Sven Hedin

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Sven Hedin

Sven Anders Hedin KCIE (born February 19, 1865 in Stockholm , † November 26, 1952 ) was a Swedish geographer , topographer , explorer , photographer , travel writer and an illustrator of his own works. In four expeditions to Central Asia he discovered the Transhimalaya (named after him the Heding Mountains ), the sources of the Brahmaputra , Indus and Sutlej rivers , Lake Lop Nor as well as remains of cities, tombs and the Great Wall of China in the deserts of the Tarim Basin . The posthumous publication of his Central Asia atlas marked the end of his life's work .

Overview of life, work and impact

Studies and first trips

Hedin was the son of Stockholm city architect Abraham Ludvig Hedin (1826–1917) and his wife Anna Berlin. At the age of 15 he experienced the triumphant return of the polar explorer Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld in Stockholm after he had traveled the Northeast Passage for the first time . Since then, he has wanted to become an explorer. Studying with the German geographer and China researcher Ferdinand Freiherr von Richthofen awakened a love for Germany in him and strengthened his decision to undertake expeditions to Central Asia in order to erase the last blank spots from the map of Asia. After completing his doctorate, learning numerous languages ​​and dialects and after two trips through Persia, he did not follow Ferdinand von Richthofen's advice to continue his geography studies and to familiarize himself with the methods of geographic research; therefore he later had to leave the evaluation of his expedition results to other scientists.

First three expeditions

In three daring expeditions between 1894 and 1908 through the mountains and desert areas of Central Asia, he mapped and explored the previously unexplored areas of Chinese Turkestan (now Xinjiang) and Tibet . When he returned to Stockholm in 1909, he was received as triumphantly as Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld had once been. As early as 1902 he was raised to the nobility, as the last Swede to this day who was not a member of the royal family. Hedin was considered one of Sweden's most important personalities. As a member of two scientific academies, he had the right to vote in the election of Nobel Prize winners . In 1909 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina , whose Cothenius Medal he received in 1925.

With his expedition records, he laid the foundations for an accurate map of Central Asia. He became known worldwide through scientific documentaries and popular travel books with his own photographs, watercolors and drawings, through adventure reports for young readers and lecture tours abroad.

As a proven expert on Turkestan and Tibet, he gained unhindered access to the monarchs, as well as to the politicians of Europe and Asia and their geographical societies and learned associations. They wanted to acquire his exclusive knowledge of the power vacuum in Central Asia with medals, grand crosses adorned with diamonds, gold medals, honorary doctorates and brilliant receptions as well as with logistical and financial support for his expeditions.

The brilliant receptions that Hedin experienced include:

Political attitude

Hedin was a man of the 19th century who also held on to the ideas and actions of the previous one in the 20th century. This prevented him from perceiving the fundamental social and political changes in the 20th century and from aligning his thoughts and actions with them.

Concerned for the security of Scandinavia, he advocated the construction of the warship Sverige in his capacity as a member of the Swedish Academy of War Studies . In his publications during the First World War , he expressly sided with the German monarchy and its warfare. As a result of this political commitment, he lost his scientific reputation among Germany's war opponents, membership in their geographical societies and learned associations, as well as any support for his planned expeditions.

Sino-Swedish expedition

With financial support from the governments of Sweden and Germany, he led the international and interdisciplinary Sino-Swedish expedition from 1927 to 1935 , in which 37 scientists from six countries took part in the scientific exploration of Mongolia and Sino-Turkestan. Despite the Chinese counter-demonstrations, after months of negotiations in China, Hedin succeeded in turning the expedition into a Chinese expedition through Chinese research assignments and the participation of Chinese scientists, and negotiated a contract that included this expedition, which was in the war zone with their armament and 300 camels an invading army looked like granted freedom of movement; the financing, however, remained the private task of Hedin.

In 1927, Hedin went on his last great adventure with sixty men, 300 camels and forty tons of luggage. On behalf of the German government, disguised as financing by Lufthansa , he was supposed to check whether a flight connection between Germany and China over the vast desert areas was possible. During the current expedition had Hedin because of his failing health, because of the civil war in Chinese Turkestan and because of prolonged captivity very difficult, after the currency devaluation in the Great Depression to obtain the necessary funds for the expedition, the logistics for the supply of the expedition in the war zone and to ensure that the expedition members have access to the research areas contested between warlords . The crossing of the huge Gobi desert and the Taklamakan "deadly desert" demanded everything from humans and animals. But after eight long years, Hedin ultimately won the desert and fulfilled a lifelong dream - he solved the riddle of the migratory lake Lop Nor .

In this house in Stockholm, Norr Mälarstrand 66, Sven Hedin lived with his relatives on the upper three floors from 1935

Evaluation of the Sino-Swedish expedition

After his return, Hedin lived in Stockholm with his siblings in a modern high-rise complex. He lived there until his death.

The archaeological finds sent to Sweden were scientifically evaluated for three years and then returned to China in accordance with the contract. The scientific material collected during the expedition was published in more than 50 volumes by Hedin and the other expedition members from 1937 for worldwide East Asia research. When he finally ran out of money for the printing costs, he pawned his large, valuable library , which filled several rooms, so that more volumes could be published.

In 1935 he made his exclusive knowledge of Central Asia available not only to the Swedish government, but also to the governments in China and Germany in lectures and one-on-one discussions with political representatives Chiang Kai-shek and Adolf Hitler. Hedin's naivete and his illusionary hope that the German Reich would protect Scandinavia from an invasion by the Soviet Union brought him dangerous close to the representatives of National Socialism, who abused him as a writer . This destroyed his reputation and led him into social and scientific isolation.

At the end of the war, troops of the US Army purposefully confiscated the documents for Hedin's planned Central Asia Atlas from the German publisher Justus Perthes in Gotha . The US Army Map Service then asked Hedin for cooperation and financed the printing and publication of his life's work, the Central Asia atlas. Anyone who compares this atlas with Adolf Stieler's Hand Atlas (1891) can see what Hedin had achieved in the years 1893 to 1935. The map sheets were used by the US Army to interpret satellite photos and were used by US Air Force pilots in the Afghan war.

A few weeks before his death, Hedin bequeathed the rights to his books and his estate to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences .

While Sven Hedin research in Germany and Sweden for Hedin's behavior in the era of National Socialism stagnated for decades, the scientific documentation were his expeditions from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (Chinese Academy of Social Sciences) in the Chinese language translated and then in the Chinese research processed and developed. According to the recommendations, the Hedin the Chinese government had given in 1935, roads and railway lines are built on the selected by him distances, dams and canals to irrigate new farms in Tarim and Yanji Basin created and by the Swedish Chinese expedition found Deposits of ores, iron, manganese, oil, coal and gold have been opened up for mining.

The discoveries of the Sino-Swedish expedition also included many previously unknown Asian plants and animals, as well as fossils of dinosaurs and extinct horned animals. They were all named after Hedin; their names were given the addition hedini . But one thing remained hidden from the Chinese during their research until the turn of the millennium: Sven Hedin discovered ruins of signal towers in the Lop Nor desert in 1933 and 1934 , which prove that the Great Wall of China once reached as far as Xinjiang .

Life

Formative childhood experience

At the age of 15, Hedin experienced the triumphant return of the Swedish polar explorer Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld after having traveled the Northeast Passage for the first time .

Stockholm on April 24, 1880

He describes it as follows in his book My Life as an Explorer :

“On April 24, 1880, the Vega entered Stockholm's Ström. The whole city was illuminated. The houses around the harbor were blazing in the glow of innumerable lamps and torches. The constellation of Vega glowed in gas flames on the castle . In the middle of this sea of ​​lights the famous ship glided into the harbor. I stood with my parents and siblings on the mountains of Södermalm , from where we had a commanding view. I was gripped by the greatest tension. I will think back to this day all my life, it became decisive for my future path. Thunderous cheers boomed from the quays, streets, windows and roofs. 'That's how I want to come home one day,' I thought. "

First trip to Persia

Sven Hedin (around 1900)

In May 1885 Hedin graduated from the Beskow School (Beskowska skolan) in Stockholm . He then accepted the offer to accompany Erhard Sandgren as a tutor to Baku , where his father worked as an engineer on Robert Nobel's oil field . Then in the summer of 1885 he took a month of topography course for general staff officers and a few weeks of portrait drawing lessons , which was his only training in topography and drawing .

On August 15, 1885, he traveled to Baku with Erhard Sandgren. He taught him there for seven months, during which time he began to learn Latin , French , German , Persian , Russian , English and Tatar . Later he learned some Persian dialects as well as Turkish , Kyrgyz , Mongolian , Tibetan and some Chinese .

On April 6, 1886, Hedin left Baku and took a paddle steamer across the Caspian Sea and rode through the Elbors Mountains to Tehran , Isfahan , Shiraz and the port city of Bushehr . From there he took a ship up the Tigris to Baghdad , returned to Tehran via Kermanshah and traveled through the Caucasus across the Black Sea to Constantinople and from there home to Sweden , where he arrived on September 18, 1886. About this trip he published the book Through Persia, Mesopotamia and Caucasia in 1887 .

Education

Hedin studied geology , mineralogy , zoology and Latin with the geologist Waldemar Christofer Brøgger in Stockholm and Uppsala from 1886 to 1888 . In December 1888 he became a philosophy candidate. From October 1889 to March 1890 he studied in Berlin with Ferdinand Freiherr von Richthofen .

Second trip to Persia

On April 12, 1890, as an interpreter and vice-consul, he accompanied a Swedish embassy to Persia , which was to present the Shah of Persia with the insignia of the Order of the Seraphins . In Tehran in 1890 he attended the audience of Shah Naser od-Din together with the Swedish embassy . He talked to him and accompanied him to the Elburs Mountains . On July 11th, he and three companions climbed the Damavand (5604 m) and collected primary material for his dissertation there. From September he traveled on the Silk Road via Mashhad , Ashgabat , Bukhara , Samarkand , Tashkent and Kashgar to the western edge of the Taklamakan desert . On the way home he visited the grave of the Russian Asian researcher Nikolai Michailowitsch Prschewalski (= Przewalski) in Karakol on the shores of Lake Issykköl . On March 29, 1891, he returned to Stockholm. About this trip, Hedin published the books King Oscar's Legation to the Shah of Persia in 1890 and Through Khorasan and Turkestan.

Doctorate and career decision

Sven Hedin's role model Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld

On April 27, 1892, Hedin went to Berlin to continue his studies with Ferdinand Freiherr von Richthofen. At the beginning of July he traveled on to Halle , heard lectures from Alfred Kirchhoff and in the same month received his doctorate in philosophy with the 28-page dissertation Der Demawend according to his own observation. This dissertation is a short version of a section from his book King Oscar's Legation to the Shah of Persia in 1890. Eric Wennerholm writes: “I cannot come to any other conclusion (than) that Sven received the Dr. phil. at the age of 27 after a total of only eight months of study and one and a half days of collecting primary material on the snow-covered summit of Demavend. "

Ferdinand Freiherr von Richthofen had suggested to Hedin not only to complete a cursory course, but to familiarize himself thoroughly with all branches of geographical science and the methods of research so that he could later work as an explorer . Hedin renounced it and explained it like this in old age: “I was not up to this demand. I had set out on the wild ways of Asia too early; I had felt too much of the splendor and splendor of the Orient, of the silence of the deserts and the loneliness of the long roads. I couldn't get used to the idea of ​​going back to school for a long time. "

With that, Hedin had decided to become an explorer . He was attracted to the last blank spots on the map of Asia and to map these areas unknown in Europe. As a voyager of discovery, Hedin became important for the Asian and European great powers, who courted him and invited him to numerous lectures in order to get topographical, economic and strategic information about Inner Asia from him, which they considered to be their sphere of influence. When the time of explorers around 1920 was over, Hedin was content with organizing the Sino-Swedish expedition for trained explorers .

First expedition

Sven Hedin's research trips 1893-1897

Between 1893 and 1897 Hedin explored the high mountains of the Pamir , toured the Tarim Basin in Xinjiang with the Taklamakan sand desert , Lake Karakoshun and Lake Bosten, and finally explored northern Tibet . He covered 26,000 km and mapped 10,498 km on 552 sheets. About 3,500 km led through a previously unknown area.

He set out on this expedition in Stockholm on October 16, 1893, traveling to the Pamir via Saint Petersburg and Tashkent . Several attempts to climb the 7,546 meter high Muztagata , the father of the icebergs , in the Pamir Mountains in 1894 failed. He stayed in Kashgar until April 1895 and then set out on April 10th with four local escorts from the village of Merket to cross the Taklamakan desert via Tusluk to the Khotan-darja river. Since the drinking water supply was insufficient, seven camels and two of his companions (according to Sven Hedin's dramatized and probably unhistorical account) died of thirst. Bruno Baumann traveled this route with a camel caravan in April 2000 and researched that at least one of the two companions who died of thirst, according to Hedin's description, had survived the expedition and that it was not possible for a camel caravan to take enough drinking water for camels and travelers on this route in spring.

Hedin's expeditions from 1886 to 1935. The travel routes of Hedin's employees during the Sino-Swedish expedition 1927–1935 are not shown.

According to other sources, at the start of the expedition, Hedin neglected to fully replenish the drinking water supplies of his caravan and set off into the desert with only half the amount of water possible . When he saw the mistake, it was too late to return. Hedin is said to have abandoned the caravan - obsessed with his thirst for research - and moved on alone with his servant on horseback. When the companion also collapsed due to lack of water, Hedin left him behind and reached a watering place with the last of his strength . From there, however, Hedin returned to his servant with water and saved him. Nevertheless, his inconsiderate behavior earned him massive criticism.

After a stopover in Kashgar, Hedin visited the 1500 year old ruined cities of Dandan Oilik (= Dandan Öiliq) and Kara Dung in January 1896 , which are northeast of Hotan in the Taklamakan desert. At the beginning of March he discovered the Bosten Lake (= Bagrasch-köl = Bagrax-hu), one of the largest inland lakes in Central Asia. He reported that the Bosten Lake is fed by a single enormous tributary, the Hädik-gol (= Chaidu-gol = ( Kaidu-he )). He mapped Karakoshun Lake and returned to Khotan on May 27th. On June 29th, he left with his caravan to cross northern Tibet and China to Beijing , where he arrived on March 2nd, 1897. He returned to Stockholm via Mongolia and Russia.

Second expedition

Sven Hedin (right) in Central Asia

From 1899 to 1902 another expedition followed in Central Asia through the Tarim Basin , through Tibet and Kashmir to Calcutta . Hedin sailed the rivers Jarkent-darja , Tarim and Konche-darja and found the dry river bed of the Kum-darja and the dried up lake basin of the Lop Nor . In the vicinity of Lop Nor, he discovered the ruins of the 340 × 310 m large, walled-off former royal city and later Chinese garrison city of Loulan with the brick building of the Chinese military commander, a stupa and 19 houses made of poplar wood. He also found a wooden wheel that came from a horse-drawn cart ( called arabas ), as well as several hundred written documents made of wood, paper and silk in the Kharoshthi script . They shed light on the history of the city of Loulan, which was located on Lake Lop Nor and was abandoned by the residents around 330 because the lake dried up and there was a lack of drinking water.

During his trips to Tibet in 1900 and 1901, Hedin tried in vain to get to the city of Lhasa , which was forbidden to Europeans . He came to India via Leh in what is now Ladakh and via Kashmir, where he traveled to Calcutta via Lahore , Delhi , Agra , Lucknow and Benares to visit George Nathaniel Curzon , the English viceroy of India.

During this expedition, 1149 map sheets were created on which Hedin depicted newly discovered land. In 1903 he was the first to describe the so-called yardangs in the Lop Nor desert .

Third expedition

Map of Sven Hedin's journey between 1906 and 1908

1905-1908 he explored the deserts of Persia , the western highlands of Tibet and the Transhimalaya , which was then temporarily called the Hedin Mountains. He visited the 9th Panchen Lama in the monastery town of Taschi Lhumpo (= Taschilunpo or Zhaxilhünbo ) in Samzhubzê . Hedin was the first European to get to the Kailash region, the sacred Lake Manasarovar and the sacred Mount Kailash , the center of the world according to Buddhist and Hindu mythology. The most important goal of the expedition was the search for the sources of the Indus and the Brahmaputra , which Hedin also found both. From India he returned to Stockholm by ship via Japan .

From this expedition he brought back a collection of rock samples as geological material, which is stored and analyzed in the magazine of the Bavarian State Collection for Paleontology and Geology at Munich University. These sedimentary rocks such as breccias , conglomerates , limestone and slate as well as volcanic rocks and granites , document the geological diversity of the areas that Hedin visited on this expedition.

Hedin and the monarchies in Sweden and Germany

Hedin was shaped by monarchy. From 1905 he took a stand against the growing democracy in his Swedish homeland. He warned of the dangers he believed Russia posed and called for military armament. August Strindberg was one of his opponents on these issues. In 1912 Hedin was publicly committed to the Swedish Armored Cruiser Association. With donations from the population, the warship Sverige was then built.

“Hedin had never come into contact with the new Sweden: emigration, the advance of the labor movement and the trade unions, increasing industrialization and the popular revival movement were alien to him, and he was in favor of the demand for universal suffrage and, above all, for democracy in the Reich government no understanding [...] Hedin was a royalist through and through, was an anti-parliamentarian, nationalist, militarist, because he believed that only a country that was willing to defend itself to the last drop of blood was worth its freedom. "

- Eric Wennerholm

He developed a special affinity for the Germany of the Empire , which he had got to know while studying. This was evident in his admiration for the German Emperor Wilhelm II , whom he also visited in his exile in the Netherlands. Hedin felt drawn to the leading figures of his time and mystified them, often without questioning their actions, because he assumed that their integrity was guaranteed by their office. He was also loyal to Mao Tse-tung and Adolf Hitler . Throughout his life he kept a romanticized image of Germany in which Germany played the role of a world power whose task it was also to protect Sweden and Norway from attacks by Russia.

He saw the First World War as a battle of the Teutons (especially against Russia) and took hold in books such as Ein Volk in Waffen. Dedicated to the German soldiers according to the party. As a result, he lost his friends in France and England and was expelled from the British Royal Geographical Society .

The German defeat in World War I and the associated loss of international importance for Germany hit him deeply. That Sweden in 1920, after the failure of the Kapp Putsch , Wolfgang Kapp recorded as a political refugee, should be primarily attributable to his work.

Drive through Mongolia

In 1923 Hedin came to Beijing via the USA , where he visited the Grand Canyon , and via Japan . Because of the unrest in China , he had to give up an expedition to Xinjiang . Instead, he traveled together with the local merchant Duke Frans August Larson (known as The Duke of Mongolia ) in a Dodge car from Beijing through Mongolia via Ulan Bator to Verkhneudinsk and from there on the Trans-Siberian Railway to Moscow .

Fourth expedition

Hedin led the international Sino-Swedish expedition from 1927 to 1935, which investigated the meteorological, topographical and prehistoric conditions in Mongolia , the Gobi and Xinjiang .

Hedin spoke of the wandering university , in which the participating scientists worked almost independently, while Hedin negotiated like a manager on site with the authorities, made decisions, organized everything necessary, raised money and recorded the routes covered. He gave archaeologists, astronomers, botanists, geographers, geologists, meteorologists and zoologists from Sweden, Germany and China the opportunity to take part in the expedition and conduct research in their specialist areas.

Envelope of a letter from Sven Hedin to his sister Alma with Chinese postage stamps that were issued on the occasion of the Sino-Swedish expedition

In Nanjing he met Chiang Kai-shek , who then became the expedition's sponsor. The Sino-Swedish expedition was honored with a series of Chinese stamps ( Michel catalog Central and East Asia: China No. 246–249) with an edition of 25,000. The four stamps show camels at a camp with the pennant of the expedition and carry the Chinese lettering Postal Administration of the flourishing Middle Kingdom and in Latin underneath: Scientific expedition to the northwestern province of China 1927–1933 . The painting Nomads in the desert in the Beijing Palace Museum served as a template for the stamps . Of the 25,000 sets, 4,000 sets went to counter sales and 21,500 sets came into the possession of the expedition. Hedin used it to fund the expedition and sold it at $ 5 a stamp.

The first part of the expedition led in the years 1927 to 1932 from Beijing via Baotou to Mongolia, into the Gobi desert and through Xinjiang to Urumqi and the northern and eastern areas of the Tarim Basin . The expedition brought a wealth of scientific results that are published up to the present day. For China, for example, the discovery of certain deposits of ores, iron, manganese, oil, coal and gold was of great economic importance. In recognition of his achievements, the Society for Geography in Berlin presented him with the Ferdinand von Richthofen Medal in 1933 ; the same honor was given to Erich von Drygalski for his Gauss expedition to Antarctica and Alfred Philippson for his research on the Aegean Sea.

From late 1933 to 1934, Hedin carried out a Chinese expedition in Nanjing on behalf of the Kuomintang government under Chiang Kai-shek to examine options for irrigation measures and to draw up plans and maps for the construction of two motorways along the Silk Road from Beijing to Xinjiang . According to his plans, large irrigation systems were built, settlements were built and motorways were built on the Silk Road from Beijing to Kashgar , which allow the Tarim Basin to be bypassed completely.

A topic of the geography of Central Asia that Hedin dealt with particularly intensively for decades was what he called the “wandering lake” Lop Nor . In May 1934 he began his river expedition to this lake. For two months he drove in the boat on the Konch-darja and the Kum-Darja to the Lop Nor, which had been filled with water since 1921. After the lake had dried up due to irrigation measures since 1971, the above-mentioned transport links made it possible for the People's Republic of China to set up the Chinese nuclear weapons test site Lop Nor in Lop Nor .

For the return trip, Hedin chose the southern route of the Silk Road via Hotan (= Chotan = Khotan) to Xi'an , where the expedition arrived on February 7, 1935. He went on to Beijing to see President Lin Sen and to Nanjing to see Chiang Kai-shek. He celebrated his 70th birthday on February 19, 1935 in the presence of 250 members of the Kuomintang government, to whom he shared everything there was to know about the Sino-Swedish expedition . On that day he was awarded the brilliant jade order 2nd class by the Chinese government .

At the end of the expedition, Hedin was in a difficult financial situation. He had left considerable debts to the German-Asian Bank in Beijing. He paid them off with the fees he received for his books and lectures. In the months after his return he gave 111 lectures in 91 German cities, as well as 19 lectures in neighboring countries. To do this, he covered a distance the length of the equator in 5 months , 23,000 kilometers by train and 17,000 kilometers by car. Before giving his lecture on April 14, 1935 in Berlin , he met Adolf Hitler.

Hedin and the time of National Socialism

Hedin repeatedly met Adolf Hitler and other leading National Socialists, with whom he was also in regular correspondence. The politely worded correspondence usually consisted of appointments, birthday wishes, planned or completed publications by Hedin, as well as his requests for pardons for those sentenced to death or for exemption, relief, release and departure of internees in prisons or concentration camps. In correspondence with Joseph Goebbels and Hans Dräger, Hedin achieved the printing of the Moravian slogans year after year .

The National Socialists tried to bind Hedin to themselves with honors. They gave him the task of giving the speech sport as an educator at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin's Olympic Stadium . They made him an honorary member of the German-Swedish Association Berlin EV. In 1938 they presented him with the plaque of honor of the city of Berlin and awarded him the Grand Cross of the German Eagle Order on his 75th birthday on February 19, 1940 ; shortly before they had awarded it to Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh . At the end of 1942/1943 (at Hedin's request) they released the Oslo professor of philology and university rector Didrik Arup Seip from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in order to obtain Hedin's consent to further honors during the 470th anniversary of the University of Munich. On January 15, 1943, Hedin received the gold medal of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences . On January 16, 1943, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Natural Sciences at the University of Munich . On the same day, in his presence, the National Socialists founded the Sven Hedin Institute for Inner Asia Research , located in Mittersill Castle , which was supposed to serve the long-term development of the scientific legacy of the Asian researchers Hedin and Wilhelm Filchner . Instead, it was abused by Heinrich Himmler as an institute of the Research Foundation German Ahnenerbe eV .

Hedin campaigned for National Socialism in the media , for example at the 1st meeting of the pro-Nazi Reich Association Sweden-Germany , of which he was a member, on March 28, 1939 in Stockholm. He made the main speech at this public meeting. In it he sharply attacked the "defamation of the left Swedish press against Hitler" and described it as "tactlessness towards a large neighbor". Even after the collapse of the Third Reich, he did not regret his collaboration with the National Socialists; because this cooperation made it possible for him to save numerous victims of National Socialism from executions or death in extermination camps.

Hedin also expressed his admiration for the Third Reich and its leaders in a necrology that he wrote at the request of the liberal daily Dagens Nyheter , the largest daily newspaper in Sweden. He concluded with the following sentences:

“Today I keep a deep and indelible memory of Adolf Hitler and consider him to be one of the greatest people that world history has possessed. Now he's dead. But his work will live on. He turned Germany into a world power. Now this Germany stands on the brink of an abyss, as her adversaries could not endure her growing strength and power. But a people of eighty million who stood for six years against all the world except Japan can never be destroyed. The memory of the great Führer will live on in the German people for thousands of years. (Dagens Nyheter, May 2, 1945). "

Hedin's criticism of National Socialism

“Much in the early days of National Socialist rule met with approval. However, he did not shy away from criticizing where it appeared to be necessary, especially on the question of the persecution of the Jews, the fight against the churches and the suppression of free science. "

- Johannes Paul 1954 about Sven Hedin

In 1937, Hedin refused to publish his book Deutschland und der Weltfrieden in Deutschland because the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda insisted on deleting passages critical of Nazi Germany. In the letter from Hedin to State Secretary Walther Funk of April 16, 1937, it becomes clear what he criticized about National Socialism at the time before the establishment of the extermination camps:

“When we first talked about my plan to write a book, I explained that I just wanted to write objectively, scientifically, possibly critically, according to my conscience, and you found this perfectly right and natural. Now I have also emphasized in a very friendly and mild manner that the removal of the important Jewish professors who had rendered great service to mankind was harmful to Germany and that it has created many agitators abroad against Germany. The position I took here was therefore only in Germany's interest.

The fact that I am afraid that the upbringing of the German youth, which I praised and admired everywhere else, will not come into contact with the questions of religion and eternity, is also out of love and sympathy for the German people, and as a Christian I see them as one Duty to say this openly, convinced that the people of Luther, who are thoroughly religious, will understand me.

Until now I have never surrendered to my conscience and I will not do so this time either. Therefore nothing is deleted. "

On the other hand, Hedin presented in this book (apart from excesses) the anti-Jewish measures (against, as he wrote, “Jewish power and destructiveness”) as understandable steps in the sense of an allegedly necessary self-defense. Jews are the misfortune for the acceptance of the Versailles Treaty over Germany, as well as responsible for the decay of culture and customs in Germany through their influence in the press or art.

Hedin then published the book in Sweden.

Working for the release of deported Jews

After he refused to remove his criticism of National Socialism from his book Deutschland und der Weltfrieden , the National Socialists withdrew Hedin's Jewish friend Alfred Philippson and his family from their passports in 1938 in order to prevent them from leaving for American exile and as a bargaining chip to keep opposite in Germany. In his book Fifty Years of Germany , Hedin expressed himself more benevolently towards the National Socialists, submitted to the censorship of the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda against his conscience and published the book in Germany.

On June 8, 1942, the National Socialists increased the pressure on Hedin by deporting Alfred Philippson and his family to the Theresienstadt concentration camp . They achieved this because Hedin wrote the book America in the Struggle of the Continents Against His Conscience in 1942 in cooperation with the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda and other government agencies and published it in Germany. In return, the National Socialists classified Alfred Philippson as "A-prominent" and granted his family relief from prison so that they could ultimately survive.

Hedin was in correspondence with Alfred Philippson for decades and regularly sent him food parcels to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. On May 29, 1946, Alfred Philippson wrote to him (literal quote, abbreviated):

“My dear Hedin! The opening of the letter post abroad gives me the opportunity to write to you ... We often think with heartfelt gratitude of our lifesaver, to whom it is solely to be attributed that we survived the terrible time of three years of confinement and hunger in the Theresienstadt concentration camp alive, in mine Age a real miracle. You know that we few survivors were finally liberated a few days before our impending gas death . We, my wife, daughter and I will be on 9/10. July 1945 was brought back here in a bus from the city of Bonn to our hometown, which was almost half destroyed ... "

Sven Hedin replied on June 19, 1946 (literal quote, abbreviated):

“… It was too good to learn that our efforts had not been in vain. In those difficult years we had over a hundred similar, unfortunate people dragged to Poland to rescue, but in most cases we did not succeed. We were able to help some Norwegians. My home in Stockholm was turned into a kind of information and assistance office and I had excellent help from Dr. Paul Grassmann, press attaché at the German legation in Stockholm. He too did not spare any effort to be active in humanitarian work. But in almost no case has it been as happy as your, dear old friend! And how nice that you are back in Bonn. ... "

The names and fates of the more than hundred deported Jews, for whose release Hedin campaigned, have not yet been researched. The names and fates of the Norwegians are known.

According to a study by the historian Sarah Danielsson, however, Hedin had far more precise knowledge of the Nazis' deportation plans for Jews than he had admitted. He also actively supported these plans and presented Hitler's Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop with a specially prepared deportation plan.

Working for the release of deported Norwegians

Hedin campaigned for the Norwegian poet Arnulf Øverland and for the Oslo philology professor and university director Didrik Arup Seip , who were in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp . He obtained the release of Didrik Arup Seip, but his efforts to get the release of Arnulf Øverland failed; Arnulf Øverland nevertheless survived the concentration camp.

Commitment to pardoning those sentenced to death

After the third senate of the Reich Court Martial in Berlin the ten Norwegians Sigurd Jakobsen, Gunnar Hellesen, Helge Børseth, Siegmund Brommeland, Peter Andree Hjelmervik, Siegmund Rasmussen, Gunnar Carlsen, Knud Gjerstad, Christian Oftedahl and Frithiof Lund on February 24, 1941 for alleged espionage Had sentenced to death, Hedin successfully campaigned for Adolf Hitler's pardon through Colonel General Nikolaus von Falkenhorst . Adolf Hitler replaced the death penalty with ten years of forced labor on June 17, 1941. The Norwegians Carl W. Mueller, Knud Naerum, Peder Fagerland, Ottar Ryan, Tor Gerrard Rydland, Hans Bernhard Risanger and Arne Sørvag, who had been sentenced to forced labor on the same charge, received reduced sentences from Adolf Hitler on June 17, 1941 at Hedin's request. However, Hans Bernhard Risanger died in prison a few days before his release.

When Nikolaus von Falkenhorst was sentenced to death by shooting by the English military tribunal on August 2, 1946 as the person responsible for the shooting of members of British commandos, Hedin obtained his pardon with the information that Nikolaus von Falkenhorst had also wanted the pardon of the ten Norwegians sentenced to death. On December 4, 1946, the English military tribunal replaced the death penalty with 20 years imprisonment. Nikolaus von Falkenhorst was finally released early on July 13, 1953 from the Werl war crimes prison.

Last years

Gravestone on the Adolf Fredriks kyrkogård

Hedin had lived in Stockholm since 1935, in an elegant residential area - a modern high-rise complex - in the Norr Mälarstrand 66 house. There he lived with his siblings on the top three floors; From the balcony he had a wide view over the Riddarfjärden stream and Lake Mälaren to the island of Långholmen . In the entrance area of ​​the stairwell there are stucco work with a map relief of Hedin's research area Central Asia and with a relief of the Lama Temple, a copy of which he brought to Chicago for the 1933 World's Fair .

On October 29, 1952, he bequeathed the rights to his books and his extensive estate in his will to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences ; the Sven Hedin Foundation ( Sven Hedins Stiftelse ), which was established soon after, owns all property rights.

He died on November 26th. The funeral took place on December 1st. Representatives of the Swedish royal family, the Swedish government, the Swedish Academy and the Diplomatic Corps attended the celebration.

Sven Hedin's tombstone is in Adolf Fredriks Kyrkogård cemetery in Stockholm.

Honors

Awards during his lifetime

In 1902 Hedin was ennobled by King Oskar II as the last Swede ever because of his services . Oskar II suggested that the name Hedin be preceded by one of the two nobility predicates in use in Sweden af or von ; but Hedin renounced it in his correspondence with the king. The renunciation of the title of nobility was common in Sweden for many noble families. The coat of arms of Sven Hedin is located together with the coats of arms of the approximately two thousand noble families on one wall of the large hall in Riddarhuset , the meeting house of the Swedish nobility in Stockholm's old town Gamla Stan .

Hedin was in the 1905 Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences was added and in 1909 in the Swedish Royal Academy of War Sciences , 1910 in the Physiographic Royal Society in Lund and in 1922 the Royal Society of Sciences in Uppsala selected. From 1913 to 1952 he was the sixth member of the Swedish Academy elected from 18 chairs . This gave him the right to vote in the election of the Nobel Prize for Literature .

He was an honorary member of numerous Swedish and foreign scientific societies and institutions, which awarded him around 40 gold medals; 27 of these medals are exhibited in a showcase in the Kungliga Myntkabinettet in Stockholm .

He was awarded a Dr. phil. hc from the Universities of Oxford (1909), Cambridge (1909), Heidelberg (1928), Uppsala (1935), Munich (1943) and the Handelshochschule Berlin (1931), as Dr. jur. hc from the University of Breslau (1915), when Dr. med. hc from the University of Rostock (1919), and was also an honorary citizen of the TH Karlsruhe .

Numerous countries awarded him medals ; Among other things, he was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire on November 9, 1909 by King Edward VII . As a foreigner, he was not authorized to use the associated title Sir , but he could add the name KCIE after his last name .

Posthumous honors

Epitaph for Sven Hedin in the Adolf Fredriks kyrka

The Sven Hedin Epitaph by Liss Eriksson , built in 1959, is in the Adolf Friedrich Church in Stockholm . It shows Asia on the globe and it is crowned by a camel. In Swedish it bears the inscription: Asia's unknown expanses were his world - Sweden remained his home.

There is a permanent exhibition with finds by Hedin in the Etnografiska Museet in Stockholm.

The following were named after Sven Hedin:

The Westfalia company also named a mobile home after him.

Sven Hedin Research

Sources for Sven Hedin Research

An overview of the extensive sources of Sven Hedin's research shows that it is currently difficult to find an appropriate assessment of Hedin's personality and work. The majority of the sources have not yet been scientifically evaluated. Even the DFG project Sven Hedin and German Geography had to limit itself to a narrow selection and to the random checking of sources.

The sources for the Sven Hedin research are contained in extensive archive materials (primary literature, correspondence, newspaper reports, necrologists and secondary literature).

  • Sven Hedin's own publications comprise around 30,000 pages.
  • There are around 2500 drawings and watercolors, films and many photographs.
  • There are also 25 volumes with records of the trips and expeditions and 145 volumes of the regularly kept diaries 1930–1952 with a total of 8267 pages.
  • The extensive holdings of the Sven Hedin Foundation (Sven Hedins Stiftelse), which manages Hedin's estate, are located in the Etnografiska museet or in the Riksarkivet in Stockholm.
  • Sven Hedin's correspondence is in the archives of the Foreign Office in Bonn, in the Federal Archives in Koblenz, in the Institut für Länderkunde Leipzig and above all in the Etnografiska museet and in the Riksarkivet in Stockholm. Most of the letter estate is housed in the Riksarkivet and is open to research and the public. This inventory comprises around 50,000 letters sorted alphabetically by country and sender. Up to 30,000 more letters are still archived in disorder.
  • Extensive correspondence with Sven Hedin and his wife Alma as well as other publishing documents on Hedin can be found in holdings 21083 FA Brockhaus, Leipzig, in the Saxon State Archives, Leipzig State Archives.
  • The scientific estate and a collection of newspaper articles about Hedin, sorted by years (1895–1952) and bound in 60 volumes, are located in the Etnografiska museet in Stockholm.
  • The finds from Tibet , Mongolia and Xinjiang are among others in Stockholm in the Etnografiska museet (around 8000 individual pieces), in Uppsala in the geological, mineralogical and paleontological institutes of the university, in the storage rooms of the Bavarian State Collection for Paleontology and Geology in Munich and at the History Museum in Beijing .

Hedin's documentaries and their evaluation

Hedin saw the focus of his work in field research on his expeditions . He made route recordings in which he determined many thousands of kilometers of his caravan routes with the details of a measuring table and supplemented them with countless height measurements and astronomical localizations. He combined the field maps with drawn panoramas. He designed the first accurate maps of previously unexplored areas: Pamir , Taklamakan , Tibet , Silk Road and Himalaya . He was probably the first European to recognize that the Himalayas are a continuous mountain range.

He systematically examined the lakes of Inner Asia, made careful climatological observations over many years and put on extensive collections of rocks, plants, animals and antiquity. On the way he made watercolors, sketches, drawings and photographs, which he later published in his works. The best print quality of the photographs and maps can be found in the original Swedish works.

Here you can see the entire area of ​​Central Asia, which Sven Hedin has developed for cartography and research through his expeditions: below the Himalayas and the Transhimalaya, above the plateau of Tibet, above the Pamir, next to it the Tarim Basin with the Taklamakan Desert.

Hedin published a scientific work on the research results of his expeditions. The volume of this documentation increased enormously from expedition to expedition. He published his research report on the first expedition in 1900 under the title: The geographical-scientific results of my journeys in Central Asia 1894–1897 (supplementary volume 28 to Petermanns Mitteilungen), Gotha 1900. The work on the second expedition Scientific Results of a Journey in Central Asia grew to six volumes of text and two atlas volumes. Southern Tibet , the scientific publication on the third expedition, comprises a total of twelve volumes, three of which are atlases. The results of the Sino-Swedish expedition were published in the Reports from the scientific expedition to the north-western provinces of China under leadership of Dr. Sven Hedin. The sino-swedish expedition released; this edition has 49 issues.

Hedin provided these documentaries with valuable equipment, which made the price so high that only a few libraries and institutes could afford them. Sven Hedin had to bear most of the immense costs of printing himself, as well as the costs of the expeditions. He used the fees he received for his popular science books and lectures.

Sven Hedin did not scientifically evaluate his documentations himself, but gave them to other scientists for evaluation. Since he disseminated the experiences of his expeditions in popular science and processed them in a large number of lectures, travel reports, youth and adventure books, he became known to a wide public. He was soon considered one of the most famous personalities of his time.

Dietmar Henze wrote about Sven Hedin in connection with the exhibition at the Deutsches Museum Sven Hedin, the last research traveler in 1997:

“He was a pioneer and guide in the transition to the century of special research. No individual has achieved more as a brightener and performer of unknown countries than he. His maps alone represent a unique creation. The scholar was not inferior to the travel artist, who quickly and apparently effortlessly created awe-inspiring works in remote hours of the night. Geography, at least the German one, has so far only stuck to his popular reports. The systematic incorporation of the huge unearthed treasures of his scientific work into the regional geography of Asia is still pending. "

Current Sven Hedin research

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, a scientific review of Sven Hedin's personality and his relationship to National Socialism was carried out at the University of Bonn by Professor Hans Böhm, Astrid Mehmel and Christoph Sieker as part of the DFG project Sven Hedin and German Geography .

literature

Primary literature

Transhimalaya, Volume 1
Transhimalaya, Volume 2
Transhimalaya, Volume 3

Scientific documentation

  • Sven Hedin: The geographical-scientific results of my travels in Central Asia 1894–1897. Supplementary volume 28 to Petermann's communications. Gotha 1900.
  • Sven Hedin: Scientific results of a journey in Central-Asia . 10 text and 2 atlas volumes. Stockholm 1904-1907.
  • Sven Hedin: Southern Tibet . 11 text and 3 atlas volumes. Stockholm 1917-1922.
  • Series of Reports from the scientific expedition to the north-western provinces of China under leadership of Dr. Sven Hedin. The sino-swedish expedition. with over 50 volumes so far, contains primary and secondary literature. Stockholm 1937ff.
  • Sven Hedin: Central Asia atlas. Maps, Statens etnografiska museum. Stockholm 1966. (published in the series Reports from the scientific expedition to the north-western provinces of China under the leadership of Dr. Sven Hedin. The sino-swedish expedition; Issue 47. 1. Geography; 1)

German editions (mostly edited and often shortened)

Scientific works
  • A route recording through Eastern Persia. 2 volumes of text + 1 map folder. 1918-1927
Biographical works
  • Blown tracks. Orient journeys by Reise-Bengt and other travelers in the 17th century, Leipzig 1923.
Popular works
  • Through Asia's deserts. Three years on new paths in Pamir, Lopor, Tibet and China, 2 volumes, Leipzig 1899; new edition Wiesbaden 1981.
  • In the heart of Asia. Ten thousand kilometers on unknown paths, 2 volumes, Leipzig 1903.
  • Adventure in Tibet, Leipzig 1904; new edition Wiesbaden 1980.
  • Transhimalaya. Discoveries and Adventures in Tibet, 3 volumes, Leipzig 1909–1912; new edition Wiesbaden 1985.
  • By land to India through Persia. Seistan and Baluchistan, 2 volumes, Leipzig 1910.
  • Von Pol zu Pol, 3 volumes, Leipzig 1911–1912; new edition Wiesbaden 1980.
    • Around Asia.
    • (New episode) From the North Pole to the Equator.
    • (Last episode) Through America to the South Pole.
  • Baghdad - Babylon - Ninive, Leipzig 1918.
  • Jerusalem, Leipzig 1918.
  • General Prschewalskij in Inner Asia, Leipzig 1922.
  • My first trip, Leipzig 1922.
  • On the threshold of Inner Asia, Leipzig 1923.
  • Mount Everest, Leipzig 1923.
  • Persia and Mesopotamia, two Asian problems, Leipzig 1923.
  • From Beijing to Moscow, Leipzig 1924.
  • Gran Canon. My visit to the American Wonderland, Leipzig, 1926.
  • On a long journey. My expedition with Swedes, Germans and Chinese through the Gobi desert 1927–1928, Leipzig 1929.
  • Gobi riddle. The continuation of the Great Journey through Inner Asia in the years 1928–1930, Leipzig 1931.
  • Jehol, the imperial city, Leipzig 1932.
  • The Escape of the Great Horse, Leipzig 1935 (excerpt edited by Ehrhard Rühle, Verlag Brockhaus, Wiesbaden 1959)
  • The Silk Road, Leipzig 1936.
  • The Wandering Lake, Leipzig 1937.
Political works
  • A warning call, Leipzig 1912.
  • A people in arms, Leipzig 1915.
  • To the east !, Leipzig 1916.
  • Deutschland und der Weltfriede, Leipzig 1937 (the title was printed but never delivered; only five copies were bound - one of them is in the possession of FA Brockhaus Verlag, Wiesbaden).
  • Fifty Years of Germany, Leipzig 1938, 1st edition, FA Brockhaus
  • America in the battle of the continents, Leipzig 1942
Autobiographical works
  • My life as an explorer, Leipzig 1928.
  • Conquest campaigns in Tibet, Leipzig 1940.
  • Without commission in Berlin, Buenos Aires 1949; Tübingen-Stuttgart 1950.
  • Great Men I Met, 2 volumes, Wiesbaden 1951.
  • My dogs in Asia, Wiesbaden 1953.
  • My life as a draftsman, ed. by Gösta Montell on his 100th birthday, Wiesbaden 1965.
Fictional works
  • Tsangpo Lamas Pilgrimage, 2 volumes, Leipzig 1921–1923.

Most of Sven Hedin's German publications have been translated from Swedish into German by FA Brockhaus-Verlag . In this respect, Swedish editions are always the original edition. After the first edition, FA Brockhaus-Verlag often also published shortened versions under the same title. Sven Hedin not only had an important business relationship with the publisher Albert Brockhaus , but also a close friendship. Their correspondence is in the Riksarkivet in Stockholm. There is the following publication:

  • Sven Hedin, Albert Brockhaus: Sven Hedin and Albert Brockhaus. A friendship in letters between author and publisher. FA Brockhaus, Leipzig 1942.

bibliography

  • Willy Hess: The works of Sven Hedin. Attempt a full directory. Sven Hedin - Life and Letters, Vol. I. Stockholm 1962. The like: First addendum. Stockholm 1965.
  • Manfred Kleiner: Sven Anders Hedin 1865–1952. A bibliography of secondary literature. Self-published by Manfred Kleinert, Princeton 2001.

Biographies (selection)

  • Detlef Brennecke: Sven Hedin with personal testimonials and photo documents. Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 1986, 1991. ISBN 3-499-50355-7
  • John Paul : Sven Hedin. The last voyager of discovery . In: Adventurous Journey through Life - Seven Biographical Essays. Wilhelm Köhler Verlag, Minden 1954, pp. 317-378.
  • Alma Hedin: My brother Sven. After letters and memories. Brockhaus Verlag, Leipzig 1925.
  • Eric Wennerholm: Sven Hedin 1865–1952. FA Brockhaus Verlag, Wiesbaden 1978. ISBN 3-7653-0302-X .
  • Axel Odelberg: Äventyr på Riktigt: Berättelsen om Upptäckaren Sven Hedin. Norstedts, Stockholm 2008 (new biography in Swedish on 600 pages).
  • Imre Josef Demhardt: Departure into the unknown. Legendary research trips from Humboldt to Hedin.

Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt January 25, 2011.

Sven Hedin and National Socialism

  • Mehmel, Astrid: Sven Hedin and National Socialist expansion policy . In: geopolitics. Border Crossings in the Zeitgeist Vol. 1 .1 1890 to 1945 ed. by Irene Diekmann, Peter Krüger and Julius H. Schoeps, Potsdam 2000, pp. 189-238.
  • Sarah K. Danielsson: The Intellectual Unmasked. Sven Hedin's Political Life from Pan-Germanism to National Socialism. (Diss.) University of Minnesota, 2005.
  • Wolfgang Kaufmann: The Third Reich and Tibet. The home of the "Eastern Swastika" in the Nazis' field of vision. 2nd corrected and supplemented edition. Ludwigsfelder Verlagshaus, Ludwigsfelde 2010, ISBN 978-3-933022-58-5 (Hedin's collaboration with the SS Tibet researchers is described; there is also a wealth of information about the Sven Hedin Reich Institute for Research on Inner Asia, in which Sven Hedin did not work, although it was named after him).
  • Matthias Hannemann: The friends in the north. Norway and Sweden in the calculation of German revision policy 1918–1939. (Diss.), LIT Verlag, Münster 2011, ISBN 978-3-643-11432-7 , esp. Pp. 423f., 455-457, 533-538 (other sections of the study deal with Hedin's role for German politics in the years before 1933).
  • Tommy Lundmark: Sven Hedin-institutet: En rasbiologisk upptäcksresa i Tredje riket. Ordvisor förlag, 2014, ISBN 9789186621957 (Swedish)

Web links

Commons : Sven Hedin  - album with pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The Jewish immigrant Abraham Brode or Brody from Prussia took on the name Johann Christian Berlin at his Christian baptism on March 17, 1771 in Malmö . (According to: Bruno Binder: Sven Hedins ancestor from Frankfurt adO . In: Communications of the Historical Association for Local History in Frankfurt an der Oder, 31 (1930) pp. 69–72)
  2. ↑ Hans Böhm: Financing of Hedin's Central Asia Expedition: “The strictest secrecy is seen as essential by all those involved”, in: Geography Vol. 57, H. 1 (2003) 40-54.
  3. ^ Chinese Cultural Center Berlin: Stranger Devils, ZDF documentaries by director Bernd Liebner
  4. ↑ Bruno Baumann: Caravan of no return. The drama in the Takla Makan desert. Munich 2000, pages 113-121, 203, 303-307
  5. ↑ Bernd Liebner: Sons of the desert - Through Gobi and Taklamakan , documentary
  6. ↑ Eric Wennerholm: Sven Hedin 1865–1952 , p. 142 f.
  7. ↑ Sven Hedin och nationalsocialismen (Swedish; PDF; 24 kB)
  8. ↑ (English: Order of Brilliant Jade )
  9. ↑ Verified sources: Sven Hedins in Stockholm's Riksarkivet archived correspondence with Hans Draeger, Wilhelm Frick , Joseph Goebbels , Paul Grassmann and Heinrich Himmler .
  10. ↑ See letter from Hans Draeger of January 17, 1942 to Hedin from the Riksarkivet in Stockholm, files: Sven Hedins Arkiv, Korrespondens, Tyskland, 457 and the book by Michael H. Kater: Das "Ahnenerbe" der SS 1935–1945 . Oldenbourg Verlag, 2001, ISBN 3-486-56529-X
  11. ^ Elisabeth Kraus: The University of Munich in the Third Reich: Essays. Herbert Utz Verlag GmbH, Munich 2006. pp. 494-502.
  12. ^ See file R 135 of the Federal Archives , stored in the Berlin-Lichterfelde office.
  13. ↑ In: Adventurous Journey through Life , p. 367.
  14. ^ Previously unpublished letter from the Riksarkivet in Stockholm, Heinrich Himmler's file: Sven Hedins Arkiv, Korrespondens, Tyskland, 470. The spelling and punctuation have been updated.
  15. ↑ Wolfgang Benz (ed.): Handbook of Antisemitism. Hostility to Jews in the past and present. Vol. 2/1, De Gruyter, Berlin 2009, p. 341 f.
  16. ↑ There is a detailed study of this process in: Mehmel, Astrid: Sven Hedin und National Socialist Expansion Policy . In: geopolitics. Border Crossings in the Zeitgeist Vol. 1 .1 1890 to 1945 ed. by Irene Diekmann, Peter Krüger and Julius H. Schoeps, Potsdam 2000, pp. 189-238.
  17. ^ Previously unpublished letters from the Riksarkivet in Stockholm, files: Sven Hedins Arkiv, Korrespondens, Tyskland, 487.
  18. ↑ cf. Sven Hedin's German Diary 1935–1942. Dublin 1951, pp. 204-217.
    Eric Wennerholm: Sven Hedin 1865–1952. Pp. 229-230.
  19. ↑ http://digbib.ubka.uni-karlsruhe.de/volltexte/digital/3/1082.pdf
  20. ↑ cf. Christian Thorén: Upptäcktsresanden Sven Hedins order stuck i Kungliga Livrustkammarens samlingar. In: Livrust Kammaren. Journal of the Royal Armory 1997-98. Stockholm. Pp. 91-128. ISSN  0024-5372 . (Swedish text with English captions and English summary, colored images of the orders of Sven Hedin, literature references.)
  21. ↑ Lotte Burkhardt: Directory of eponymous plant names - Extended Edition. Part I and II. Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin , Freie Universität Berlin , Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-946292-26-5 doi: 10.3372 / epolist2018 .
  22. ^ Sven Hedin and German Geography , gepris.dfg.de (undated).
This article was added to the list of excellent articles on November 9, 2005 in this version .
personal data
SURNAME Hedin, Sven
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hedin, Sven Anders from; Ho-ting, Ssu-wên; Gedin, Sven; Hao-ting, Ssu-wen; Sir Hedin, Sven Anders from
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swedish geographer, topographer, explorer, photographer, travel writer and illustrator
DATE OF BIRTH February 19, 1865
PLACE OF BIRTH Stockholm
DATE OF DEATH November 26, 1952
Place of death Stockholm