Anna Davie Thesis

Thesis by Anna Davie entitled 'By the Rivers of Babylon' A Study of the Rastafarian Movement, 1986.

The Rastafarian Movement emerged from the prophecies of Marcus Garvey, a Jamaican American preacher, entrepreneur and advocate of rights for black people. Hailed as a prophet in Jamaica, he proclaimed that the Jamaican people would return to their African homeland, and in 1929, after returning to Jamaica, foresaw the crowning of a black king in Africa. This prophecy was seen as being fulfilled when Ras Tafari Makonnen was crowned 111th Emperor of Ethiopia in 1930, claiming direct descent from Solomon and Sheba and styling himself Haile Selassie I Power of the Holy Trinity. In Jamaica Selassie was regarded as a living deity, his worshippers believing that they were one of the lost tribes of Israel, taken in slavery to Babylon (Jamaica). They named themselves Ras Tafaris and, later, Rastamen.

The thesis was produced by Anna Davie for the University of Sheffield, 1986.

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