Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 8, 1897.djvu/181

 Reviews. 157

Brauxschweiger Volkskunde von Richard Andree. Braun- schweig : F. Vieweg und Sohn, i8g6.

Dr. Andree, already well known for his valuable contributions to folklore, has in this volume laid scientific students under a further obligation. In somewhat less than 400 pages he has given an ethnographical survey of the Duchy of Brunswick. Beginning with a topographical sketch of the district, he discusses the race and shows by anthropological data (namely, the colour of hair, skin, and eyes, for skull-measurement and other observations are, as he says, still sadly to seek in the province), that the race is tolerably pure, and that although the Wends at one time occu- pied the land the population is now mainly Saxon. This he con- firms by examination of the dialect and place-names, which indicate that the Wends must have been almost entirely rooted out by the invading Teutons. Dr. Andree's son-in-law, Finanzrat Dr. Zimmerman, contributes a statistical chapter upon the various classes of the population, its density, the causes of different developments, the influence of the beet-cultivation, of the wood, of the waterways, railroads, industries, and so forth. Chapters follow, dealing with the arrangement of the villages, the archi- tecture, the peasant, his flocks and servants, the spinning industry of the women, implements and utensils, clothing and personal ornaments — all of great interest and illustrated with cuts and with really excellent coloured plates and photographs. The author then passes to what we in England understand by the term folklore, and describes the customs and superstitions connected with birth, marriage, and death, the various periods of the year, and the days of festival and fasting. The spirit-world, mythical beings and witchcraft, weather-lore, leechcraft, and miscellaneous superstitions follow, together with a large collection of folk- rhymes classified under various heads. In a final chapter he examines in detail the traces left by the Wendish occupants of the soil, of whom he finds, as we might expect from the earlier chapters, comparatively little.

It is not necessary to insist on the importance of this work. The name of Dr. Andree is a sufficient guarantee for its accuracy. If we miss folk-tales from the list of contents it must be remem- bered that the book should be regarded as supplementary to the collections of Kuhn and Schwarz, Schambach and Miiller, Prohle