the ethnological notebooks of karl marx - Marxists Internet Archive

Notes to Introduction, pp. 88-89.The editors of the Socbineniia and of the MEW (see above) havedated Engels’ discovery of Marx’s manuscript on Morgan from thefirst half of February 1884. While this is possible, it neverthelessleaves open the question of the basis on which Engels began his searchfor the book by Morgan at the beginning of January of that year. Theimplication of Engels’ reference to his search is that he had alreadycome on Marx’s manuscript at the earlier time, and that therefore thetime of the ‘discovery’ must be moved back. This is not a sure conclusion,but the alternative advanced by the editors of the Socbineniiaand the MEW must account for this possibility, and not ignore it.(See above, note 147.) The editors of the Sochineniia and the MEWhave implicidy separated the work by Marx on Morgan into twoparts : the first contact with the Morgan work, and the later intensivestudy. This is indeed possible, and has been advanced by me onother grounds. They have further mentioned the concern by Marxwith problems of Urgemeinschaft and Urgesellschaft, which is awelcome broadening of the issues (see above, section 6, Community,Collectivism and Individualism).The reference to Marx’s work on Lubbock in the Sochineniia andin the MEW does not raise a substantial issue of chronology.170 On dating these excerpts, see preceding note and n. 15 above.171 Cf. Chroniky op. cit. Meiners and de Brosses, p. 11 ; Meiners, p. 125.C. Meiners, Grundriss der Geschichte der Menschheit, 1785, has exercisedsome influence on the subsequent history of anthropology. Cf. R. H.Lowie, History of Ethnological Theory, 1937; W. E. Mühlmann, Geschichteder Anthropologie, 1948; A. L. Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn,Culture etc., 1963.172 E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture (1871) 1958, v. 1, p. 36, and v. 2, p. 230.173 Grundrisse, op. cit., p. 579.174 Capital, op. cit., v. 1, ch. 1, sect. 4; v. 3, ch. 24 and ch. 48, sect. 3.175 De Brosses offered his work, Du culte des dieux fétiches, c’est-à-diredes objets terrestres et matériels, anim. ou inanimés, contenant leparallèle de l’ancienne religion de l’Egypte avec la religion actuellede Nigritie, et l’examen philosophique et critique des causes auxquelleson a coutume d’attribuer le fétichisme, to the Académie desInscriptions in 1757, which rejected it. It was published anonymouslyin 1760, Du culte des dieux fétiches, ou parallèle etc. He took up thesubject in the Encyclopédie méthodique, Philosophie, v. 2, pp. 411-457.On the relation of de Brosses and Turgot see Frank Manuel, Theprophets of Paris, 1965, pp. 32, 34; on the relation of de Brosses andComte, see ib., pp. 277, 281, 282; Tylor, op cit., v. 2, p. 230; E. E.Evans-Pritchard, Theories of Primitive Religion, 1965, ch. 2.Stocking, Race, Culture and Evolution, p. 98, has taken Tylor tobe de Brosses’ intellectual heir, but although Stocking’s erudition isimpressive, his point in this regard is not convincing. Aside from thefact that there is no explicit acknowledgement of his debt, Tylor’s396