This collection of essays addresses different aspects of the life and career of the Norwegian-born collector Johan Adrian Jacobsen (1853-1947). Raised on boats at sea and trained as a shipmaster, but not otherwise formally educated, Jacobsen rose to international fame as a collector of both living people and material things towards the end of the nineteenth century. Jacobsen contributed substantially to museum collections in Europe and North America, especially in Germany where he settled with his family. Through his long-standing relationship with zoo purveyor Carl Hagenbeck in Hamburg, the prime entrepreneur of live ethnographic displays, he became a major actor in bringing representatives of Indigenous peoples from all over the world to exhibition venues in Europe.

The book's point of departure is the large archive Jacobsen left of his own work, such as books, publications, collection records, photographs, and other ephemera. Engaging with unstudied or understudied materials, especially at the Jacobsen Archive at Museum am Rothenbaum - Kulturen und Künste der Welt (MARKK) in Hamburg, the authors challenge simplistic perceptions of the history of ethnography, collecting, and museums. Moreover, insight is provided into the way Jacobsen's life and career refl ect fundamental changes in the perception of culture and science at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century - changes that still resonate in today's climate of global cultural movement and exchange.