RELIGIONS IN WEST AFRICA AND ANCIENT EGYPT

First edition, first printing. Inscribed by the author to Sir Brynmor Jones. Original green cloth lettered in gilt to the spine and front panel. Issued without a dustwrapper. A near fine copy, the binding square and firm, the contents clean throughout. There a handful of small marks to the upper and fore-edges of the page block. An uncommon volume.

Inscribed by the author in black ink to the front pastedown, "Presented / To / Sir Brynmor Jones / With the compliments of the author", signed and dated "3 /10/73". Jonathan Olumide Lucas (b. 1897) was a Nigerian clergyman, educator and historian, known for his work on the history of Yoruba religion. Educated at Fourah Bay College, Durham University and the University of London, he was a leading member of Lagos Union of Teachers which later merged with the Nigerian Union of Teachers. In 1944, he became the first vice president of the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons. Religions in West Africa and Ancient Egypt is "an account of the religions of West Africans inhabiting parts of Ghana, Togoland, Dahomey and Southern Nigeria. The influence of Ancient Egypt on the religions is illustrated, and the impress of Ancient Egyptian culture upon West African culture is clearly delineated. The work also contains a correction of the errors which appear in some of the existing works on the subject of West African Religions" (from the author's prefatory note). Sir Brynmor Jones (1903–1989), was born in North Wales and educated at University College of Wales at Bangor and at St John's College, Cambridge. In 1947 he became a professor chair at University College, where he later became Dean of Science, Deputy Principal. When the college achieved full university status in 1954, he became iPro-Vice-Chancellor and, in 1956, Vice-Chancellor. The expanded University of Hull Library, famously presided over by the poet, Philip Larkin, was named after Jones in 1967.