Karl Klaus from the ceiling

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Karl Klaus von der Betten, wood engraving by C. Kolb 1874 based on an original
Karl Klaus from the ceiling with the Johanniter cross

Karl Klaus von der Betten , also Carl Claus von der Betten (born August 8, 1833 in Kotzen , Brandenburg , † October 2, 1865 near Baardheere , Somalia ) was a German explorer and traveler to Africa. He was also active as a botanist and dealt with ferns , his botanical author abbreviation is blankets .

Life

Karl Klaus von derdecke was a member of the noble family von derdecke . His father was Ernst Carl von der Betten (1796–1846) on Melkof , his grandfather was the royal Hanoverian Prime Minister Claus von derützen (1742–1826). His mother Adelheid, b. von Stechow (born September 25, 1807, † August 24, 1868) married Hans Heinrich X. von Hochberg , Prince of Pless, in their second marriage on January 29, 1848 after the death of Ernst Carl von derillen. Julius von der Betten (1827–1867) was his older brother.

Having had given up on the ceiling of his career in the military, he explored excited by Heinrich Barth , the Eastern Africa . His first expedition in 1860 took him to the Lake Malawi region . The goal of opening up East Africa together with the geographer Albrecht Roscher was prevented by the early death of Roscher in 1860 on Lake Malawi. In the following year von der Deckens and the British geologist Richard Thornton (1838–1863) reached the 5895  m high Kilimanjaro - 13 years after the first (European) sighting by the German missionary Johannes Rebmann , whose discovery they confirmed. Von derdecke and Thornton explored the mountain on this expedition up to a height of about 1580  m . Another year later, in 1862, von derdecke returned to Kilimanjaro to be the first European to dare to climb the mountain. It reached an altitude of about 4,300  m , then the onset of snowfall forced it to give up. The adventurer then explored the Pangani at the foot of Kilimanjaro . On his trip in 1862, von derdecke was accompanied by Otto Kersten (1839–1900), who after his return home wrote a six-volume work on his companion's two Kilimanjaro expeditions. Later von derdeck organized a large expedition to explore the Tana , the longest river in Kenya .

His last expedition to Somalia in 1865 was to explore the Juba River . He drove up the Juba with two specially designed river steamers that were built in Hamburg, shipped in parts and assembled in Zanzibar . One of the ships, the Passepartout , was already lost in the mouth . The big steamer Welf was shipwrecked in the rapids above Baardheere (Bardera) . After a camp was set up, the team got into a fight with angry Somali people , and von derdecke and many of his people lost their lives. Other members of the crew managed to save themselves and brought the news to Zanzibar. The report on the failed expedition is considered an important ethnological source on southern Somaliland.

Lobeliackenii , subspecies keniensis . A local name is litaya .
River steamer Welf to explore the Juba is 36 m long and the support boat is 9 m long
River Steamer Welf Longitudinal section and floor plan drawing
Male blanket toko with a captured beetle. The tokos are hornbills .
Rest under a large tree by the lake
From-the-ceiling-Sifaka (The Sifakas are a subspecies of the lemurs . All lemurs live only in Madagascar .)
Kilimanjaro , woodcut by Ernst Heyn, after a drawing by vd ceiling, 1869
Satellite photo of Kilimanjaro showing the location of the main ice fields; bottom right of the ceiling glacier (June 2004)
Kilimanjaro massif with Shira , Kibo and Mawenzi (from left to right). The ceiling glacier is the narrow long one on the right.

Honors

In 1864 Karl Klaus von der Betten received the Patron's Medal from the Royal Geographical Society in London .

An East African bird from the order of the Rackenvogel (Coraciiformes) was named in honor of Karl Klaus von der Blankets , the "Von-der-Decken-Toko" (also " Blanket Toko ", Tockus blanket ).

A species of lemur in Madagascar is named after him: Von-der-Ceiling Sifaka .

A species of lobelia that occurs on Kilimanjaro and other mountains in East Africa is named after him, Lobeliadeckii .

One of the ice fields (Rebmann, Ceiling, Kersten, Heim and Bailetto glaciers) on the southern slope of Mount Kilimanjaro was named in his honor.

Financing the expeditions and the works

The costs of the five-year expeditions can be estimated according to the information on the costs of the porters, which von derdeck describes in a letter to Heinrich Barth . The brother and mother supported the research trips and the publication of the six-volume travelogues. After the death of the traveler's father in 1846, his mother married Adelheid geb. von Stechow (1807–1868) in 1848 the imperial count Hans Heinrich X. von Hochberg , since 1848 Prince of Pless , who was previously married to her sister Ida (1811–1843), who died after the birth of the third child. The Princes of Pless owned coal mines in Silesia in addition to the large Fürstenstein Castle . Karl Klaus von derdeck's family owned several goods that had been acquired by their grandfather, the Hanoverian Minister Claus von der Betten . He grew up in Melkof Castle near Ludwigslust in Mecklenburg , which his older brother Julius von der Betten (1827-1867) inherited and managed. Other goods such as Eickhof in Liebenau (Lower Saxony) near Nienburg / Weser were sold in order to finance the trips, among other things.

Works

The following travelogues (1st + 2nd narrative and 3rd + 4th scientific volumes) were published after the death of the traveler on behalf of his mother, Princess Adelheid von Pless :

Smaller contributions

literature

Web links

Commons : Karl Klaus von der Betten  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ August Petermann : Foreword , in: Baron Carl Claus von der Deckens̓ Travel in East Africa in the years 1859 to 1865. Volume 1, Gotha 1869, p. XII
  2. ↑ a b Dietmar Henze: Enzyklopädie der Entdecker und Erforscher der Erde, 1975 Volume 2, pp. 33–37
  3. ^ Gary Firth: in Target 1992 Livingstone was impressed by Thornton's early work
  4. ↑ The Geological Society of London , Geoscientist August 2011, article on Richard Thornton: Mr Thornton, I presume?
  5. ↑ Carl Claus von der Betten, edited by Otto Kersten , Reisen in Ost-Afrika in the years 1859 to 1865, Volume 2, Narrative Part 1871, p. 52
  6. ↑ Allgemeine Zeitung München, supplement from Oct. 8. 1865 p. 4561 - Vienna Oct. 2. - Mrs. v. the Decken's expedition to East Africa
  7. ^ Paul Reichard German East Africa. The country and its people. Its political and economic development, Leipzig 1892: ND Bremen 2010, pp. 112–113
  8. ↑ Volker Matthies (Ed.): Death on Juba. The steamship expedition of Baron von derdecke to Somali land (1865). Deutsches Schiffahrtsarchiv 35, 2012, supplement, ISBN 978-3-86927-135-4
  9. ↑ List of gold medalists of the Royal Geographical Society , there medals for 1864
  10. ↑ Mount Kilimanjaro Wiki there: Glacier decay
  11. ^ Journal of General Geography . - Berlin: Reimer, NF 10 (1861), p. 230 Excerpt from von Decken's letters to Dr. H. Barth Heinrich Barth Nov. 1860
  12. ↑ Dietmar Henze: Foreword to Reprint 1978 and Otto Kersten : Foreword to Volume I in Travel in East Africa 1859 to 1865 Carl Claus von der Betten, p. XII
  13. ↑ Herwart and Thassilo from the ceiling: family tables of the family from the ceiling , 1994 p. 106
  14. ↑ Thassilo von der Betten and Claudia Bei der Wieden: Guts und Höfe der Familie von der Betten , Stade 1998 p. 147
  15. ↑ database Niedersächsische people there looking with: Name ceiling Carl
personal data
SURNAME Blankets, Karl Klaus from the
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Blankets, Carl Claus from the
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German explorer and Africa traveler
DATE OF BIRTH August 8, 1833
PLACE OF BIRTH Kotzen , Brandenburg
DATE OF DEATH October 2, 1865
Place of death near Baardheere , Somalia