Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent: During the Years 1799-1804

by Alexander von Humboldt, Aimé Bonpland, Helen Maria Williams (Translator)

Overview

The Prussian naturalist Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) was one of the most famous explorers of his generation. Charles Darwin called him 'the greatest scientific traveller who ever lived'. In 1799, Humboldt and the botanist Aimé Bonpland secured permission from the Spanish crown for a voyage to South America. They left from Madrid and spent five years exploring the continent. Humboldt reported his findings in a total of thirty volumes, published in French over a period of more than twenty years beginning in 1805. This English translation by Helen Maria Williams of one important component of Humboldt's account, the Relation historique du voyage (1814–1825), consists of seven volumes and was published in London between 1814 and 1829. Volume 3 (1818) describes the mountains, flora and fauna of Venezuela, and its indigenous peoples, especially the Chayma, focusing particularly on their language.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781108027984
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	06/02/2011
Series:	Cambridge Library Collection - Latin American Studies
Pages:	874
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 2.10(d)

Table of Contents

Part I; Book IX: 25. Llanos Del Pao, or the eastern part of the Plains (Llanos) of Venezuela. Missions of the Caribbees. Last abode on the coast of Nueva Barcelona, Cumana, and Araya. 26. Explanations; Notes to Book IX; Part II; Sketch of a geognostic view of South America, on the North of the River of the Amazons, and on the East of the Meridian of the Sierra Nevada de Merida; 1. Configuration of the country. Inequalities of the soil. Chains and groups of mountains. Ridges of partition. Plains or llanos; 2. General partition of lands. Direction and inclination of the layers. Relative height of the formations above the level of the ocean; 3. Nature of the rocks. Relative age and superposition of the formations primitive, transition, secondary, tertiary, and volcanic soils; Book X: 27. Passage from the coast of Venezuela to the Havannah. General view of the population of the West Indies, compared with the population of the new continent, with respect to the diversity of races, personal liberty, language, and worship.