author
Josiah Henry Combs
1886–1960
A Kentucky-born folklorist, linguist, and collector of traditional song, he helped preserve the voices and music of the southern Appalachian region. His work bridged scholarship and lived experience, drawing on the mountain culture he knew firsthand.
1 Audiobook
A syllabus of Kentucky folk-songs
by Hubert G. (Hubert Gibson) Shearin, Josiah Henry Combs
About the author
Born in Hazard, Kentucky, in 1886 and raised in Hindman, Josiah Henry Combs grew up hearing folksongs from his family, especially his mother. That early connection to Appalachian music shaped a career devoted to language, folklore, and regional culture.
Combs studied at Transylvania University and later earned a Ph.D. from the Sorbonne in Paris in 1925. He taught foreign languages at several universities and became known as an early scholar of folk songs, dialects, and mountain life. Sources describing his career consistently present him as both an academic and a collector deeply rooted in the communities he wrote about.
He is especially remembered for preserving traditional songs of the southern United States and for writing about Kentucky highland culture from an insider's point of view. Combs died in 1960, but his work remains a useful window into Appalachian folklore, language, and everyday life.