page_title: Hoplology
section_title: 1800s - The accidental Hoplologists': Burton & Pitt-Rivers
hierarchical_section_title: Hoplology / Warriors, Scholars, Explorers and their Hoplologies / 1800s - The accidental Hoplologists': Burton & Pitt-Rivers
caption_attribution_description: English: Photograph of Richard Francis Burton in Africa
context_page_description: Hoplology is a science that studies human combative behavior and performance.
context_section_description: Several pioneering Anthropologists were also contributing to the field of Hoplology while Burton was active.  A retired military officer who fought in the Crimean War, A.H.L. Pitt-Rivers developed a now outdated view of human evolution.  Cultures, he concluded, evolved through time from technologically simpler societies to technologically complex societies. In other words, progress is an integral aspect of human history. Primitive Warfare 2. Oxford: The Journal of the Royal United Service Institution Vol. XII 1868 NO. LI. Working in the Trobriand Islands (just off Australia) around the time of WWI, the renowned Anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski also delved into the field of Hoplology. "War and Weapons Among the Natives of the Trobriand Islands". Man. Vol. 20 pg.10-12 (1920).
  Hoplology has always had a theoretical and practical orientation. Seeking to introduce more effective forms of close quarter combat to British soldiers Burton wrote two instructional manuals “ A Complete System of Bayonet Fighting.” London: William Clowes and Sons. 1853. And “A New System of Sword exercise for Infantry.” London: William Clowes and Sons.1876. while the memoir by the ex-Hussar F.J Norman’s  “The Fighting Man of Japan: the training and exercise of the samurai.” London: Archibald Constable & CO.
caption: Richard Francis Burton
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