Explorers of Asia

For early exploration, see the following pages:

General

European contacts with Japan in the 16th and 17th century.

The Dutch

Jan Huyghen van Linschoten
Frederick Houtman
Discovery of the Houtman Abrolhos
alternative site
Jacques Mahu & Simon de Cordes
Jacob Quackernaeck and the first Dutch voyage to Japan (in Dutch)
The Voyage of 'de Liefde'
Olivier van Noort (in Dutch)
alternative site (in German)
Hendrik Brouwer
Joris van Spilbergen (in German)
Tranquebar and the Danish East India Company
The Dutch on Formosa
Hendrik Hamel and the Dutch interest in Korea
400 years Japan and the Netherlands
Travels of the Dutch East India Company in the Japanese Archipelago (German version)
Matthijs Quast

The English in the Indies

Ralph Fitch
William Adams
James Lancaster

The Jesuits

Saint Franciscus Xavier
alternative site
alternative site
The Jesuits in China
Matteo Ricci
Mapping "All Under Heaven" - the Jesuits and Chinese cartography
Antonio de Andrade

Russia and Siberia

Russian naval officers and geographic exploration of northern Russia (18th to 20th centuries)
Richard Chancellor
Olivier Brunel
Semen Ivanov Dezhnev
Bering, Chirikov: see Russian America

Arabia

Ludovico di Varthema
Carsten Niebuhr
William Gifford Palgrave
preface to his narrative
Palgrave family chronology
Sir Richard Francis Burton
Gertrude Bell
The Gertrude Bell Project - archiving all of Bell's diaries, letters and photographs

Central Asia and Tibet

Evarist Huc and Joseph Gabet
alternative site
Ferdinand von Richthofen (in German)
The Pundits
including: Nain Singh, Hari Ram, Krishna Singh, Kinthup
Nikolai Przhevalski
Agvan Dorjiev
Sven Anders Hedin
exhibition in the German museum (in German)
picture
Alexandra David-Néel
real-audio interview with Barbara and Michael Foster, who wrote a biography of David-Neel
Philips Christiaan Visser
Edmund Hillary
interview