Principal Technician R.P. Rivers (Senior Technician), V.P. Narracott (Senior Technician-Photographer), L.H. Taylor, Mrs. M.E. Fowler, H.J. Walker, W.R. Last.

Staff Changes
Mr. P.W. Gathercole (M.A., Cantab.), formerly Head of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand, replaced Dr. K.O.L. Burridge as University Lecturer in Ethnology, with special responsibility for Asia and Oceania.

The newly created post of Museum Assistant was filled by Mr. J.G. Rhodes, B.A., who will assume duty on 1 August 1969.

Research Facilities
With special funds provided by the General Board of the Faculties, a Casio AL 1000 programme memory machine was purchased to facilitate advanced research. Of more general benefit to departmental and museum staff and students was the purchase of a Savin 220 photocopying machine for the copying of documents and extracts from bound books at reasonable cost.

Minor Works
Storage Facilities for Reserve Collections. One large room in one of the temporary storage houses has been equipped with new shelving on Dexion framework for accommodation of new collections during accessioning and treatment. Of more lasting benefit (because not immediately threatened) is a similar development in the large loft space above the main museum workshop and in the research room allocated to Mr. Baden-Powell.

The electric lighting in the Balfour Library has been substantially improved by the installation of modern fluorescent strip-lighting, following requests from students.

By the generosity of Mr. Graham Cooper, who donated £375 for the purpose, a Phillips 23" colour television set was installed in the Museum Lecture Room, and has been used mainly by University undergraduate societies concerned with historical, archaeological and anthropological studies, especially by the Archaeological Society, though our benefactor imposed no limitations on the programmes for which it may be used. As soon as repeat programmes are available for hire on videotape, efforts will be made to obtain the necessary plant for feeding such recorded lectures and documentaries into the television set.

Teaching, Research and External Academic Activities
Mr. Baden-Powell has continued his laboratory research on the environmental archaeology of fossil man in Europe and Africa, and has further prosecuted his field research in Scotland and the North of England to establish the relationship between the retreat of the ice sheets, changes in sea level and the arrival of the first Mesolithic immigrants. His environmental studies are being used successfully for the relative dating of stone implements from Britain, Portugal and West and South Africa. Much useful information is being built up from the study of the changing climates, especially comparing the northern and southern hemispheres in the Atlantic region.

Dr. D.A. Roe: Having completed his teaching commitments in Michaelmas and Hilary terms, Dr. Roe proceeded to the United States for sabbatical leave, principally to carry out research on Lower Palaeolithic artifacts from Spanish and African sites held by the University of Chicago and the University of California at Berkeley, and on the metrical and statistical analyses of palaeolithic handaxes. He also studied British palaeoliths held by the Field Museum in Chicago and the University Museum in Philadelphia. Extra-mural activities: Secretary of Palaeolithic and Mesolithic Research Committee (and of the Mesolithic Sub-committee), Council for British Archaeology. He also served on (1) Advisory Panel on Grants for Publication, C.B.A., (2) Council of the Prehistoric Society, (3) Editorial Board of new journal, World Archaeology.

Mr. D. Britton: Lecturing and tutorials on the Neolithic and Bronze Age of Europe and on archaeological techniques for the Diploma in Prehistoric Archaeology and for the Diploma in Ethnology. Began research for the full publication of the Isleham (Cambs.) find of Late Bronze Age metalwork. Served (1) as Secretary of the Neolithic and Bronze Age Research Committee of the Council for British Archaeology (2) Advisory Committee on Grants for Publication of the Council for British Archaeology. Attended the Conference of the Prehistoric Society at Bristol, September 1968. Read paper at the Conference on the Bronze Age in Western Britain, Bristol University, May 1968.

Dr. A.J. Colson: Having completed three terms' lecturing and tutorials for the Diploma in Ethnology and for the Geography Preliminary examinations, Dr. Colson visited Venezuela from June to September to study documents relating to the history of early contacts between Amerindians and the settler population. Supported by a grant from the Latin American Studies Fund, she was a visiting scholar at the Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Cientificas, Departmento de Antropologia, Caracas. She also served (1) as Hon. Sec. of the Committee for Middle and South American Research of the Royal Anthropological Institute, (2) on the Council of the Royal Geographical Society, (3) on the Royal Geographical Society Exploration Committee.

Mr. P.W. Gathercole, who assumed duty at the beginning of the academic year, has, in addition to his lecturing and tutorial duties, undertaken a detailed study of the Museum’s much valued Polynesian collection made by Reinhold Forster on Captain Cook's Second Voyage of Discovery (1772-5), in preparation for a catalogue for the proposed Cook Exhibition planned for 1970.

We gratefully acknowledge valuable voluntary work in the Balfour Library by Mr. Robert MacKilligin and in the Museum Stores by Mrs. Elizabeth Sandford Gunn, who has undertaken the extensive research necessary on a sparsely documented collection of ethnographical specimens, prior to accessioning, and good progress can be recorded.

The Regional, Subject and Donors' Card Indexes have again been admirably maintained by Miss Blackwood, who in addition has done much of the registration. She has also found time to serve on the Council of the Folklore Society, the General Committee of the Field Studies Council, and the Middle and South American Research Committee of the Royal Anthropological Institute.

Field Research
Mr. John B. Campbell, Jr., continued his research into the Upper Palaeolithic of the British Isles. Fossil pollen was extracted and identified from five British Upper Palaeolithic cave sites and from the open site of Hengistbury Head. Excavations were carried out at Creswell Crags (Derbys.) and at Port Eynon (S. Wales), and the work on the Late Upper Palaeolithic flint assemblage at Hengistbury Head was resumed and completed. Bone samples, associated with Mousterian, 'Proto-Solutrean' and Creswellian flint industries, have been accepted by the British Museum Laboratory for radio carbon dating.

Accessions
The most important single acquisition is the collection of Palaeolithic stone implements from the gravel deposits of the Upper Thames made over many years by the discoverer of the sites, Mr. R.J. MacRae, who has deposited them on indefinite loan and has simultaneously arranged for them to be bequeathed to the Museum. These have been provided with accessible storage and study space in one of the temporary stores in houses in North Oxford where Mr. MacRae is able to continue his research and analysis of them prior to publication. An important collection of weapons, predominantly from India, where they were collected during the XIXth century by members of the Morland family, was presented by the Abingdon Borough Museum. This is a useful supplement to the extensive collection of weapons of all peoples and periods made by General Pitt Rivers himself, which forms the nucleus of the Museum collections. Mrs. E. M. Almedingen, early XVIIth century strip of ecclesiastical embroidery from Hungary. Dr. E.A. Alport, colour transparencies illustrating his lecture 'The Canary Islanders before the European Conquest'. Mr. D.F.W. Baden-Powell, a number of specimens, including musical instruments and textiles. Mr. T.G. Brierley, collection of straw hats and other basket work from Nigeria, Ghana, and other parts of Africa. Mrs. I. de Chroustchoff. With a 'matching grant' of £375 from the Victoria and Albert Museum fund, two rare Yoruba Epa masks were purchased from Mrs. I. de Chroustchoff, whose late husband had loaned them to form a central feature in the exhibition 'Art from the Guinea Coast'. Mr. B.A.L. Cranstone, collection of tools, musical instruments, toys and two colour transparencies from New Guinea. The late Mrs. Helen Maria Dennis, through her daughter, Mrs. D. Mayers, twenty specimens of Indian textiles. Miss Ann Dinnison, wax doll. Mrs. R.M. Downes, five ethnographic specimens from the Tiv tribe of Benue Province, Nigeria, collected by her late husband, Captain R.M. Downes, a very generous donor during his lifetime. Mr. S.P. George, glazed urn from the Okigwi Pottery. Mrs. Gibbons, two Zulu clubs which had belonged to Chief Cetewayo, and a photograph of him probably taken between 1879 and 1882 in Cape Town. Miss M. Godfrey, a pair of moccasins from the Central Plains Indians and a pair of soft leather shoes from Western Asia. Dr. S.W.A. Gunn, fifteen colour transparencies illustrating the life of the American Indians of the North West Coast from photographs taken by him in 1965-6. Mr. F.E. Hughes, collection of Victorian clothing and embroidery. Dr. E.W. Jones, five photographs taken by him in Nigeria in 1955. Mr. Jeremy Montagu, rattle used in ceremonial dances, from the Kimberley area of N.W. Australia. Mr. D. Stafford, Ancient Egyptian faience and other beads, including some representing the head of Horus, and two iridescent glass scent bottles of the Roman period. Mr. C. Stonor, flute from the Congo, and a valuable collection of negatives of photographs of the tribal people of Assam and the North East Frontier districts of India. Thames Valley Constabulary, copy of 17th century flintlock revolver.

Publications
Corrected proofs of Occasional Paper on Technology No. 10, Metallurgical Reports on British and Irish Bronze Age Implements, have recently been returned to the Press. Publication should not now be long delayed.

Mr. T. K. Penniman has made good progress with documentary work on the forthcoming illustrated catalogue of the Hermann Gunther Collection of Japanese Netsuke, for which the photographic work has now been completed.

In response to a suggestion from Dr. W.C. Sturtevant, Curator of Anthropology at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., preparations are being made for the publication of Miss Beatrice Blackwood's 'Classification of Artefacts in the Pitt Rivers Museum', for which she has written a historical introduction which will also be published separately as a pamphlet for sale to visitors to the Museum.

BERNARD FAGG