Alexander von Humboldt

Alexander von Humboldt

Alexander von Humboldt, by Joseph Stieler, 1843
Born September 14, 1769
Berlin
Died May 6, 1859 (aged 89)
Berlin
Nationality Prussian
Fields Geography
Known for Biogeography, Kosmos (1845)
Influences Schelling
Influenced Darwin
Notable awards Copley Medal (1852)

Signature

Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander von Humboldt ( listen ; September 14, 1769 – May 6, 1859) was a Prussian geographer, naturalist, and explorer, and the younger brother of the Prussian minister, philosopher and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767–1835).[1] Humboldt's quantitative work on botanical geography laid the foundation for the field of biogeography. Humboldt's advocacy of long-term systematic geophysical measurement laid the foundation for modern geomagnetic and meteorological monitoring.[2][3]

Between 1799 and 1804, Humboldt travelled extensively in Latin America, exploring and describing it for the first time from a modern scientific point of view. His description of the journey was written up and published in an enormous set of volumes over 21 years. Humboldt was one of the first to propose that the lands bordering the Atlantic Ocean were once joined (South America and Africa in particular). Humboldt resurrected the use of the word cosmos from the ancient Greek and assigned it to his multi-volume treatise, Kosmos, in which he sought to unify diverse branches of scientific knowledge. This important work also motivated a holistic perception of the universe as one interacting entity.[4] Humboldt supported and worked with other scientists, including Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac, Justus von Liebig, Louis Agassiz, Matthew Fontaine Maury, Georg von Neumayer, and most notably, Aimé Bonpland, with whom he conducted much of his scientific exploration.

Biography

The Tegel Palace (or Humboldt Palace), where Alexander von Humboldt and Wilhelm von Humboldt lived for several years.

Early life and education

Alexander von Humboldt was born in Berlin in Prussia in 1769.[5] His father, Alexander Georg von Humboldt, belonged to a prominent Pomeranian family; a major in the Prussian Army, he was rewarded for his services in the Seven Years' War with the post of Royal Chamberlain. He married the daughter of the Prussian general adjutant, Schweder.[5] In 1766, Alexander Georg married Maria Elizabeth Colomb, the widow of Baron Hollwede, and they had two sons, Wilhelm and Alexander. The money that Baron Holwede left to Alexander's mother would become instrumental in funding Alexander's explorations, contributing more than 70% of his private income.

Due to his youthful penchant for collecting and labelling plants, shells and insects, Alexander received the playful title of "the little apothecary". Alexander's father died in 1779, after which his mother saw to his education. Marked for a political career, Alexander studied finance for six months at the University of Frankfurt (Oder); a year later, on April 25, 1789, he matriculated at Göttingen, then known for the lectures of C. G. Heyne and J. F. Blumenbach. His vast and varied interests were by this time fully developed, and during a vacation in 1789 Alexander made a scientific excursion up the Rhine and produced the treatise Mineralogische Beobachtungen über einige Basalte am Rhein (Brunswick, 1790) (Mineralogic Observations on Several Basalts on the River Rhine).

A portrait of Humboldt by Friedrich Georg Weitsch, 1806

Alexander von Humboldt's passion for travel was confirmed by a friendship formed at Göttingen with Georg Forster, Heyne's son-in-law and the companion of Captain James Cook on Cook's second voyage. Thereafter, Humboldt's talents were devoted to the purpose of preparing himself as a scientific explorer. With this emphasis, he studied commerce and foreign languages at Hamburg, geology at Technische Universität Bergakademie Freiberg under A. G. Werner, anatomy at Jena under J. C. Loder and astronomy and the use of scientific instruments under F. X. von Zach and J. G. Köhler. Humboldt's researches into the vegetation of the mines of Freiberg led to the publication, in 1793, of his Florae Fribergensis Specimen. Long experimentation on muscular irritability, then recently discovered by Luigi Galvani, was described in his Versuche über die gereizte Muskel- und Nervenfaser (Berlin, 1797) (Experiments on the Frayed Muscle and Nerve Fibres), enriched in the French translation with notes by Blumenbach.

Travels and work in Europe

In 1794 Humboldt was admitted to the famous Weimar coterie and contributed (June 7, 1795) to Schiller's new periodical, Die Horen, a philosophical allegory entitled Die Lebenskraft, oder der rhodische Genius. In the summer of 1790 he paid a short visit to England in the company of Forster. In 1792 and 1797 he was in Vienna; in 1795 he made a geological and botanical tour through Switzerland and Italy. Humboldt had obtained, in the meantime, official employment by appointment as assessor of mines at Berlin, February 29, 1792. Although this service to the state was regarded by him as only an apprenticeship to the service of science, he fulfilled its duties with such conspicuous ability that not only did he rise rapidly to the highest post in his department, but he was also entrusted with several important diplomatic missions. The death of his mother, on November 19, 1796, set him free to follow the bent of his genius, and severing his official connections, he waited for an opportunity to fulfil his long-cherished dream of travel.

Latin American expedition

Alexander von Humboldt's Latin American expedition
Geography of Plants, 1805.

On the postponement of Captain Nicolas Baudin's proposed voyage of circumnavigation, which he had been officially invited to accompany, Humboldt left Paris for Marseille with Aimé Bonpland, the designated botanist of the frustrated expedition, hoping to join Napoleon Bonaparte in Egypt. Means of transport, however, were not forthcoming, and the two travellers eventually found their way to Madrid, where the unexpected patronage of the minister Don Mariano Luis de Urquijo convinced them to make Spanish America the scene of their explorations.

Armed with powerful recommendations from the King of Spain, they sailed in the Pizarro from A Coruña, on June 5, 1799, stopped six days on the island of Tenerife to climb the volcano Teide, and landed at Cumaná, Venezuela, on July 16. Humboldt visited the mission at Caripe and explored the Guácharo cavern, where he found the oil-bird, which he was to make known to science as Steatornis caripensis. Returning to Cumaná, Humboldt observed, on the night of November 11–12, a remarkable meteor shower (the Leonids). He proceeded with Bonpland to Caracas where he would climb the Avila mount with Andrés Bello. In February 1800, Humboldt and Bonpland left the coast with the purpose of exploring the course of the Orinoco River and its tributaries. This trip, which lasted four months and covered 1,725 miles (2,776 km) of wild and largely uninhabited country, had the important result of establishing the existence of the Casiquiare canal (a communication between the water-systems of the rivers Orinoco and Amazon), and of determining the exact position of the bifurcation, as well as documenting the life of several native tribes such as the Maipures and their extinct rivals the Atures (several words of the latter tribe were transferred to Humboldt by one parrot[6]). Around March 19, 1800, Humboldt and Bonpland discovered and captured some electric eels. They both received potentially dangerous electric shocks during their investigations. Two months later they explored the territory of the Maypures and that of the then recently extinct Aturès Indians. Humboldt also laid to rest the persistent myth of Raleigh's Lake Parime by proposing that the seasonal flooding of the Rupununi savannah had been misidentified as a lake.[7]

On November 24, the two friends set sail for Cuba where they met fellow botanist and plant collector John Fraser,[8] and after a stay of some months they regained the mainland at Cartagena, Colombia. Ascending the swollen stream of the Magdalena River and crossing the frozen ridges of the Cordillera Real, they reached Quito on January 6, 1802, after a tedious and difficult journey. Their stay there was marked by the ascent of Pichincha and an attempt on Chimborazo. Humboldt and his party reached an altitude of 19,286 feet (5,878 m), a world record at the time. The journey concluded with an expedition to the sources of the Amazon en route for Lima, Peru.[9] At Callao, Humboldt observed the transit of Mercury on November 9, and studied the fertilizing properties of guano, the subsequent introduction of which into Europe was due mainly to his writings. A tempestuous sea-voyage brought them to Mexico, where they resided for a year, travelling to different cities.

Next, Humboldt made a short visit to the United States, staying in the White House as a guest of President Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson, a scientist himself, was delighted to have Humboldt as a guest and the two held numerous intense discussions on scientific matters. After six weeks, Humboldt set sail for Europe from the mouth of the Delaware and landed at Bordeaux on August 3, 1804.

Achievements of the Latin American expedition

An 1815 self-portrait of Humboldt (aged 45)

This memorable expedition may be regarded as having laid the foundation of the sciences of physical geography and meteorology. By his delineation (in 1817) of "isothermal lines", he at once suggested the idea and devised the means of comparing the climatic conditions of various countries. He first investigated the rate of decrease in mean temperature with the increase in elevation above sea level, and afforded, by his inquiries regarding the origin of tropical storms, the earliest clue to the detection of the more complicated law governing atmospheric disturbances in higher latitudes; while his essay on the geography of plants was based on the then novel idea of studying the distribution of organic life as affected by varying physical conditions. His discovery of the decrease in intensity of Earth's magnetic field from the poles to the equator was communicated to the Paris Institute in a memoir read by him on December 7, 1804, and its importance was attested by the speedy emergence of rival claims. His services to geology were based mainly on his attentive study of the volcanoes of the New World. He showed that they fell naturally into linear groups, presumably corresponding with vast subterranean fissures; and by his demonstration of the igneous origin of rocks previously held to be of aqueous formation, he contributed largely to the elimination of erroneous views, such as Neptunism.

Humboldt is considered to be the "second discoverer of Cuba" due to all the scientific and social research he conducted on this Spanish colony. During an initial three-month stay at Havana, his first tasks were to properly survey that city and the nearby towns of Guanabacoa, Regla and Bejucal. He befriended Cuban landowner and thinker Francisco Arango y Parreño; together they visited the Guines area in south Havana, the valleys of Matanzas Province and the Valley of the Sugar Mills in Trinidad. Those three areas were, at the time, the first frontier of sugar production in the island. During those trips, Humboldt collected statistical information on Cuba's population, production, technology and trade, and with Arango, made suggestions for enhancing them. He predicted that the agricultural and commercial potential of Cuba was huge and could be vastly improved with proper leadership in the future. After traveling to the United States, Humboldt returned to Cuba for a second, shorter stay in April 1804. During this time he socialized with his scientific and landowner friends, conducted mineralogical surveys and finished his vast collection of the island's flora and fauna. Finally, Humboldt conducted a rudimentary census of the indigenous and European inhabitants in New Spain, and on May 5, 1804, he estimated the population to be six million individuals.[10][11]

The editing and publication of the encyclopedic mass of scientific, political and archaeological material that had been collected by him during his absence from Europe was now Humboldt's most urgent desire. After a short trip to Italy with Gay-Lussac for the purpose of investigating the law of magnetic declination and a sojourn of two and a half years in his native city, he finally, in the spring of 1808, settled in Paris with the purpose of securing the scientific cooperation required for bringing his great work through the press. This colossal task, which he at first hoped would occupy but two years, eventually cost him twenty-one, and even then it remained incomplete. In these early years in Paris, he shared accommodation and a laboratory with his former rival, and now friend, Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac, both working together on the analysis of gases and the composition of the atmosphere. A statue of Alexander von Humboldt was raised commemorating the 200th anniversary of his travels in Mexico, located in the Alameda Central (central park) of Mexico City. The inscription reads "From the Mexican Nation to Alejandro de Humboldt - Hero of the Nation (benemérito de la patria) 1799–1999".

Humboldtian science

Main article: Humboldtian science
von Humboldt depicted by Charles Willson Peale, 1805

Alexander von Humboldt saw the need for an approach to science that could account for the harmony of nature among the diversity of the physical world. For Humboldt, "the unity of nature" meant that it was the interrelation of all physical sciences—such as the conjoining between biology, meteorology and geology—that determined where specific plants grew. He found these relationships by unravelling myriad, painstakingly collected data,[12] data extensive enough that it became an enduring foundation upon which others could base their work. Humboldt viewed nature holistically, and tried to explain natural phenomena without the appeal to religious dogma. He believed in the central importance of observation, and as a consequence had amassed a vast array of the most sophisticated scientific instruments then available. Each had its own velvet lined box and was the most accurate and portable of its time; nothing quantifiable escaped measurement. According to Humboldt, everything should be measured with the finest and most modern instruments and sophisticated techniques available, for that collected data was the basis of all scientific understanding. This quantitative methodology would become known as "Humboldtian science." Humboldt wrote "Nature herself is sublimely eloquent. The stars as they sparkle in firmament fill us with delight and ecstasy, and yet they all move in orbit marked out with mathematical precision."[13]

Criticism

His critics say his writings contain fantastical descriptions of America, while leaving out its inhabitants. They claim Humboldt, coming from the Romantic school of thought, believed '... nature is perfect till man deforms it with care.'[14] In this line of thinking, they think he largely neglected the human societies amidst this nature. The writing style that describes the 'new world' without people is a trend among explorers both of the past and present. Views of indigenous peoples as 'savage' or 'unimportant' leaves them out of the historical picture.[14] In reality Humboldt dedicated large parts of his work to describing the conditions of slaves, indigenous peoples and society in general. He often showed his disgust for the slavery[15] and inhumane conditions in which indigenous peoples and others were treated and he often criticized the colonial policies.[1]

Acclaim

Humboldt was now one of the most famous men in Europe.[16] The acclaimed American painter Rembrandt Peale painted him during his European stay, between 1808 and 1810, as one of the most prominent figures in Europe at the time. A chorus of applause greeted him from every side. Academies, both native and foreign, were eager to enrol him among their members. He was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1810. King Frederick William III of Prussia conferred upon him the honour, without exacting the duties, attached to the post of royal chamberlain, together with a pension of 2,500 thalers, afterwards doubled. He refused the appointment of Prussian minister of public instruction in 1810. In 1814 he accompanied the allied sovereigns to London. Three years later he was summoned by the king of Prussia to attend him at the congress of Aachen. Humboldt was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1822.[17] Again in the autumn of 1822 he accompanied the same monarch to the Congress of Verona, proceeded thence with the royal party to Rome and Naples and returned to Paris in the spring of 1823.

Humboldt had long regarded the French capital as his true home. There he found not only scientific sympathy, but the social stimulus which his vigorous and healthy mind eagerly craved. He was equally in his element as the lion of the salons and as the savant of the Institut de France and the observatory. During that time he met in 1818, the young and brilliant Peruvian student of the Royal Mining School of Paris, Mariano Eduardo de Rivero y Ustariz. They became good friends. Subsequently Humboldt acted as a mentor of the career of this promising Peruvian scientist. Thus, when at last he received from his sovereign a summons to join his court at Berlin, he obeyed indeed, but with deep and lasting regret. The provincialism of his native city was odious to him. He never ceased to rail against the bigotry without religion, aestheticism without culture, and philosophy without common sense, which he found dominant on the banks of the Spree. The unremitting benefits and sincere attachment of two well-meaning princes secured his gratitude but could not appease his discontent. At first he sought relief from the "nebulous atmosphere" of his new abode by frequent visits to Paris; but as years advanced, his excursions were reduced to accompanying the monotonous "oscillations" of the court between Potsdam and Berlin. On May 12, 1827, he settled permanently in the Prussian capital, where his first efforts were directed towards the furtherance of the science of terrestrial magnetism. For many years, it had been one of his favourite schemes to secure, by means of simultaneous observations at distant points, a thorough investigation of the nature and law of "magnetic storms" (a term invented by him to designate abnormal disturbances of Earth's magnetism). The meeting at Berlin, on September 18, 1828, of a newly formed scientific association, of which he was elected president, gave him the opportunity of setting on foot an extensive system of research in combination with his diligent personal observations. His appeal to the Russian government, in 1829, led to the establishment of a line of magnetic and meteorological stations across northern Asia. Meanwhile his letter to the Duke of Sussex, then (April 1836) president of the Royal Society, secured for the undertaking, the wide basis of the British dominions.

The Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, observes, "Thus that scientific conspiracy of nations which is one of the noblest fruits of modern civilization was by his exertions first successfully organized." However, earlier examples of international scientific cooperation exist, notably the 18th-century observations of the transits of Venus.

The President of Mexico, Benito Juárez, gave him honorary Mexican citizenship.

Explorations in Russia

In 1811, and again in 1818, projects of Asiatic exploration were proposed to Humboldt, first by the Russian government, and afterwards by the Prussian government; but on each occasion, untoward circumstances interposed, and it was not until he had begun his sixtieth year that he resumed his early role of traveller in the interests of science. Between May and November 1829, he, together with his chosen associates, Gustav Rose and C. G. Ehrenberg, traversed the wide expanse of the Russian empire from the Neva to the Yenesei, accomplishing in twenty-five weeks a distance of 9,614 miles (15,472 km). The journey, however, though carried out with all the advantages afforded by the immediate patronage of the Russian government, was too rapid to be profitable. The correction of the prevalent exaggerated estimate of the height of the Central Asian plateau, and the prediction of the discovery of diamonds in the gold-washings of the Urals, were important aspects of these travels.

Humboldt as diplomat

Humboldt's seal on a private letter

Between 1830 and 1848 Humboldt was frequently employed in diplomatic missions to the court of King Louis Philippe of France, with whom he always maintained the most cordial personal relations.

His brother, Wilhelm von Humboldt, died in Humboldt's arms on April 8, 1835. The death saddened the later years of his life; Alexander lamented that he had lost half of himself with the death of his brother.

Upon the accession of the crown prince Frederick William IV in June 1840, Humboldt's favour at court increased. Indeed, the new king's craving for Humboldt's company became at times so importunate as to leave him only a few waking hours to work on his writing.

The "Cosmos"

Photograph of Humboldt in his later years

The first two volumes of the Kosmos were published between the years 1845 and 1847. Humboldt had long intended to write a comprehensive work about geography and the natural sciences. The writing took shape in lectures he delivered before the University of Berlin in the winter of 1827–28. These lectures would form "the cartoon for the great fresco of the [K]osmos".[18] The work attempted to unify the sciences then known in a Kantian framework. With inspiration from German Romanticism, Humboldt sought to create a compendium of the world's environment.[4]

He spent the last decade of his long life — as he called them, his "improbable" years — continuing this work. The third and fourth volumes were published in 1850–58; a fragment of a fifth appeared posthumously in 1862.

Kosmos was very popular in Britain and America. In 1849 a German newspaper commented that in England two of the three different translations were made by women, "while in Germany most of the men do not understand it."[19] The first translation by Augustin Pritchard — published anonymously by Mr. Baillière (volume I in 1845 and volume II in 1848) — suffered from being hurriedly made. In a letter Humboldt said of it: "It will damage my reputation. All the charm of my description is destroyed by an English sounding like Sanskrit."

The other two translations were made by Mrs. Sabine under the superintendence of her husband Col. Edward Sabine (4 volumes 1846–1858), and by Miss E.C. Otté (5 volumes 1849–1858, the only complete translation of the 4 German volumes). These three translations were also published in America. The numbering of the volumes differs between the German and the English editions. Volume 3 of the German edition corresponds to the volumes 3 and 4 of the English translation, as the German volume appeared in 2 parts in 1850 and 1851. Volume 5 of the German edition was not translated until 1981, again by a woman.[20] Miss Otté's translation benefited from a detailed table of contents, and an index for every volume; of the German edition only volumes 4 and 5 had (extremely short) tables of contents, and the index to the whole work only appeared with volume 5 in 1862.

Not so well known in Germany is the atlas belonging to the German edition of the Cosmos "Berghaus' Physikalischer Atlas", better known as the pirated version by Traugott Bromme under the title "Atlas zu Alexander von Humboldt's Kosmos" (Stuttgart 1861). In Britain Heinrich Berghaus planned to publish together with Alexander Keith Johnston a "Physical Atlas". But later Johnston published it alone under the title "The Physical Atlas of Natural Phenomena". In Britain its connection to the Cosmos seems not have been recognized.[21]

Illness and death

On February 24, 1857, Humboldt suffered a minor stroke, which passed without perceptible symptoms. It was not until the winter of 1858–1859 that his strength began to decline, and that spring, on May 6, he died peacefully in Berlin at the age of 89. The honours which had been showered on him during life continued after his death. His remains, prior to being interred at the family resting-place at Tegel, were conveyed in state through the streets of Berlin, and received by the prince-regent at the door of the cathedral.

The first centenary of Humboldt's birth was celebrated on September 14, 1869, with great enthusiasm in both the New and Old Worlds. Numerous monuments were constructed in his honour, such as Humboldt Park in Chicago, planned that year and constructed shortly after the Chicago fire. Newly explored regions and species named after Humboldt, as discussed below, also stand as a measure of his wide fame and popularity.

Personal life

Portrait of Humboldt by Julius Schrader, 1859. Metropolitan Museum of Art

Much of Humboldt's private life remains a mystery because he destroyed his private letters. Humboldt made many friends and had a reputation for widespread benevolence. He showed zeal for the improvement of the condition of the miners in Galicia and Franconia, detestation of slavery, and patronage of rising men of science.[22]

On the speculations about his private life and possible homosexuality, in 1908, the sexual researcher Paul Näcke, who worked with outspoken gay activist Magnus Hirschfeld, gathered reminiscences of him from people who said he participated in the homosexual subculture of Berlin.[23] A travelling companion, Francisco José de Caldas, accused him of frequenting houses where 'impure love reigned', of making friends with 'obscene dissolute youths', and giving vent to 'shameful passions of his heart'.[24] Nevertheless, author Robert F. Aldrich concludes hesitantly: "As for so many men of his age, a definite answer is impossible."[25]

Other suspicions arouse because he never married, and, in a letter to Reinhard von Haeften, a soldier, he wrote: "I know that I live only through you, my good precious Reinhard, and that I can only be happy in your presence."[26] There were other two notable occasions when he seems to have been drawn to members of the opposite sex; the first was an adolescent infatuation with Henriette Herz, the beautiful wife of Marcus Herz, his mentor, and the second was a short-lived but intimate relationship with a woman named Pauline Wiesel in Paris in 1808. He was strongly attached to his brother's family.

Four years before his death, he executed a deed of gift transferring the absolute possession of his entire property to an old family servant named Seifert.[27]

Religion

In one occasion, a supposed admirer of Humboldt wrote an article claiming that Humboldt was "a materialist philosopher, or perhaps an atheist."[28] The speculation was based on the argument that Humboldt did not mention God in his work Kosmos, nor in the letters he knew, and that sometimes he spoke unfavourably of hypocritical religious attitudes. Unlike irreligious figures like Robert G. Ingersoll, who went so far as to use Humboldtian science to campaign against religion,[29] Humboldt himself denied imputations of atheism in a letter he wrote to Varnhagen von Ense, to whom he emphasized that he believed the world had indeed been created:

"In the "Westminster Review" a certain Dr. Cross says, the style of Kosmos is lengthened, and very indifferent ; the frequent reflection on sentiment was deemed very superfluous by English savants — such a book did not contain any thing new. Then follows the denunciation of Atheism, although "creation" and the "created world" are never lost sight of in the book. And did I not, only eight months ago, in the French translation, say, in the plainest terms: 'It is this necessity of things, this occult but permanent connection, this periodical return in the progress, development of formation, phenomena, and events which constitute Nature submissive to a controlling power? Physics, as the name itself implies, can only deduce the phenomena of the physical world from the properties of matter; the highest aim of experimental science is therefore to ascend to the existence of the laws, and progressively to generalize the same. Whatever lies beyond is no objection for physical demonstration, it belongs to another order of more elevated speculations."
—Humboldt, (1845)[30]

Early in life, Humboldt had moments of temporary "religious fervour" which were brought up when he contemplated nature. When he grew up, "Humboldt acknowledged the existence of a ruling and regulative force in the world and said it could be called divinity".[31]

In the words of Wayne scholar Adrina Michelle Garbooshian, "although Humboldt emphasizes the basis of morality in the nature of man, he does acknowledge that a belief in God is linked directly to acts of virtue" and therefore "the dignity of man lies at the centre of Humboldt's religious thought."[32] Not only did Humboldt believe in God, but he also believed firmly in the afterlife.[33] This is also reflected in a letter to his friend Charlotte Hildebrand Diede (1769-1846), to whom Humboldt wrote:

"God constantly appoints the course of nature and of circumstances; so that, including his existence in an eternal future, the happiness of the individual does not perish, but on the contrary grows and increases. True peace, true consolation, or rather the feeling that no consolation is required, first arises when we leave all earthly considerations, and contemplate the appearances of Nature and the world as if from an exalted point of view. The Creator might have placed man in life only for His own pleasure: He might have given him up either to the blind changes of universal laws and progressive organization, or to an ideal aim of an ever-present, long-continuing whole, whose limits and true nature he is never in a position to survey. Every one on his entrance into life ought to be happy, happy in a deep and spiritual mind, whose happiness is an inward feeling arising from love and the fulfillment of duty. In this disposition God guides and loves him, and considers him worthy of his protection. In him "in the individual" lies the aim and the whole power of life, and with this aim, the course of nature and events will be brought into harmony. Nowhere is the paternal care of God for the happiness of each so beautifully, so soothingly displayed as in Christianity, in the New Testament. It contains the simplest, but at the same time the most exciting and heart-stirring demonstrations of it."
—Humboldt to Diede; Letter VII, Aug. 20, 1829[34]

He remained distant of organized religion, he did not believe in the Bible as an inerrant document, nor in the divinity of Jesus; yet, Humboldt still held deep respect for the ideal side of religious belief and church life within human communities.[35] He differentiated between "negative" religions, and those "all positive religions [which] consist of three distinct parts — a code of morals which is nearly the same in all of them, and generally very pure; a geological chimera, and a myth or a little historical novel."[36] In Cosmos: Sketch of a Physical Description of the Universe, he wrote about how rich geological descriptions where found in different religious traditions, and showing his attitude toward Christianity, he stated:

"Christianity gradually diffused itself, and, wherever it was adopted as the religion of the state, it not only exercised a beneficial condition on the lower classes by inculcating the social freedom of mankind, but also expanded the views of men in their communion with Nature. The eye no longer rested on the form of the Olympic gods. The Fathers of the Church, in their rhetorically correct and often practically imaginative language, now taught that the Creator showed himself great in inanimate Nature no less than in animated Nature; and in the wild strife of the elements no less than in the still activity of organic development. It was thus the tendency of the Christian mind to prove from the order of the universe and the beauty of Nature the greatness and goodness of the Creator, and this tendency to glorify the Deity in his works gave rise to a taste for natural observation."
—[37]

In addition, Humboldt showed religious tolerance towards Judaism, and he criticized the political Jews Bill, which was an initiative intended to establish legal discrimination against Jews. He called this an "abominable" law, since he hoped to see Jews being treated equally in society.[38]

Publications

Scientific works

Le voyage aux régions equinoxiales du Nouveau Continent, fait en 1799–1804, par Alexandre de Humboldt et Aimé Bonpland (Paris, 1807, etc.), consisted of thirty folio and quarto volumes, including:

Other works

The Nova genera et species plantarum (7 vols. folio, 1815–1825), containing descriptions of above 4500 species of plants collected by Humboldt and Bonpland, was mainly compiled by Carl Sigismund Kunth; J. Oltmanns assisted in preparing the Recueil d'observations astronomiques (1808); Cuvier, Latreille, Valenciennes and Gay-Lussac cooperated in the Recueil d'observations de zoologie et d'anatomie comparée (1805–1833).

Humboldt's Ansichten der Natur (Stuttgart and Tübingen, 1808) went through three editions in his lifetime, and was translated into nearly every European language.

The results of his Asiatic journey were published in Fragments de géologie et de climatologie asiatiques (2 vols. 8vo, 1831), and in Asie centrale (3 vols. 8vo, 1843) an enlargement of the earlier work. The memoirs and papers read by him before scientific societies, or contributed by him to scientific periodicals, are too numerous for specification.

Biographies and studies of his work

A 1992 essay "Journey to the Top of the World" details Humboldt's South American exploration and America's interest in him. The essay is chapter one of David McCullough's book, Brave Companions: Portraits in History (Prentice Hall Press, 1992).

Gerard Helferich's 2004 biography Humboldt's Cosmos: Alexander von Humboldt and the Latin American Journey that Changed the World (Gotham Books, 2004) provides a descriptive account of Humboldt's journey through Latin America, using Humboldt's journals.

Daniel Kehlmann's 2005 novel Die Vermessung der Welt, translated into English by Carol Brown Janeway as Measuring the World in 2006, explores Humboldt's life through a lens of historical fiction, contrasting his character and contributions to science to those of Carl Friedrich Gauss.

Humboldt's effect on American scientists and environmentalists (Clarence King, Jeremiah N. Reynolds, George Wallace Melville, and John Muir) is examined in The Humboldt Current: Nineteenth Century Exploration and the Roots of American Environmentalism, by Aaron Sachs (Viking, 2006).

Honours and namesakes

Humboldt and Bonpland in the Amazon rainforest

Species named after Humboldt

Humboldt described many geographical features and species that were hitherto unknown to Europeans. Species named after him include:

Humboldt and Bonpland at the Chimborazo base

Geographical features named after Humboldt

Features named after him include:

Places named after Humboldt

The following places are named for Humboldt:

Astronomical features

Universities, colleges, and schools

Universities

Schools

Lecture series

Alexander von Humboldt also lends his name to a prominent lecture series in Human geography in the Netherlands (hosted by the Radboud University Nijmegen). It is the Dutch equivalent of the widely known annual Hettner lectures at the University of Heidelberg.

The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation

After his death, Humboldt's friends and colleagues created the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Stiftung in German) to continue his generous support of young scientists. Although the original endowment was lost in the German hyperinflation of the 1920s, and again as a result of World War II, the Foundation has been re-endowed by the German government to award young scientists and distinguished senior scientists from abroad. It plays an important role in attracting foreign researchers to work in Germany and enabling German researchers to work abroad for a period

Dedications

Edgar Allan Poe dedicated his last major work, Eureka: A Prose Poem, to Humboldt. Humboldt's attempt to unify the sciences in his Kosmos was a big inspiration for Poe's project.

Charles Darwin made frequent reference to Humboldt's work in his Voyage of the Beagle, where Darwin described his own scientific exploration of the Americas. In one note, he placed Humboldt first on the "list of American travellers".[42] When this Journal was published, Darwin sent a copy to Humboldt, who responded "You told me in your kind letter that, when you were young, the manner in which I studied and depicted nature in the torrid zones contributed toward exciting in you the ardour and desire to travel in distant lands. Considering the importance of your work, Sir, this may be the greatest success that my humble work could bring."[43] In his autobiography, Darwin recalled reading "with care and profound interest Humboldt's Personal Narrative" and finding it one of the two most influential books on his work, which had "stirred up in me a burning zeal to add even the most humble contribution to the noble structure of Natural Science."[44]

Ship

Alexander von Humboldt is also a German ship named after the scientist originally built in 1906 by the German shipyard AG Weser at Bremen as Reserve Sonderburg. She was operated throughout the North and Baltic Seas until being retired in 1986. Subsequently she was converted into a three masted barque by the German shipyard Motorwerke Bremerhaven and was re-launched in 1988 as Alexander von Humboldt.

Recognitions by contemporaries

Simón Bolívar wrote that "The real discoverer of South America was Humboldt, since his work was more useful for our people than the work of all conquerors."[45] Charles Darwin expressed his debt to Humboldt, and admiration for his work,[46] writing to Joseph Dalton Hooker that Humboldt was the "greatest scientific traveller who ever lived".[47] Wilhelm von Humboldt wrote that "Alexander is destined to combine ideas and follow chains of thoughts which would otherwise have remained unknown for ages. His depth, his sharp mind and his incredible speed are a rare combination." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe observed that "Humboldt showers us with true treasures." Friedrich von Schiller wrote that "Alexander impresses many, particularly when compared to his brother - because he shows off more!" José de la Luz y Caballero wrote that "Columbus gave Europe a New World; Humboldt made it known in its physical, material, intellectual, and moral aspects." Napoléon Bonaparte remarked "You have been studying Botanics? Just like my wife!" Claude Louis Berthollet said "This man is as knowledgeable as a whole academy." Thomas Jefferson remarked "I consider him the most important scientist whom I have met." Emil Du Bois-Reymond wrote that "Every scientist is a descendant of Humboldt. We are all his family." Robert G. Ingersoll wrote that "He was to science what Shakespeare was to the drama."[48] Hermann von Helmholtz wrote that "During the first half of the present century we had an Alexander von Humboldt, who was able to scan the scientific knowledge of his time in its details, and to bring it within one vast generalization. At the present juncture, it is obviously very doubtful whether this task could be accomplished in a similar way, even by a mind with gifts so peculiarly suited for the purpose as Humboldt's was, and if all his time and work were devoted to the purpose."[49]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Nicolaas A. Rupke (2008). "Alexander von Humboldt: A Metabiography". University of Chicago Press. p.138 ISBN 0-226-73149-9
  2. ↑ Love, J.J. (2008). "Magnetic monitoring of Earth and space" (PDF). Physics Today. February: 31–37.
  3. ↑ Thomson, A. (2009), "Von Humboldt and the establishment of geomagnetic observatories", IAEA-INIS
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Walls, L. D. (2009). "Introducing Humboldt’s Cosmos". Minding Nature. August: 3–15.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Hermann Klencke, Gustav Schlesier, Lives of the brothers Humboldt, Alexander and William New York, 1853:13.
  6. ↑ Mark Forsyth. The etymologicon. // Icon Books Ltd. London N79DP, 2011. p. 123
  7. ↑ Humboldt, Alexander von, Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America During the Years 1799-1804, (chapter 25). Henry G. Bohn, London, 1853.
  8. ↑ Brendel, Frederick, Historical Sketch of the Science of Botany in North America from 1635 to 1840, The American Naturalist, 13:12 (Dec. 1879), pp. 754–771, The University of Chicago Press. Accessed 31 July 2012.
  9. ↑ Muratta Bunsen, Eduardo, "El conflicto entre eurocentrismo y empatía en la literatura de viajes de Humboldt." Revista Andina 50 (2010): 247-262 ISSN:0259-9600
  10. ↑ Humboldt, Alexander von (1811). Political Essay on the Kingdom of New Spain (in French). F. Schoell, Paris.
  11. ↑ McCaa, Robert (1997-12-08). "The Peopling of Mexico from Origins to Revolution". The Population History of North America. Richard Steckel and Michael Haines (eds.). Cambridge University Press. Retrieved 2007-11-18.
  12. ↑ Gerard Helferich, Humboldt's Cosmos (New York: Gotham Books, 2005), 25.
  13. ↑ Alexander von Humboldt, Personal Narrative of Travels of the Equinocial Regions of the New Continent during Years 1799–1804 (London, 1814), Vol. 1, pp. 34–35
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 Pratt, Mary Louise (1997). Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation. London: Routledge. ISBN 0415060958.
  15. ↑ David McCullough. Brave Companions. Portraits of History. Simon & Schuster, 1992. p. 3ff. ISBN 0-6717-9276-8.
  16. ↑ Sachs 2007, p.1
  17. ↑ "Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter H" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 7 April 2011.
  18. ↑ Quoted in Dickinson & Howarth 1933, p.145
  19. ↑ Beilage zu No. 102 der (Augsburger) Allgemeinen Zeitung from 12. April 1849
  20. ↑ Margarita Bowen (1981). "Empiricism and Geographical Thought: From Francis Bacon to Alexander von Humboldt". Cambridge Geographical Studies (No.15). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-10559-0.
  21. ↑ all information from Wolf-Dieter Grün: The English editions of the Kosmos. Lecture at Alexander von Humboldt. Science in Britain and Germany during his lifetime. Joint Symposium of the Royal Society and the German Historical Institute, London on 1 October 1983
  22. ↑ Foner, Phillip S. (Fall 1983). "Alexander von Humboldt and Slavery in America". Science and Society 47 (3): 330–42.
  23. ↑ Havelock Henry Ellis (1927). "Sexual Inversion". Studies in the Psychology of Sex 2: 39.
  24. ↑ Colonialism and Homosexuality, by Robert F. Aldrich, Routledge, London 2003, p. 29.
  25. ↑ Aldrich, ''Colonialism and Homosexuality'' pp.28. Books.google.com. Retrieved 2013-12-04.
  26. ↑ Helmut de Terra, The Life and Times of Alexander von Humboldt (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1955), p. 63
  27. ↑ Helferich, Gerard (2004). Humbold't Cosmos. p. 312.
  28. ↑ Humboldt and the New Infidelity, article found in Friedrich Kapp's Letters of Alexander von Humboldt to Varnhagen von Ense. From 1827 to 1858. With extracts from Varnhagen's diaries, and letters of Varnhagen and others to Humboldt (1860).
  29. ↑ Sachs, Aaron. 2007. The Humboldt Current: Nineteenth-Century Exploration and the Roots of American Environmentalism. Penguin. Ch. 3
  30. ↑ Humboldt, Alexander von. 1860. Letters of Alexander von Humboldt to Varnhagen von Ense. Rudd & Carleton. p. 194
  31. ↑ James, Helen Dickson. 1913. Humboldt's ideal of humanity. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, p. 57
  32. ↑ Garbooshian, Adrina Michelle. 2006. The Concept of Human Dignity in the French and American Enlightenments: Religion, Virtue, Liberty. ProQuest, p. 305
  33. ↑ James, Helen Dickson (1913). Humboldt's ideal of humanity. Chapter IV: "The Foundations and Expressions of Humboldt's ideal"; pp. 56-60
  34. ↑ Wilhelm Humboldt (Freiherr von), Charlotte Hildebrand Diede, Catharine M. A. Couper (1849). Letters to a female friend: A complete ed., translated from the 2d German ed, Volume 2. J. Chapman, p. 24-25
  35. ↑ James, 1913; p. 56-58
  36. ↑ Friedrich Kapp's Letters of Alexander von Humboldt to Varnhagen von Ense. From 1827 to 1858. With extracts from Varnhagen's diaries, and letters of Varnhagen and others to Humboldt (1860). Cambridge University Press. pp. 25-26
  37. ↑ Wikisource. Popular Science Monthly Volume 9. "Science and Religion as Allies"
  38. ↑ Sachs, Aaron. 2007. The Humboldt Current: Nineteenth-Century Exploration and the Roots of American Environmentalism. Penguin. (See the section "Notes", 29.
  39. ↑ "Author Query for 'Humb.'". International Plant Names Index.
  40. ↑ Natural Resources Conservation Service. "Salix humboldtiana Willd./ Humboldt's willow". USDA. Retrieved 5 June 2012.
  41. ↑ "Short History — Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin". Hu-berlin.de. Retrieved 2013-10-31.
  42. ↑ Darwin, C. R. 1839. Narrative of the surveying voyages of His Majesty's Ships Adventure and Beagle between the years 1826 and 1836, describing their examination of the southern shores of South America, and the Beagle's circumnavigation of the globe. Journal and remarks. 1832–1836. London: Henry Colburn. p. 110
  43. ↑ Darwin Correspondence Project " Letter 534 — Humboldt, F. W. H. A. von to Darwin, C. R., 18 Sept 1839
  44. ↑ Barlow, Nora ed. 1958. The autobiography of Charles Darwin 1809–1882. With the original omissions restored. Edited and with appendix and notes by his granddaughter Nora Barlow. London: Collins. pp. 67–68
  45. ↑ "Alexander von Humboldt. From the Americas to the Cosmos."
  46. ↑ Darwin Correspondence Project " Letter 9601 — Darwin, C. R. to secretary of New York Liberal Club, [after 13 Aug 1874]
  47. ↑ Darwin Correspondence Project " Letter 13277 — Darwin, C. R. to Hooker, J. D., 6 Aug 1881
  48. ↑ The Writings of Robert G Ingersoll (Dresden Edition) - C P Farrell (1900)
  49. ↑ H. Helmholtz (1869), translated by E. Atkinson, The aim and progress of physical science, in Popular Lectures on Scientific Subjects, 1873

References

Dickinson, Robert Eric; O.J.R. Howarth (1933). The Making of Geography (online Universal Digital Library, facsimile of original ed.). Oxford: The Clarendon Press. OCLC 9640382.
Helferich, Gerard (2004). Humboldt's Cosmos: Alexander von Humboldt and the Latin American journey that changed the way we see the world. New York: Gotham Books. ISBN 978-1-59240-052-2. OCLC 54758735.
Sachs, Aaron (2007). The Humboldt Current: A European explorer and his American disciples. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-921519-5. OCLC 74522263.
Hey'l, Bettina, Das Ganze der Natur und die Differenzierung des Wissens. Alexander von Humboldt als Schriftsteller (Berlin, de Gruyter, 2007) (Quellen und Forschungen zur Literatur- und Kulturgeschichte 47 (281)).
Rupke, Nicolaas A., Alexander von Humboldt. A Metabiography. Corrected edition. (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2008).
 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Humboldt, Friedrich Heinrich Alexander von". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

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