Alice Bertha Gomme, Lady Gomme (born Merck; 4 January 1853,

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

– 5 January 1938, London), was a leading

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

folklorist, and a pioneer in the study of children's games.

Life

Gomme was the daughter of Charles Merck, a master tailor, and Elizabeth, his wife. On March 31, 1875, she married

George Laurence Gomme Sir George Laurence Gomme, FSA (18 December 1853 – 23 February 1916) was a public servant and leading British folklorist. He helped found both the Victoria County History and the Folklore Society. He also had an interest in old buildings an ...

(1853-1916), who was himself an important figure in folklore studies.Gomme (2004). The couple had seven sons, born between 1876 and 1891. One of these, Arthur Alan Gomme, would, like his father, become president of the

Folklore Society The Folklore Society (FLS) is a national association in the United Kingdom for the study of folklore. It was founded in London in 1878 to study traditional vernacular culture, including traditional music, song, dance and drama, narrative, arts an ...

. Another,

Arnold Wycombe Gomme Arnold Wycombe Gomme (16 November 1886 – 17 January 1959) was a British classical scholar, lecturer in ancient Greek and Greek history (1911–1945), professor of ancient Greek, University of Glasgow (1946–1957), Fellow of the British Academy ...

, was a noted classical scholar. When the Folklore Society was founded in 1878, Gomme and her husband were among the founder members; and she would be a leading figure in its activities for the rest of her life. Her major work is ''The Traditional Games of England, Scotland and Ireland'' (two vols., 1894 and 1898), containing descriptions of some 800 children's games, collected with the help of seventy-six correspondents. Among other works on the same subject was ''Children's Singing Games'' (two vols., 1894) and several later works in collaboration with her husband or with

Cecil Sharp Cecil James Sharp (22 November 1859 – 23 June 1924) was an English-born collector of folk songs, folk dances and instrumental music, as well as a lecturer, teacher, composer and musician. He was the pre-eminent activist in the development of t ...

.Simpson and Roud (2000), 149. Her ''Children's Singing Games: with the Tunes to Which they are Sung'' was also notable for being one of the finest illustrated Arts & Crafts books produced by the Birmingham School of Art. Another pioneering interest was folk cookery; and she was elected as the first president of the English Folk Cookery Association in 1931. Beyond these specialist areas, her articles on folklore show a wide variety of interests.

Notes

References

*Georgina Boyes,
A Proper Limitation: Stereotypes of Alice Gomme
, ''Musical Traditions'' (internet journal, 2001) *Robert Gomme, 'Gomme, Alice Bertha, Lady Gomme (1853-1938)', ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (Oxford: OUP, 2004, online ed. 2006) *Jacqueline Simpson and Steve Roud, 'Gomme, Alice Bertha', ''A Dictionary of English Folklore'' (Oxford: OUP, 2000), 148-9

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Gomme, Alice English folklorists Women folklorists 1853 births 1938 deaths People from London