Explorers and Travellers
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Adams - William ….. born 1564 died 14th April 1620 ….. FIRST Englishman to reach Japan which he did as the chief pilot of a Dutch vessel which ran aground on the coast of Kyushu in April 1600. He was befriended by Tokugawa Ieyasu, the country's ruler who persuaded him to stay in Japan to teach mathematics, navigation, how Europeans lived and traded and how they built ships. In return Bill became the ruler's diplomatic agent, was granted an estate and married a Japanese girl. He was known as the Blue-Eyed Samurai and later became a celebrated Samurai warrior. He was the inspiration for the novel Shogun which chartered his life and links with the Anjin San. In Tokyo there is an Anjin-Cho, or Pilot Street which was named after him " who had lived in such favour with two emperors as never was any Christian in those parts of the world". On the 300th anniversary of his death a shrine was erected in Tokyo on the site of the house in which he had lived
Africa Association - The ..... the world's FIRST geographical society was the brainchild of Sir Joseph Banks, a wealthy patron of exploration, a naturalist, part-time explorer and the longest serving president of the Royal Society
Amundsen Roald ..... born 1872 died 1928 ..... Norwegian explorer who was the FIRST person to navigate the Northwest Passage in 1903-06 and to reach the South Pole
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Bartolomeu - Diaz ..... born c 1450 died 1500 ..... Portuguese explorer who was the FIRST European to reach the Cape of Good Hope in 1488 and to establish a route around Africa
Bellinghausen - Fabian Gottlieb Von ..... born 1779 died 1852 ..... Russian Antarctic explorer who was the FIRST to sight and circumnavigate the Antarctic continent 1819-21 although at the time he did not realise what it was
Benjamin of Tudela ..... died 1173 ..... Spanish rabbi who was the FIRST European traveller to describe the Far East
Bering - Vitus ..... born 1681 died 1741 ..... Danish explorer who was the FIRST to sight Alaska
Blashford-Snell - John ..... born 1936 ..... British explorer and soldier who made the FIRST descent and exploration of the Blue Nile in 1964, crossing the Darien Gap between Panama and Columbia for the first time 1971 to 1972 and in 1974-75 made the FIRST complete navigation of the Zaire river in Africa
Bogle - George ..... born 1746 died 1781 ..... Scottish diplomat who was the FIRST Briton to cross the Tsanpu in its upper range. He established commercial links with Tibet and became a personal friend of the Lama
Borough - Steven ..... born 1525 died 1584 ..... English navigator who commanded the Searchthrift in 1553, the FIRST English ship to reach northern Russia via North Cape
Bougainville - Louis Antoine de ..... born 11th November 1729 died 1811 ..... French navigator, mathematician and soldier who made the FIRST French circumnavigation of the world in 1766-69 and the FIRST systematic observations of longitude
Bruce James ..... born 1730 died 1794 ..... Scottish explorer who was the FIRST European to reach the source of the Blue Nile in 1770 and follow the river downstream to Cairo in 1773
Burton – Sir Richard.....born 19th March 1821 .....English explorer and orientalist who was the FIRST Englishman to visit Mecca and the FIRST to translate The Arabian Nights into English
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Cabot - John ..... Giovanni Caboto ..... Italian navigator who became the FIRST European to set foot on the North American mainland since the Vikings - 24th June 1497
Columbus - Christopher ..... on 12th October 1492, with his shore party, became the FIRST modern Europeans to set foot in the Americas after leaving Palos, Spain, on 3rd August
Condamine - Charles-Marie de la ….. geographer and adventurer who was the FIRST Enlightenment scientist to map the Amazon and study its habitat - 1742
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Davis - John ..... born 1550 died 1605 ..... English navigator and explorer who was the FIRST European to see the Falkland Islands in 1592
Drake – Sir Francis ..... born 1540 died 28th January 1595/96?..... English buccaneer and explorer who became the FIRST Englishman to circumnavigate the globe and played an important role in establishing England's naval superiority
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Endeavour - The ….. in October 1769 the crew became the FIRST Europeans to land on New Zealand
Equiano - Olaudah ..... born c1745 died 1797 ..... in 1773 he became the FIRST black person to explore the Arctic when he sailed, on the same ship as Horatio Nelson, on Lord Mulgrave's famous expedition to find a passage to India
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Gama - Vasco da ..... born 1469 died 1525 ..... Portuguese explorer who was the FIRST European to sail to Asia round Africa and on May 22nd 1498 became the FIRST European to reach India by sea
Gauntlett - Rob & James Hooper ..... FIRST explorers to travel from the North to South Poles entirely under natural power. They were named National Geographic 2008 Adventurers of the year. Rob Gauntlett, who died in a climbing accident in 2009 was the youngest Briton to climb Mount Everest
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Indicopleustes - Cosmos ..... merchant, traveller and cosmographer who drew the FIRST known maps of the Christian era
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Jansz - Willem ..... explorer who was the FIRST European known to have set foot in Australia - 1606
Jennings - Edmund ..... a native of North Carolina who left Tennessee in the early 1800s and is said to be the FIRST white man to traverse South Western Missouri
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Laing - Alexander Gordon ..... Scottish explorer who was the FIRST European to reach the African city of Timbuktu
Livingstone - David ..... born 1813 died 1873 ..... Scottish missionary explorer who was the FIRST European to see (and name) the Victoria Falls in Africa
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Mackenzie - Alexander ….. on July 22nd 1793 he became the FIRST European to cross Canada from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific
Magellan -Ferdinand ..... born c1480 died 1521 ..... Portuguese navigator and leader of the FIRST expedition to circumnavigate the globe - see 6th September 1522. He was the FIRST person to visit every line of longitude and led the FIRST Pacific crossing
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Niza - Marcos de ..... FIRST Spaniard to visit Arizona - 1539
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Palmer - Captain Nathaniel ..... FIRST to explore the Antarctic Peninsula in 1820 and which was originally known as Palmer Land
Polo - Marco ….. born 1254 died 1324 ..... Venetian traveller who was the FIRST Westerner to travel to the Far East in the Middle Ages
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Soto – Hernando De ….. born c1496 died 1542 ..... Spanish explorer who was the FIRST European to set eyes on the Mississippi River in 1539
Smyth-Windham - William Russell ….. born c1910 died 1994 ..... as part of the 1936 Everest attempt he achieved a telecommunications FIRST by installing a telephone line up to the North Col so that the expedition leader Hugh Ruttledge could communicate with London and receive monsoon reports
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Tasman Abel Janszoon ..... born 1603 died 1659 ..... Dutch navigator who in 1642, was the FIRST European to see Tasmania which he called Van Diemen's Land in honour of the governor general of the Netherlands Indies and which was subsequently renamed Tasmania in 1856. He also made the FIRST European sightings of New Zealand, Tonga and Fiji. The Tasman Sea, part of the Pacific Ocean between SE Australia and NW New Zealand is also named after him
Thomson - Joseph & James Martin ..... Scotsman and Maltese respectively explorers who were the FIRST Europeans to contact the Kenyan Luo tribe in 1883
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Victoria ..... FIRST ship to sail around the world, it was one of the Spanish squadron of five vessels that sailed from Seville in August 1519 under the Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan. The other four vehicles were lost and the Victoria arrived back in Spain in September 1522 under Cano. Magellan had died the previous year ( see above - Magellan)