Richard Francis Burton
1821–90
Soldier, diplomat, explorer, and writer. Joined the Indian army in 1842. Studied Asiatic languages and culture. Assistant on the survey of Sind, 1844. Adopting an assumed identity, went on pilgrimage to Mecca in 1853. Explored Somalia in 1854. Served in the Crimea in 1855. Participated in the search for the source of the Nile, 1856–9. British consul, Fernando Po, West Africa, 1861–4; Santos, Brazil, 1864–9; Damascus, 1869–71; Trieste, 1872. In later years, in England, devoted himself to literary scholarship.
Source
ODNB.
Bibliography
ODNB: Oxford dictionary of national biography: from the earliest times to the year 2000. (Revised edition.) Edited by H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison. 60 vols. and index. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2004.
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