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Darwin Correspondence Project

Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander (Alexander) von Humboldt

1769–1859

Prussian naturalist, geographer, and traveller. Official in the Prussian mining service, 1792–6. Explored northern South America, Cuba, Mexico, and the United States, 1799–1804. Travelled in Siberia in 1829. Foreign member, Royal Society of London, 1815.

Sources

DBE

DSB

NDB.

Bibliography

DBE: Deutsche biographische Enzyklopädie. Edited by Walter Killy et al. 12 vols. in 14. Munich: K. G. Saur. 1995–2000.

DSB: Dictionary of scientific biography. Edited by Charles Coulston Gillispie and Frederic L. Holmes. 18 vols. including index and supplements. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. 1970–90.

NDB: Neue deutsche Biographie. Under the auspices of the Historical Commission of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. 27 vols. (A–Wettiner) to date. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot. 1953–.

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