8vo. Volume I: The Christian Women, with an ethnographical map and introductory chapters on the ethnography of Turkey; and folk-conceptions of nature by John S. Stuart-Glennie: lxxvii, 382 pp., [2 adverts], 1 folding colour map / Volume II: The Jewish and Moslem Women, with concluding chapters on the origins of Matriarchy by John S. Stuart-Glennie: xvi, 616 pp., [4 adverts], half-titles, contemporary blue gilt & decorated cloth, bookplate of Library of the Supreme Council, Washington D.C. verso front covers, library stamp on title pages, otherwise set unopened, clean and in very good condition, David Nutt, London, 1890-1891.

Synopsis

Around the turn of the 19th century, British folklorist and traveller Lucy Mary Jane Garnett (1849-1934) published several books on Turkish folklore and mysticism. Having travelled extensively in the Balkans and Middle East, Garnett was considered an expert on the cultures in these regions both by fellow folklorists and the wider British audience that read her books. Her knowledge of Greek and Turkish, languages she learned in Smyrna and Salonica aided her greatly in compiling books such as Greek Folk-Songs from the Turkish Provinces of Greece (1890), The Women of Turkey and their Folk-Lore (1890), Mysticism and Magic in Turkey (1912), Ottoman Wonder Tales (1915) and Balkan Home Life (1917). Together with her publications of reviews and articles on the same subjects in well-known and widely read journals and magazines, Garnett’s body of work presented her perspective on the customs of the Balkans to a large British audience.