R. R. (Robert Ranulph) Marett

Born in Jersey in 1866 and educated at Victoria College and Balliol College, Oxford, he became one of the best-known British anthropologists of his generation. He was closely associated with Oxford for most of his career and succeeded E. B. Tylor in the university's anthropology post, later serving as Rector of Exeter College.

Marett is best remembered for his work on the anthropology of religion. Rather than treating early religion as mere mistaken explanation, he argued that emotion, ritual, taboo, and a sense of awe were central to religious life. That approach shaped influential books such as The Threshold of Religion and helped make him an important voice in the British evolutionary school of anthropology.

He died in 1943. Today he is remembered as a bridge figure in the history of anthropology: rooted in older comparative ideas, but also pushing the field toward a richer understanding of belief, practice, and the emotional side of culture.