Alexander von Humboldt

Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander von Humboldt ( listen ; 14 September 1769 – 6 May 1859) was a Prussian geographer, naturalist, explorer, and influential proponent of romantic philosophy. He was the younger brother of the Prussian minister, philosopher, and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767–1835). Humboldt's quantitative work on botanical geography laid the foundation for the field of biogeography. Humboldt's advocacy of long-term systematic geophysical measurement laid the foundation for modern geomagnetic and meteorological monitoring.

Between 1799 and 1804, Humboldt travelled extensively in Latin America, exploring and describing it for the first time from a modern scientific point of view. His description of the journey was written up and published in an enormous set of volumes over 21 years. Humboldt was one of the first people to propose that the lands bordering the Atlantic Ocean were once joined (South America and Africa in particular). Humboldt resurrected the use of the word cosmos from the ancient Greek and assigned it to his multi-volume treatise, Kosmos, in which he sought to unify diverse branches of scientific knowledge and culture. This important work also motivated a holistic perception of the universe as one interacting entity.

Alexander von Humboldt (ship)

Alexander von Humboldt is a German sailing ship originally built in 1906 by the German shipyard AG Weser at Bremen as the lightship Reserve Sonderburg. She was operated throughout the North and Baltic Seas until being retired in 1986. Subsequently she was converted into a three masted barque by the German shipyard Motorwerke Bremerhaven and was re-launched in 1988 as Alexander von Humboldt.

History

Planned and ordered in 1906 as a reserve lightvessel (to stand in for other lightvessels during scheduled yard maintenance), the ship was launched on 10 September 1906 at AG Weser with the yard number 155 as the first of its class. Its hull was that of a sailing ship, as was common in this class, with the beacon mast in place of the main mast. There is no clear record whether she was christened Reserve Fehmarnbelt (after her first station) or Reserve Sonderburg, as both names are documented. On the ship's bell appears only Reserve; a first home port at Sonderburg (today Sønderborg, Denmark) is most likely. From 1920 to 1945 the ship was home ported at Kiel-Holtenau and served in many locations, but mainly along Baltic shores.

Alexander von Humboldt (disambiguation)

Alexander von Humboldt was a German naturalist and explorer.

Alexander von Humboldt may also refer to:

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