author
Sir Richard Carnac Temple
1850–1931
A British administrator in colonial India, he also became a prolific writer on folklore, ethnography, and travel. His work reflects both the reach of the British Empire and the period’s growing fascination with documenting local cultures and traditions.
1 Audiobook
Lord Lawrence
by Sir Richard Carnac Temple
About the author
Born in Allahabad, India, on 15 October 1850, Sir Richard Carnac Temple served in the British Army and later in the Indian administration. He is especially noted for his time as Chief Commissioner of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a role that placed him at the center of British colonial governance in South and Southeast Asia.
Alongside his official career, he built a substantial reputation as a scholar and collector of folklore. He wrote and edited works on Indian traditions, anthropology, and travel, and he was active in learned circles in Britain, including the Royal Anthropological Institute and the Folklore Society. His interests ranged widely, from regional customs and oral traditions to historical travel accounts.
Temple died on 3 March 1931. Today he is remembered less as a novelist or literary stylist than as a busy recorder of stories, beliefs, and social life whose books preserve material that might otherwise have been lost, even as they also reflect the assumptions of the colonial world in which he worked.