Édouard-Alfred Martel Édouard-Alfred Martel Édouard-Alfred Martel (1 July 1859, Pontoise, Val-d'Oise – 3 June 1938, Montbrison), the 'father of modern speleology', was a world pioneer of cave exploration, study, and documentation. Martel explored thousands of caves in his native France and many other countries, popularised the pursuit of cave exploration, introduced the concept of speleology as a distinct area of scientific study, maintained an extensive archive, and in 1895 founded , the first organisation devoted to cave science in the world. Édouard-Alfred Martel was born in Pontoise, Seine-et-Oise on 1 July 1859. Born into a family of lawyers, he studied at the
Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion The Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion ("JSSR") is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal published by Wiley-Blackwell in the United States of America under the auspices of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, dedicated to publishing scholarly articles in the social sciences, including psychology, sociology and anthropology, devoted to the study of religion. It is not a theology journal, as its publications tend to be empirical papers in the aforementioned disciplines, rather than papers assessing the truth or falsity, or otherwise attempting to clarify, theological doctrines. However, the eminent theologian