Leo Frobenius

German anthropologist

• Born: June 29, 1873
• Birthplace: Berlin, Germany
• Died: August 9, 1938
• Place of death: Biganzolo, Italy

Frobenius was a pioneer in the study and exploration of African culture. He championed the idea that primitive, nonliterate cultures have preserved forms of thought, behavior, and cultural patterns older than those of the earliest advanced literate civilizations. He also developed a theory explaining the origin of culture, its stages of development, and how all the various cultures of the world are linked by these stages.

Early Life

Leo Frobenius (froh-BAY-nee-uhs) was born to a Prussian soldier assigned to the construction of various fortresses throughout Germany. Frobenius and his brother lived an uprooted childhood, traveling with their father and attending school in such cities as Berlin, Strasbourg, Charlottenburg, and Halle. At an early age, Frobenius became an avid reader of adventure books. He also spent considerable time visiting the zoological gardens of the various cities in which he lived. At that time, many of the zoological gardens “displayed” so-called primitive peoples from Africa, Alaska, and the South Pacific, along with the wild animals of the world. Frobenius was able to make friends with many of the “primitive” people at the gardens, recognizing in them a common humanity. He was also stimulated to research primitive history and culture, becoming especially fascinated by the civilizations of Africa.

With minimal formal education, Frobenius became a self-taught expert in African cultures. At the age of twenty, he began a collection of photographs and other ethnological materials, which aided him in writing his first book, Die Geheimbunde Afrikas: Ethnologische Studie (1894), published when he was twenty-one. The book was typical of all the many works he later produced, written in a highly verbose, overly romantic style, lacking in scholarly objectivity, but filled with a zestful passion for his subject. Such was the character of Frobenius: What he lacked in scientific discipline and training, he more than compensated for in enthusiasm and emotional involvement with his subject.

Frobenius followed his first book three years later with Der westafrikanische Kulturkreis (1897) and a year later with Der Ursprung der afrikanischen Kulturen (1898; The Origin of African Civilizations , 1898). It was with these two publications that Frobenius first put forth his theories on the laws governing the development of culture, the relationship between humans and culture, and the meaning and goal of historical development. Frobenius believed, along with such prominent German ethnologists of the time as Richard Andree, Friedrich Ratzel, and Frobenius’s own teacher, H. Schurtz, in the diffusion, or migration, theory of cultural development. This theory emphasized the interrelated influence of one culture on another, that certain similarities found between civilizations separated by vast distances are a result of these civilizations having had either direct or indirect contact with one another at some time. By comparing civilizations that shared cultural elements, Frobenius was able to provide a historical background for nonliterate cultures, therefore becoming a pioneer of the historical approach in ethnology.

Frobenius was not satisfied to be merely an armchair theorist. Because of his passionate desire to obtain firsthand knowledge of the African cultures, he quit his job as a business apprentice at the age of twenty-nine and obtained funding from the ethnology museum in Hamburg to collect specimens and artifacts in the Congo. In 1904, Frobenius founded the German Inner-African Exploration Expedition and set off on his first of twelve expeditions to Africa.

Life’s Work

Frobenius’s first expedition, in 1904, led him to the forest peoples of the Kasai and Congo basins. He collected everything artifacts, art information, and tales returning two years later with a collection of eight thousand pieces. He insisted on thoroughly checking and rechecking all collected data. He also “collected” native representatives as traveling companions who would relate to various interpreters (Frobenius never learned a single African language) the oral history of their people. More than anything else, Frobenius collected the stories of the natives he encountered; he immediately recognized the importance of oral literature and the significance of stylistic elements. During the expeditions, Frobenius relied on his wife, Editha, to take care of such practical matters as organizing the journeys and making sure enough water, food, and medical equipment were ordered. Out of this first journey, he wrote Im Schatten des Kongostaates (1907; in the shadow of the Congo state).

The second expedition, 1907-1909, led to West Africa Senegal, Liberia, Niger, Togo, and the Ivory Coast where Frobenius gathered adventure stories of the natives. Frobenius was never a champion of the scientific method, preferring style and enthusiasm to factual detail. His lack of a formal education affected his objectivity, yet it also served to free him from the constraints of a cold detachment to his subject matter and encouraged the natives he encountered to express themselves more openly when relating their oral traditions. Thus, from this journey emerged a collection of stories that Frobenius called Der schwarze Dekameron (1910; The Black Decameron , 1971), uninhibited, erotic folktales.

The third expedition, in 1910, led from Algiers into Algeria and brought forth tales of the Berbers. However, it was the fourth journey, in 1910-1912, through Nigeria and Cameroon that produced the most dramatic artifacts. Frobenius discovered the richly mythic culture of the Yoruba and transcribed in great detail their logical systems of gods, myths, and legends. Frobenius was so impressed with the Yoruba culture that he imagined that he had discovered the descendants of Atlantis. Along with the fabulous myths, the expedition discovered intricate terra cotta heads, which included the head of the Yoruba sea god Olokun, whom Frobenius imagined as a variation of the Greek sea god Poseidon. Frobenius’s belief in cultures’ having common ancient influences clouded his interpretation of the Yorubas. His excitement over this discovery also led him to make an impulsive decision to remove illegally some of the artifacts, for which he was tried in a Nigerian court as a trafficker in illicit goods. Out of this expedition emerged a monumental twelve-volume set of richly detailed African oral tales and narratives entitled Atlantis (1921-1928).

After completion of his fifth expedition in 1912, in which he explored the ancient mines of Kush in Sudan, Frobenius’s fame was at its height. On his return to Germany in 1912, he was received by William II, German emperor and king of Prussia, who agreed to sponsor personally future expeditions.

On his sixth journey in 1913-1914, Frobenius excavated in search of ancient tomb structures in an area between Algeria and Morocco. The seventh expedition, in 1914-1915, led through Turkey across the Red Sea to Northern Abyssinia and revealed information about the location of lost ore mines. This expedition was more of a military exercise, having been commissioned by the German military command.

World War I interrupted Frobenius’s expeditions. During the war and several years afterward, he took the time to organize the information that he had collected. He established the African Archives and the Institute for the Morphology of Culture (renamed the Frobenius Institute after his death) in Frankfurt. During the 1920’s, a seven-volume set of his work appeared, Erlebte Erdteile (1925-1929; continents experienced), which assembled his studies and his theory of culture. In 1925, he became professor of ethnology at the University of Frankfurt. In the later journeys he made to Africa, from 1926 through 1935, Frobenius documented rock paintings of various cultures in Nubia, South Africa, and the Sahara. His collection of rock paintings was, at that time, the most complete and extensive ever documented.

Frobenius’s main goal in all of his expeditions was to collect information that would support his theory of culture. As a believer in the diffusionist theory, he strove to provide a historical background for the civilizations that had formerly been regarded as having no history by written records; by providing an organized history for these nonliterate cultures, Frobenius could incorporate them into an overall world culture history. It was Frobenius’s ultimate goal not only to comprehend a particular culture but also to illuminate the entire history of the world.

Frobenius believed that every culture of the world has a spiritual center, a paideuma, or cultural soul. This paideuma permeates humankind and gives its actions a direction, a goal. Every moment and expression of a culture is related to its spiritual center. Environment is the key factor in determining the soul of a culture, while race, according to Frobenius, is totally irrelevant in the shaping of a culture’s paideuma.

Frobenius regarded all cultures as living organisms in the biological sense, that every culture is subject to the laws of the organic world. He believed that every culture has a life curve and used the terms Ergriffenheit (emotional involvement), Ausdruck (expression), and Anwendung (application) to characterize the stages of youth, maturity, and decline of a culture. According to Frobenius, during the stage of Ergriffenheit, humans are gripped by the phenomena of their environment and, using their creative powers, begin to form patterns of behavior based on what they experience. The youthful stage of culture is always characterized by fundamental spiritual-religious creations. In the Ausdruck, or maturity, stage, the culture is in spiritual, social, and artistic harmony with its elements, having risen above the basic patterns that originally inspired its creation. The Anwendung, or declining, stage is characterized by an overemphasis on technical, nonpurposeful functions in which rites and symbols become routine and a paralysis in creativity occurs. Frobenius said that humans cannot alter these inevitable stages; they can prolong or shorten the stages, but they cannot prevent the process from occurring once it has begun.

After nearly forty years of exploration throughout the African continent, surviving very rough living conditions along with the native inhabitants while collecting his invaluable data, Frobenius died of a heart attack at the age of sixty-five in Biganzolo, Italy, on August 9, 1938.

Significance

Frobenius’s ideas on cultural development were the target of violent attacks from the scientific community. His belief in culture as a living organism endowed with a soul was regarded as highly speculative and beyond the scientific method of empirical observation. However, Frobenius’s attitude toward culture, his insistence on the importance of primitive, nonliterate cultures being on equal ground with the literate cultures of the world, was a revolutionary concept.

Frobenius’s expeditions stimulated an expansion of the historical perspective that, at the turn of the century had been almost exclusively confined to the advanced literate civilizations of Europe and the Near East. When Europe was still caught up in the prejudices of the superiority of the white race and its culture, Frobenius revealed the idea of an inclusive cultural historical view of the entire world. All the cultures of the world from then on appeared to be equal unities in their own right.

Ironically, Frobenius, with his clumsy, unscientific methods, served to humanize the study of humans, to reveal the common humanity in all cultures, regardless of race. It was largely his revelatory expeditions to Africa and his romantically compassionate narratives, detailing the history and myths of the African people, that led to the abolishment of the display of human beings in zoological gardens. Free from the prejudices of his time, independent of the politics of the day, Frobenius proved that race has nothing to do with culture and that culture exists wherever human beings are to be found.

Bibliography

Frobenius, Leo. The Childhood of Man: A Popular Account of the Lives, Customs, and Thoughts of the Primitive Races. Translated by A. H. Keane. London: Seeley, 1909. An early work of Frobenius written before his expeditions, containing biographical information along with his early theories and observations of primitive cultures.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Leo Frobenius, 1873-1973: An Anthology. Edited by Eike Haberland. Translated by Patricia Crampton. Wiesbaden, West Germany: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1973. This anthology was compiled to commemorate the one hundredth anniversary of Frobenius’s birth. It contains excerpts from a wide variety of Frobenius’s works, detailing his cultural theories as well as containing examples of oral narratives from different African civilizations. Illustrated with drawings and photographs of African rock paintings and other art works.

Haberland, Eike, ed. Leo Frobenius on African History, Art, and Culture: An Anthology. Princeton, N.J.: Markus Weiner, 2006. A collection of excerpts from Frobenius’s writings about African art and culture, and his methods of studying African cultural history.

Ita, J. M. “Frobenius in West African History.” Journal of African History 13, no. 4 (1972). This article reexamines Frobenius’s methods and observations dealing with the chronicling of West African history. Examines the data Frobenius collected on the various cultures of West Africa and argues that, although Frobenius’s theories may have been suspect, the artifacts that he collected were of great value for future historians and anthropologists.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. “Frobenius, Senghor, and the Image of Africa.” In Modes of Thought, edited by Robin Horton and Ruth Finnegan. London: Faber & Faber, 1973. Examines Frobenius’s cultural theories and his attitudes toward the various African tribes with which he came into contact. Also examines the reasons why certain influential African scholars revere Frobenius while modern anthropologists, for the most part, ignore him.

Jahn, Janheinz. Leo Frobenius, the Demonic Child. Translated by Reinhard Sander. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1974. Written by a contemporary of Frobenius, this concise critical biography both condemns and praises his accomplishments, offers insights into Frobenius’s field methods, and gives highlights of each of the twelve expeditions.

Kalous, Milan. “Leo Frobenius’ Atlantic Theory A Reconsideration.” Paideuma 16 (1968). This article reexamines Frobenius’s disputed theory regarding the connection between the early Mediterranean cultures and African cultures of the Guinean Coast. The author compares artifacts and religious/mythological beliefs of the two regions and examines ancient historical references to support Frobenius’s findings.

Straube, Helmut. “Leo Frobenius.” In International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, edited by David L. Sills, vol. 6. New York: Macmillan, 1968. A concise overview of Frobenius’s life with special emphasis on explaining his theory of culture and how it affected the thinking of the diffusionist theorists of the day.