Leo Sternberg, (1861-05-03 - 1927-08-14), was a Russian and Soviet ethnographer of Jewish origin, professor at the University of Leningrad, Chief Ethnographer of the Museum for Ethnography, and Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences of the U. S. S. R. In his youth, immediately after completing his university studies in Odessa, he was arrested for participating in the Russian revolutionary movement and after serving a three years’ jail sentence he was exiled to Saghalin for a period of ten years. Here, amidst the most distressing conditions of life and the greatest privations, surrounded by Gilyak and Ainu, he developed a live interest in the customs and beliefs of rude peoples. The remainder of his life was devoted to their investigation. Since 1901 he was actively engaged at the Museum for Anthropology and Ethnography of the Academy of Sciences; and in 1915 he became Professor and Dean of the Ethnographic Faculty of the Geographical Institute, which was later combined with the University of Leningrad.
He passed away in Duderhof near Leningrad.
(Eugen Kagaroff, American Anthropologist, 1929)
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