Archival Significance
One of a continuing series of scholarly bulletins issued by the National Museum of Southern Rhodesia (predecessor to today’s Natural History Museum of Zimbabwe, Bulawayo) from the 1930s onward. This issue carries two studies by Neville Jones, on the Codrington Collection and the Bembesi Industry, among the early published contributions to the archaeological record of Stone Age and Iron Age sites in the region.
Institutional Context
Issued under the museum’s Trustees and Scientific Staff, both listed in full within the pamphlet, at a time when the institution combined the roles of natural history museum, ethnological archive and prehistory research body under a small permanent staff based in Bulawayo.
- Hon. Mr Justice R. Hudson, C.M.G., M.C. — Trustee
- Lt.-Col. J. B. Brady, D.S.O., M.P. — Trustee
- G. M. Isaac, Esq., J.P. — Trustee
- Major B. Lightfoot, M.C., M.A., F.G.S. — Trustee
- D. Niven, Esq., F.L.A. — Trustee
- P. V. Samuels, Esq. — Trustee
- G. Arnold, D.Sc., A.R.C.Sc., F.R.S.S.A., F.R.E.S. — Director and Keeper of the Department of Zoology
- L. H. Ower, D.I.C., A.L.M.M., F.G.S. — Keeper of the Department of Geology
- Neville Jones, F.R.A.I. — Keeper of the Department of Ethnology, Prehistory and National History
- E. B. Edney, B.Sc., Ph.D., D.I.C. — Assistant, Department of Zoology
Content Summary
Covers the Codrington Collection held by the museum and Jones’s findings on the Bembesi Industry, priced at five shillings and printed at the University Press, Cambridge.
Research Utility
Useful for tracing the early institutional history of archaeology in Southern Rhodesia, and for researchers working specifically on Neville Jones’s fieldwork, since it captures his findings close to the time of excavation.
Abantu Archives Note
Held in-house; part of the Archive’s holdings on colonial-era scientific institutions in the region.