THURSTON, Edgar. Kew (London) 1855 — Penzance 5/12.10.1935 (when 80). British Physician, Anthropologist and Naturalist in India. Son of architect Charles Bosworth Thurston (1824–1886) and Georgiana Robins (1833–1927). Educated at Eton, studies of medicine at King’s College, London (LRCP 1877), then worked ar Kent County Lunatic Asylum. From 1885-1908 Superintendent in Madras Museum, also lectured in anatomy at Madras Medical College. From 1901 Superintendent of Ethnography for Madras Presidency. C.I.E. 1909. Retired and returned to England.
As anthropologist Thurston followed the unfortunate fashion of his time and used phrenology to support racist ideas and helped police in “identifying” criminals with it. “He believed that intelligence was inversely proportional to the breadth of the nose.” He collected plants and animals, finding and describing some new species.
Publications: Coins. Catalogue No. 1. Mysore. 123 p. 20 pl., No. 2. Roman, Indo-Portuguese, and Ceylon. 75 p., No. 3. Sultáns of Dehlí. 15 p. Madras 1888-90.
– Index volume to G. Watt’s A Dictionary of the Economic Products of India. Calcutta 1896.
– With K. Rangachari: Ethnographic Notes in Southern India. Madras 1906; Castes and Tribes of Southern India. 1-7. Madras 1909.
– Omens and Superstitions of Southern India. 320 p. L. 1912.
– The Madras Presidency. With Mysore, Coorg and the Associated States. 293 p. Provincial Geographies of India 3. Cambridge 1914.
– Numerous articles in the Bulletin of Madras Government Museum in 1895-1903; also wrote on botany, zoology and various industries (pearl fishery, silk industry, ivory carving).
Sources: *S.P. Nair, “E.Th. at the Madras Museum: The multiple career of a colonial museum curator”, S. Longair & J. McAleer (eds.), Curating Empire. Museums and the British Imperial Experience. Manchester 2026, 168-187; *Nature 136, 1935, 575f.; parents in fortunatusfamilia.com.au; Wikipedia with photo.
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