author

Matthew L. Hewat

A medical doctor writing in the early 1900s, this author left behind a rare record of Bantu traditional medicine and folklore in southern Africa. His best-known book opens a window onto healing practices, beliefs, and everyday culture as they were documented in 1906.

1 Audiobook

Bantu Folk Lore (Medical and General)

Bantu Folk Lore (Medical and General)

by Matthew L. Hewat

About the author

Little biographical information about this author is easy to confirm from major public sources, but library records identify him as Matthew L. Hewat, M.D. and credit him with Bantu folk lore (medical and general), published in Cape Town in 1906.

That book is the main reason his name still appears in library and archive catalogs today. It brings together material on folklore and traditional medicine among southern African communities, including references to Pondo, Xhosa, and Zulu traditions, making it a small but notable historical source for readers interested in ethnography, healing practices, and colonial-era documentation.

Because confirmed personal details about his life remain scarce in the sources reviewed here, the clearest picture available is through his work itself: a physician-author who preserved cultural material that might otherwise have been lost to print history.