Field notebook compiled by J. H. Driberg, later Lecturer in Anthropology, Cambridge University, compiled while a British colonial official, and dealing with local, linguistic and other matters.

A significant item, written, as his biographer Roy Abrahams explains, by a man who was 'almost single-handedly responsible for keeping academic social anthropology, and one might add the place of African research within it, alive in the small Archaeology and Anthropology Department in Cambridge in those otherwise rather barren days of the 1930s'. 45pp., 12mo. In a ruled, stitched notebook without cover. Written in pencil on stained and aged paper. Some of the text is faded. A piecemeal notebook, filled in 'on the hoof', with the sense of immediacy such an approach entails, containing a mixture of linguistic, practical and anthropological entries, as the following quotations indicate. The hand is a difficult one, and the transcriptions are not entirely certain. On 27 March 1923 Driberg writes: 'Lolami up Lotimoir killed | Loknangai up Lomuti of Longelra | Loleman's brother Nartot was killed by a Japosa who has since died of small pox. | So brought in at end of month by Lotimoi'. On 4 April 1923: 'Sureai ajie here. migrated long ago. Kathiangon is the H.Q. 7 days. friendly with Japoli. Some people - no chief known. Porok is the important elder. They cultivate a little tobacco'. On 6 April 1923, at Parengya: 'Oponi killed at Lokodoka u/o Morukurnon. Some time before Amonytim's. Wolf was present with his soldiers. Oponi was walking to awi & was killed on the road. He was walking with a few Ethan. No cause known.' & very strong feeling here against the oti & they ask that Wolf may never return'. Shortly afterwards he writes: 'Raid on Jjongkothi & steal their cattle. May they go on raiding them please? Mustn't come anyway to me if they are raided back. Jjongkotha also steal cattle. 2 months away. Administration. Dont recommend it. Kailil R. Tinkor & all that river are away with Halash raiding Tinkana. Lommima & "Lokinon" landing. Have been away several days.' Elsewhere he writes: 'There was a big Lomoti who died in 1905. Lived at Morukori'. A late entry reads: 'Abyssinian party gone to Arukomugi, when a section of Parenga Topotha lies N. about 20 miles N.G. of Lokothowran water in Lopure river. They go from the W. to shoot elephant at Nyangyang-ayik. They are either there nor or at Morinyogi. Both uninhabited. Lomunimri is away with Nikor against Tinkana'. On 15 August 1923: '/woman Natoranyang taken at Morukgrith escaped from Habash about 3 weeks ago. Was kept by Lomininoir - one of the other captives was killed & the rest & the rest taken elsewhere.' The last entry is a page of 'Readings from Loringa Hill. 15/1/25'. Also included are lists of words, including a full page headed 'Old Men', beginning with LODUNGOTULYA LOTHOAMOI | oldest (NYIMORU) in Namminchik, village of Lottmyen'. One page carries a crude pencil plan of the territory. Among a number of observations is the following: 'Tapose | Butter & milk pots. Milk may not be brought out of pot at midday. Cattle wd die. Only early in morning & evening. Only applies to Opoko. You can milk with hands or calabash. | May not drink from trough. That is the only time one can drink otherwise when cattle drink. No prohibition about wells.' The context of the present item is explained at the end of this entry. In his paper on Driberg, Roy Abrahams (Journal of the Anthropological Society of Oxford, January 2011) fills in the context in which the present item was written, describing Driberg's 'colourfully eccentric life as a colonial administrator in Uganda and neighbouring areas of the Sudan until 1926 [...] After a successful period of several years among the Lango of northern Uganda, Driberg was moved in 1922 to the newly 'pacified' Didinga mountains on the Sudan border. When the area was formally taken back under the Sudan administration, he remained in charge there and transferred to the Sudan Political Service. As earlier among the Lango, he seems to have become strongly attached to the people ? and also to their highland country ? and he was especially keen to defend them against their enemies, the as yet unadministered Toposa pastoralists, who were apparently taking advantage of their weakened state and that of their closely related Longarim neighbours. Contrary to orders from above he led some forays against the Toposa, and he was keen to be sent some military reinforcements, which he hoped would persuade them to pay compensation for their raids and make peace through the threat of force. In pursuit of this he got caught up in a mire of deception, claiming falsely that the Toposa had carried out a particularly serious raid which he had repelled with local police support. It appears that at the time he was overworking and genuinely unwell, with symptoms of jaundice. In the end, faced with an imminent government strike force to punish the Toposa for this fictive raid, he confessed his fabrications and was allowed to resign, albeit it seems with a pension.'