1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Schlagintweit

SCHLAGINTWEIT, the name of five German scientific explorers or students of foreign countries. They were brothers, and were named Hermann (1826–1882, who became known as Hermann von Schlagintweit Sakünlünski), Adolf (1829–1857), Eduard (1831–1866), Robert (1833–1885), and Emil (1835–1904). Hermann was born at Munich on the 13th of May 1826. His first scientific labours were studies in the Alps, carried on between 1846 and 1848 in association with his brother Adolf (born at Munich on the 9th of January 1829). The publication of the Untersuchungen über die physikalische Geographie der Alpen in 1850 (Leipzig) founded the scientific reputation of the two brothers, and their reputation was increased by subsequent investigations in the same field, in which Robert (born at Munich on the 27th of October 1837) also took part. Soon after the publication of the Neue Untersuchungen über die phys. Geog. u. Geol. der Alpen (Leipzig, 1854), the three brothers received, on the recommendation of Alexander von Humboldt, a commission from the East India Company to travel for scientific purposes in their territory, and more particularly to make observations on terrestrial magnetism. During 1854–1857 they travelled, sometimes in company, sometimes separately, in the Deccan and in the region of the Himalayas, prosecuting their investigations beyond the frontiers of the company's territory into the region of the Karakorum and Kuen-lun mountains. Hermann and Robert were the first Europeans who crossed the Kuen-lun, and in honour of that achievement the former had the title or surname of Sakünlünski bestowed upon him (in 1864). Robert returned to Europe early in 1857; Hermann, after a visit to Nepal, joined him on his homeward journey; but Adolf, who remained to prosecute his explorations in Central Asia, was put to death by the amir of Kashgar on the 26th of August. Hermann and Robert published in four volumes the Results of a Scientific Mission to India and High Asia (Leipzig, 1860–1866). They had, moreover, made extensive ethnographical and natural history collections. Hermann spent the last years of his life chiefly in literary and scientific activity, partly at Munich, partly at the castle of Jägernburg near Forchheim. He died at Munich on the 19th of January 1882. Robert was appointed professor of geography at Giessen in 1863. He paid several visits to America, which furnished him with material for such works as Die Pacific-Eisenbahn (1870), Die Mormonen (1874), Die Prärien (1876), &c., all published at Cologne. He died at Giessen on the 6th of June 1885. Eduard, born on the 23rd of March 1831, killed in battle at Kissingen in 1866, made himself known by an account of the Spanish expedition to Morocco in 1859–1860. Emil, born on the 7th of July 1835, wrote several learned works relating to India and Tibet. He died on the 29th of October 1904.