Usuari:Mcapdevila/tmpnil

Vegeu també

• Grans llacs d'Àfrica
• Richard Francis Burton
• James Augustus Grant
• Samuel White Baker
• Henry Morton Stanley
• Cascades Ripon
• Cascades Livingstone
• Gondokoro
• Johannes Rebmann
• Johann Ludwig Krapf
• Sámuel Teleki

1847 Johannes Rebmann -Stumbling upon Kilimanjaro and Mt. Kenya

Kibo Summit of Kilimanjaro, the mountain upon which Rebmann beheld snow

In 1848, Rebmann was the first European to see Kilimanjaro. The following year, he saw Mt. Kenya together with his colleague Krapf.

On the October 16, 1847, the two men set out for the mountain of Kasigau. With them came eight tribesmen and a local caravan leader named Bwana Kheri. This expedition was designed with the goal of establishing some of the first mission posts in the region. The journey was successful, and the group of tribesmen and the missionaries returned to Mombasa on October 27.

Sometime during their journey or their stay in the region, Rebmann and Krapf learned of a great mountain referred to as 'Kilimansharo', who peaked the clouds and who was 'capped in silver'. The two men, like most Europeans at the time, were under the impression that snow and ice could not exist so close to the equator, and failed to realize the significance of the mountain being 'topped with silver'.

However, the two missionaries, who had become just as much explorers as they were missionaries, became quite interested in Kilimanjaro, and Krapf sought permission of the Mombasa governor for an expedition to the land of the Jagga, a people now known as the Chaga, who lived and live on the actual slopes of Kilimanjaro. Krapf told the governor that this journey would be work-based. Despite this, Krapf actually did not accompany Rebmann on the journey, so only Bwana Kheri and Rebmann left for Kilimanjaro on April 27, 1848.

Within two weeks, Rebmann and his guide were within sight of the mountain. He noted in his journal the strange white on the summit of Kilimanjaro, and he questioned his guide on what he thought it was. According to Rebmann's log, the guide 'did not know what it was, but supposed it was coldness'. It was then that Rebmann realised that Kilimanjaro, even though it was located in a region that was thought impossible to bear snow or 'coldness', as the guide referred to it, was in fact capped in it. In 1849, these observations were published, but the findings were not truly accepted by most of the scientific community at the time. On November 10, 1848, Rebmann recorded an entry in his log about the mountain:

Mt. Kenya was found by Krapf in the next year, on December 3, 1849. The finding of this mountain was also met with disbelief in Europe, but the impact of the both of these findings was enough to trigger further investigations into other areas of Africa, thereby stimulated a growth of scientific (among other fields) knowledge of the regions, people, history, and geography of the African continent.

Other work in Africa

Rebmann stayed in Africa for almost thirty consecutive years. He kept to a policy that, in order to truly have an impact on the African people, and to complete his task as a missionary, much patience was needed. It appears that this policy was the driving force behind his many years of work on the continent.

As well as visiting Kilimanjaro, Rebmann and Krapf visited other areas of Africa, including the African Great Lakes and Mount Meru. He even became married to a fellow missionary, Anna Maria, née Maisch, with whom he spent fifteen years doing missionary work in Africa before her death in 1866, and had a child with (who died only days after his birth). Also during his time in Africa, after his expeditions to Kilimanjaro and around the Great lakes, he learned to speak several native languages, as well as wrote a dictionary in the Swahili language.

Slug map

The Slug Map, illustrating some of the missionaries findings

During their time in Africa, Krapf and Rebmann worked their way into the interior of the continent. They traveled to several areas in the regions of Central and Eastern Africa, including to what is now known as the African Great Lakes. The finding of one especially large lake is depicted in a map known as the 'Slug' map. It was known by this name because the layout of the water body suggested a shape similar to that of a slug.

On the map, several subtle but interesting things can be discovered, including, in the northeast section of the cartograph, a reference to a stream flowing through Lake Victoria, then known by the missionaries as "the Ukerewa". A note is present describing how the waters of the stream were very sweet, but stained the teeth a sickly yellow. This note is probably the first known text referring to the drinking water, found primarily around and of Mount Meru, which has a high content of fluorineand causes a yellow-brown stain to the incisors which cannot be removed.

Among other things, another piece of writing on the Slug Map -"From where the Magad [soda] is bought" - provides evidence that the soda trade, the soda originating in Lake Natron (obviously not known by that name then), was active at that time in those regions of Africa in which the map depicts. The Slug Map has never been published.

The Slug Map is now in the care of the Royal Geographical Society in London, who were presented it in 1855 by Erhardt, a fellow missionary. The map is described by the society as:

1856, Speke and Burton

In 1856, Speke and Burton went to East Africa to find the Great Lakes, which were rumoured to exist in the centre of the continent. It was hoped that the expedition would locate the source of theNile. The journey was extremely strenuous and both men fell ill from a variety of tropical diseases. Speke suffered severely when he became temporarily deaf after a beetle crawled into his ear and he tried to remove it with a knife. He also later went temporarily blind. After an arduous journey, the two became the first Europeans to reach Lake Tanganyika (although Speke was still blind at this point and could not properly see the lake). They heard of a second lake in the area, but Burton was too sick to make the trip. Speke thus went alone, and found the lake, which he christened Lake Victoria. It was this lake that eventually proved to be the source of the River Nile. However, much of the expedition's survey equipment had been lost at this point and thus vital questions about the height and extent of the lake could not be answered.

Routes taken by the expeditions of Burton and Speke (1857-1858) and Speke and Grant (1863).

Speke returned to England before Burton, on 8 May 1859, and made their trip famous in a speech to the Royal Geographical Society, in which he claimed to have discovered the source of the Nile. When Burton returned on 21 May, he was angered by Speke's precipitous announcements, believing that they violated an agreement that the two men would speak to the society together. A further rift was caused when Speke was chosen to lead a subsequent expedition instead of Burton. The two presented joint papers concerning the expedition to the Royal Geographical Society on 13 June 1859.

1860, Speke i James Augustus Grant

Va tornar a Anglaterra el 1858, i el 1860 es va unir a John Hanning Speke en la memorable expedició que va resoldre la qüestió de les fonts del Nil. Van sortir de l'illa de Zanzíbar a l'octubre de 1860 i van arribar a Gondokoro, el febrer de 1863, on els viatgers van estar de nou en contacte amb el que ells consideren la civilització, al febrer de 1863. Speke era el líder de l'expedició, però Grant va dur a terme diverses investigacions de forma independent i va aconseguir reunir valuoses col·leccions botàniques. Va actuar en tot moment amb absoluta fidelitat envers al seu camarada.

Ripon Falls són unes cascades que es trobaven (fins 1954) a l'extrem nord del Llac Victòria aUganda i van ser considerades les fonts del riu Nil. El 1862 en John Hanning Speke, va ser el primer europeu en seguir el corrent Nil riu avall després d'haver trobat el llac Victòria amb les cascades que ell va considerar que eren les fonts del Nil (el viatge el va iniciar a Tanzània cap a Gondokoro).

Va travessar el cor d'Àfrica en direcció nord fins Egipte encara que no va poder fer-ho seguint tot el curs del Nil per problemes amb les tribus veïnes, això li va comportar discussions amb Burton i possiblement la seva mort el dia abans del cara a cara entre ells organitzat per la Royal Geographic Society.

Va donar el nom a les cascades en honor a George Robinson, 1er Marquès de Ripon.

En 1864 va publicar un llibre sobre el viatge, A Walk across Àfrica ( Un passeig a través d'Àfrica ), en el qual tracta particularment la vida ordinària dels nadius de les regions que van visitar, descrivint els seus costums, les activitats diàries i els sentiments de les persones, també recalca el valor econòmic dels països travessats. En 1864 va ser guardonat amb la medalla de l'Royal Geographical Society, i el 1866 se li va concedir l'Orde del Bany en reconeixement dels seus serveis en l'expedició.

Together with James Augustus Grant, Speke left from Zanzibar in October 1860. When they reached Uganda, Grant travelled north and Speke continued his journey towards the west. Speke reached Lake Victoria on 28 July 1862 and then travelled on the west side around Lake Victoria without actually seeing much of it; but on the north side of the lake, Speke found the Nileflowing out of it and discovered the Ripon Falls. Speke then sailed down the Nile and he was reunited with Grant. Next he travelled to Gondokoro in Southern Sudan, where he met Samuel Baker and his wife, continuing to Khartoum, from which he sent a celebrated telegram to London: "The Nile is settled."

An obelisk dedicated to Speke stands in Kensington Gardens, London

Speke's expedition did not resolve the issue, however. Burton claimed that because Speke had not followed the Nile from the place it flowed out of Lake Victoria to Gondokoro, he could not be sure they were the same river. A debate was planned between the two before the geographical section of the British Association in Bath on 18 September 1864, but Speke died that morning from a self-inflicted gunshot wound while hunting at Neston Park in Wiltshire. An inquest concluded that the death was accidental, a conclusion supported by his only biographer, though the idea of suicide has appealed to some. Bearing in mind, however, that the fatal wound was just below Speke's armpit, suicide seems most unlikely. Speke was buried in Dowlish Wake, Somerset, the ancestral home of the Speke family.

1861, Samuel Baker

In March 1861 he started upon his first tour of exploration in central Africa. This, in his own words, was undertaken "to discover the sources of the river Nile, with the hope of meeting the East African expedition under Captains Speke and Grant somewhere about the Lake Victoria." After a year spent on the Sudan–Ethiopian frontier, during which time he learned Arabic, explored the Atbara river and other Nile tributaries, and proved that the Nile sediment came from Ethiopia, he arrived at Khartoum, leaving that city in December 1862 to follow up the course of the White Nile.

Two months later at Gondokoro he met Speke and Grant, who, after discovering the source of the Nile, were following the river to Egypt. Their success made him fear that there was nothing left for his own expedition to accomplish; but the two explorers gave him information which enabled him, after separating from them, to achieve the discovery of Albert Nyanza (Lake Albert), of whose existence credible assurance had already been given to Speke and Grant. Baker first sighted the lake on March 14, 1864. After some time spent in the exploration of the neighbourhood, Baker demonstrated that the Nile flowed through the Albert Nyanza. He formed an exaggerated idea of the relative importance of the Albert and Victoria lake sources in contributing to the Nile flow rate. Although he believed them to be near equal, Albert Nyanza sources add only ~15% to the Nile flow at this point, the remainder provided primarily by outflow from Lake Victoria. He started upon his return journey, and reached Khartoum, after many checks, in May 1865.

In the following October Baker returned to England with his wife, who had accompanied him throughout the dangerous and difficult journeys in Africa. In recognition of the achievements, the Royal Geographical Society awarded him its gold medal, and a similar distinction was bestowed on him by the Paris Geographical Society. In August 1866 he was knighted. In the same year he published The Albert N'yanza, Great Basin of the Nile, and Explorations of the Nile Sources, and in 1867 The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia, both books quickly turned into several editions. In 1868 he published a popular story called Cast up by the Sea. In 1869 he travelled with the future King Edward VII (who was the Prince of Wales at that time) through Egypt.

Baker never received quite the same level of acclamation granted to other contemporary British explorers of Africa. Queen Victoria, in particular, avoided meeting Baker because of the irregular way in which he acquired Florence, not to mention the fact that during the years of their mutual travels, the couple were not actually married. A court case involving his brother Valentine Baker (following his indecent assault of a woman on a train) also harmed Baker's chances of wider acceptance by the Victorian establishment.

Film

The film Mountains of the Moon (1990) (starring Scottish actor Iain Glen as Speke) related the story of the Burton-Speke controversy, portrayed as having been unjustifiably incited by Speke's publisher to stimulate book sales. Speke's death is presented as a suicide committed as the result of his learning the truth of this betrayal of his trust. It also hints at a sexual intimacy between Burton and Speke and vaguely portrays Speke as a closeted homosexual. This was based on the William Harrison novel Burton and Speke, which explicitly portrays Speke as homosexual and Burton as rampantly heterosexual.

Speke was also portrayed in four of the six episodes of the 1971 BBC television mini-series “Search for the Nile.”