First Explorers

The geographic heart of North Carolina, Randolph County has been at the crossroads of history since the 17th century, when explorers first arrived along the Great Indian Trading Path. Every variety of

From the preface: "When the first Spanish and French explorers encountered the western Gulf Coast, they were confronted by an immense and continuous wetland zone that ranged from shallow brackish bays

This is an evocative account, first published in 1883, of the final expedition to the East by Isabella Bird (1831–1904), who was one of the most famous Victorian female explorers, and the first woman to be admitted to the Royal Geographical Society. The Golden Chersonese is the ancient name for the Malay Peninsula, as named by the Greek geographer and astronomer Ptolemy. The book is a collection of twenty-three letters written by Bird to her ailing sister, Henny, in Scotland. Henny died as the book was published and Bird dedicates the book of letters to her memory. As well as giving detailed descriptions of her travels and adventures in and around Malaysia, the book also includes fascinating accounts of many aspects of the region, including the people, culture, landscapes and wildlife. It also contains a number of delightful illustrations and a thorough appendix.

From crude woodblock engravings depicting 16th-century explorers' first glimpse of New York Harbor to the latest satellite photographs, this calendar is a unique art portfolio of the capital of the w

"First in a planned Traveling Photographer series, this will delight armchair explorers and animal lovers."—KIRKUS REVIEWSA SMITHSONIAN Notable Book for ChildrenPowerful but shy, the African mountain

Dora is excited for her big birthday fiesta—but first she has an adventure to complete. Little explorers aged 3 to 6 can follow Dora as she finds three clues that lead to her best gift ever!

The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India. The Canary Islands have been known to European countries since the Roman era. In 1402, the kingdom of Castile sent an expeditionary force, led by French explorers Jean de Béthencourt (1362–1425) and Gadifer de la Salle (1340–1415), to conquer the islands. This volume, first published in English in 1872, contains a contemporary account of the conquest written by Pierre Bontier and Jean Le Verrier, both members of the expedition; it contains valuable details of the indigenous inhabitants of the islands.

The Mohawks were the largest group in the Iroquois confederacy of Native American tribes in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Living in what is now upstate New York and along the Canadian border, they held political control over north-eastern America before the colonial period, and were one of the first native American groups to have contact with European explorers. First published in 1938, this work contains a history of the Mohawks and the Iroquois confederacy from the period 1704 to 1807 taken from the archives of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, founded in 1704 and at first active mainly in North America. J. W. Lydekker provides a detailed history of the Mohawks' co-operation and alliance with the British colonists during the wars of the mid-eighteenth century and during the Revolutionary War, seen from the perspective of the missionaries from the Society.

The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India. This volume, first published in 1877, contains four contemporary accounts of the voyages of Sir James Lancaster (c. 1555–1618) between 1591 and 1600 together with the journal of Captain John Knight from his 1606 voyage to discover the 'North-West Passage'. Sir James Lancaster was one of the leading traders and explorers of the Elizabethan era, whose first voyage to India in 1591 was instrumental in establishing the East India Company in 1600.

The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India. This volume, first published in 1880, translates the first detailed description of the geography and indigenous culture of South America, written by Joseph de Acosta (1540–1600) and originally published in Spanish in 1590. Acosta was one of the first explorers to record and analyse the geophysical phenomena of the 'New World' and attempt to explain them scientifically. Volume 1 contains the first four books of Joseph de Acosta's work describing the climate, plants, animals and meteorological phenomena of South America.

The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India. This volume, first published in 1880, translates the first detailed description of the geography and indigenous culture of South America, written by Joseph de Acosta (1540–1600) and published in Spanish in 1590. Acosta was one of the first explorers to record and analyse the geophysical phenomena of the 'New World' and attempt to explain them scientifically. Volume 2 contains Books 5–7 of Acosta's work, describing the life of the indigenous population and including a brief history of the end of the Inca empire.

The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India. This 1881 volume contains accounts by William Baffin (1584–1622) and others of Baffin's voyages exploring the coasts of Greenland and Spitsbergen, and his search for the North-West Passage. Although he did not find a route east, he got considerably further north than previous navigators, and provided much useful information on the conditions and natural resources of the area. His meticulous chart making and record keeping, and his use of lunar observations to calculate longitude, were groundbreaking and remarkably accurate, as later explorers found.

Captured by slavers as a boy, freed by the Royal Navy, and raised at a mission, Samuel Crowther in 1864 became the first African to be ordained as an Anglican bishop. As a priest, he accompanied the Scottish merchant MacGregor Laird on his expedition to West Africa in 1854, and celebrated Sunday services in a variety of bizarre locations and perilous conditions. This 1855 book is Crowther's detailed record of his journey aboard the steamboat Pleiad. Written from the unusual perspective of an African-born, London-educated clergyman, it is a congenial and evocative account of the day-to-day difficulties confronting the explorers, their interactions with native peoples, and encounters with slavery and civil war. Crowther, a keen linguist, went on to publish several books on African languages including Nupe, Igbo and Yoruba. This book includes a substantial appendix comparing the grammar and vocabularies of the languages he encountered.

The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India. Volume 5, published in 1849 and edited by Thomas Rundall, contains a collection of accounts relating to the search for the 'North-West Passage' - the hoped-for route to the Far East and India through the scattered islands and freezing seas to the north of Canada. Narratives of attempts by famous explorers such as Cabot, Frobisher, Hudson and Baffin as well as lesser known figures are accompanied by an editorial introduction and conclusion, and by explanatory notes.

Henri Coudreau (1859–1899) was one of the greatest explorers of the nineteenth century. He was highly regarded in his own time as a thoroughly modern expedition leader, and his reports on the anthropological and geographical features of the region were of great value in the expansion of French colonial power. In this magisterial two-volume work, Coudreau describes the history of French settlement and rule in Guyana, and its people, flora and fauna, drawing particular attention to the natural resources ready to be exploited in the region. Based on four years of observations dating from his arrival in Cayenne in 1881, and drawing on extensive field work, the first volume is an informative survey of French Guyana, enlivened by personal experience and opinion, intended to give politicians in France an up to date account of the state of affairs in the colony.

First published in 1890 in a run of just 200 copies, anthropologist Henry Ling Roth's The Aborigines of Tasmania provides a comprehensive account of native Tasmanians' life and culture. Roth, writing in the wake of the Tasmanian Aborigines' extinction, produces 'an approach to absolute completeness' that relies on the accounts of the explorers, colonisers, and anthropologists who preceded him. His work covers an exhaustive range of detail, from the Tasmanians' mannerisms to their psychology, origin, and language. Compiling his predecessors' observations and arguments, Roth often sets opinions in opposition to highlight the lack of consensus amongst those who encountered the Tasmanians. Roth's book is additionally valuable for the 'vocabularies' included in his appendices. The 1899 edition (225 copies) revises and expands the first, adding photographs to the first edition's illustrations as well as new appendices. It made an innovative and lasting contribution to an established research

At the turn of the nineteenth century, crystallographers, glaciologists, and polar explorers for the first time demonstrated that frozen shapes are not dead but bearers of vital powers. Aware of this

In many ways, Puget Sound looks today as it did in the eighteenth century, when its first explorers probed into the bays and inlets. The Olympics flank the west and the Cascades rise to the east with

As happened in other parts of North America, the first explorers and settlers of British Columbia thought they'd arrived in a place without a history. Independent historian Reimer shows how Euro-Canad

The first landings in the Atlantic World generated striking and terrifying impressions of unknown peoples who were entirely foreign to anything in European explorers’ experience. From the first record

In 1880, the Royal Geographical Society commissioned Sir Clements R. Markham, a noted British geographer and the Society's secretary, to write a history of its formation, and of the many expeditions it had supported since 1830, to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. Published in 1881, The Fifty Years' Work of the Royal Geographical Society consists of twelve chapters. The first five are a condensed history of the original group of geographers who called themselves the Raleigh Club, and the events leading up to the Society's official formation. Chapters 6 and 7 recount the activities of past presidents, secretaries and leading members of the Society, with the rest of the book detailing the fascinating scientific expeditions the Society sponsored financially from the Arctic to Antarctica, the explorers who took part in them, and the various publications the Society published to advance natural science and exploration.

During Mexico's first century of independence, European and American explorers rediscovered its pre-Hispanic past. Finding the jungle-covered ruins of lost cities and artifacts inscribed with unintel

Introduces the history of exploration and focuses on notable explorers and their discoveries, in a book that includes a fictional account of the first astronaut to reach the stars.

For many people, “western art” immediately conjures images by Frederic Remington or Georgia O’Keeffe—but there’s so much more. From early explorers’ first sketches of the Rockies to the modern earth s

The Arrernte people of Central Australia first encountered Europeans in the 1860s as groups of explorers, pastoralists, missionaries, and laborers invaded their land. During that time the Arrernte we

The Arrernte people of Central Australia first encountered Europeans in the 1860s as groups of explorers, pastoralists, missionaries, and laborers invaded their land. During that time the Arrernte we

Although less than one square mile in area, Weehawken's rich history extends more than 400 years to when Dutch explorers first dropped anchor in Weehawken Cove. The town commands a unique location ove

This study examines and explains how British explorers visualized the African interior in the latter part of the nineteenth century, providing the first sustained analysis of the process by which this

The first landings in the Atlantic World generated striking and terrifying impressions of unknown peoples who were entirely foreign to anything in European explorers’ experience. From the first record

Adventurers, explorers, kings, gods, and goddesses come to life in this "useful, entertaining and informative" story of the first great epic (The Washington Post) Composed in Middle Babylonia around 1

In this reconstruction of the history of the Catawba Indians, Charles M. Hudson first considers the "external history" of the Catawba peoples, based on reports by such outsiders as explorers, missiona

"A study of the first encounters between Spanish explorers and the indigenous tribes of the Americas, this work focuses on the life and times of Francisco Pizarro and his quest to locate the legendary

With roots set deep in California history, Napa's story reaches back to the Bear Flag Rebellion and earlier, to the first contact between Spanish explorers and the Wappo Indians. Through the founding

Part of the award winning Great Explorers series this book details the story of the first circumnavigation of the world. Magellan's four-year journey was marked by extremes of brilliance, courage, br

In 1768, Captain James Cook made the most important scientific voyage of the eighteenth century. He was not alone: scores of explorers like Cook, travelling in the name of science, brought new worlds and new peoples within the horizon of European knowledge for the first time. Their discoveries changed the course of science. Old scientific disciplines, such as astronomy and botany, were transformed; new ones, like craniology and comparative anatomy, were brought into being. Scientific disciplines, in turn, pushed literature of the period towards new subjects, forms and styles. Works as diverse as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Wordsworth's Excursion responded to the explorers' and scientists' latest discoveries. This wide-ranging and well-illustrated study shows how literary Romanticism arose partly in response to science's appropriation of explorers' encounters with foreign people and places and how it, in turn, changed the profile of science and exploration.

From the Native Americans who lived in the Chicago area for thousands of years, to the first European explorers Marquette and Jolliet,to the 2005 Chicago White Sox World Series win, parents, te

California's northern Channel Islands have one of the longest and best-preserved archaeological records in the Americas, spanning some 13,000 calendar years. When European explorers first traveled to

California's northern Channel Islands have one of the longest and best-preserved archaeological records in the Americas, spanning some 13,000 calendar years. When European explorers first traveled to

During the early decades of the 19th century, the Southern Plains of the North American continent were only occasionally visited by explorers, trappers, traders, and missionaries. The first trading po

The heavily wooded area of western Hennepin County, known as the "Big Woods" to early explorers, slowly transformed into three trade centers with the first permanent settlers staking their claims to l