Sven Hedin

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Sven Hedin. From Emil Hildebrand, Sveriges historia intill tjugonde seklet (1910).

Sven Anders Hedin (February 19, 1865 - November 26, 1952) was a Swedish explorer, geographer and geopolitician.

Hedin was born in Stockholm. Between 1886 and 1892 he studied geology, mineralogy, zoology, and Latin in Stockholm, Uppsala, Berlin, and Halle. He was a student of Ferdinand von Richthofen.

Between his graduation in 1892 and 1935 he led several expeditions to Central Asia. In 1902 he was the last Swede ever to be ennobled with a hereditary title. He became a member of the Swedish Academy in 1913.

His achievements include the production of the first detailed maps of vast parts of Pamir, Taklamakan, Tibet, the ancient Silk Road, and the Himalayas. He seems to be the first to realise that the Himalayas are a single mountain range.

Although primarily an explorer, Hedin was also the first to unearth the ruins of ancient Bhuddist cities in Chinese Central Asia. In 1899 he discovered the ancient Chinese garrison town of Loulan (Lou-lan) in the Taklamakan desert. The many manuscripts he unearthed there proved to be of great historical importance.

In his later expeditions he was to map large parts of the Tibetan highlands but never reached his ultimate goal: the then forbidden city of Lhasa.

He was a personal friend of Gustav V of Sweden (and his queen Victoria of Baden) and paid them regular visits. He was the co-author (together with Carl Bennedich) of the so-called borggårdstalet (the speech at the royal castle) which was read during the peasant armament support march (bondetåget) arrival at the royal castle. In this speech the king denounced the government (headed by Karl Staaff) defence policy, which led to its resignation.

Residence of Sven Hedin in Stockholm, Norr Mälarstrand 66. Sven Hedin lived in this residence in the years 1935 - 1952.

Being a Germanophile since his days of study in Berlin, Hedin was together with Queen Victoria of Sweden a strong advocate for a Swedish alliance with Germany during WWI, and he wrote several books about his experiences from journeys along the front lines, in west, east and south-east. This caused him to lose several influential friends in England and the USA, among them Lord Kitchener.

Sven Hedin felt that Russia was a dangerous threat to the West, and this may be part of the reason why he supported and admired Adolf Hitler (who in turn admired him) before and during the Third Reich. Still, Hedin was not a Nazi and he was rather deceived by the Nazis. Hedin wrote in his book Tyskland och världsfreden (Germany and world peace), a magnificent effort originally funded by the German government:

In my blood, every sixteenth drop is of Jewish origin. I cherish this sixteenth drop and I do not want to lose it. (Wallström 1983:265)

Expeditions

• 1885-1886 First journey to Russia, the Caucasus, Persia, Iraq, and Turkey.
• 1890-1891 Second journey to Persia and Central Asia
• 1893-1897 Central Asia. Whilst crossing the Taklamakan Desert only he and another member of his team survived. Tibet and finally Beijing.
• 1899-1902 Central Asia. Mapping of Tibet. He also unsuccessfully tried to reach Lhasa.
• 1905-1909 Third expedition to Central Asia, particularly the Himalayas, where he spent significant time in Tibet, where he probably was the first to discover the Trans-Himalaya mountain system.
• 1914 Toured German military positions in Belgium, France, Germany and Luxembourg.
• 1926-1935 The so-called Sino-Swedish Expedition (partly sponsored by the German government and the airline Lufthansa) to the Gobi Desert and Mongolia. During this time, he also met Chiang Kai-shek, whom he found to be an impressing personality.

Publications

• 1887 A Journey Through Persia and Mesopotamia
• 1891 Konung Oscars beskickning till Schahen af Persien, år 1890 (in Swedish)
• 1898 Through Asia
• 1903 In Asia
• 1904-1907 Co-author of Scientific Results of a Journey in Central Asia 1899-1902
• 1909 Transhimalaya
• 1914 With the German armies in the West (English translation published in England in 1915).
• 1925 My Life as an Explorer
• 1934 A Conquest of Tibet

External links

• [Excellent biography also listing publications and further literature]

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Bibliography

• Wallström, T. 1983. Svenska upptäckare. Bra böcker, Höganäs.

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