Nationality American Name Matilda Stevenson | Fields Ethnology | |
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Born Matilda Coxe Evans
May 12, 1849
San Augustine, Texas ( 1849-05-12 ) Institutions Bureau of American Ethnology, Smithsonian Institution Alma mater Miss Annable's Academy; private study of law with her father, Alexander H. Evans; of chemistry and geology with Dr. N. M. Mew of the Army Medical School, Washington, D.C.; of ethnology with her husband, James Stevenson, of the USGS Died June 24, 1915, Oxon Hill, Maryland, United States Spouse James Stevenson (m. 1872–1888) Books The Zuni Indians Their Mythology Esoteric Fraternities and Ceremonies Institution Bureau of American Ethnology, Smithsonian Institution | ||
Matilda Coxe Stevenson (née Evans) (May 12, 1849 – June 24, 1915), who also wrote under the name Tilly E. Stevenson, was an American ethnologist, born in San Augustine, Texas.
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Life and career
Born Matilda Coxe Evans, in 1872 she married James Stevenson (1840-1888), an ethnologist with whom she spent 13 years in explorations of the Rocky Mountain region. In the 1880s, the Stevensons "formed the first husband-wife team in anthropology." Matilda Coxe Stevenson's contributions often focused on women and family life, for which she "quickly developed a reputation as a vigorous and devoted scientist."
In 1885, Matilda Coxe Stevenson became the first President of the Women's Anthropological Society of America.
After 1889 she was on the staff of the Bureau of American Ethnology of the Smithsonian Institution. Stevenson explored the cave, cliff, and mesa ruins of New Mexico, studied all the Pueblo tribes of that state, and from 1904 to 1910 made a special study of the Taos and Tewa Native Americans. Artifacts collected by Matilda and James Stevenson are in the collections of the Department of Anthropology in the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution. Papers from Stevenson are in the Institution's National Anthropological Archives.
Among Stevenson's "protegés" were John Peabody Harrington
Works
Stevenson was the author of: