Living biographies of european explorers
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Early YearsTop ⤴
David Livingstone, perhaps the best known missionary and explorer of the Victorian period, was born in 1813 to parents Neil and Agnes Livingstone. He began life in Blantyre, a small town near Glasgow on the river Clyde where the cotton mill was the major employer. Like many locals, Livingstone entered the factory when he was ten years old, working as a piecer with the job of repairing threads broken during cotton spinning.
Though Livingstone’s childhood has often been romanticized, conditions at the Blantyre Mill were severe. Run by Monteith, Bogle and Co., work began at 6am and continued until 8pm with 40 minutes for breakfast and 45 for dinner (Mullen 2013:19). The mill had among the longest working hours in Scotland and, moreover, employed a greater number of children than most others operating in the greater Glasgow area. Livingstone was part of a considerable “child labour force” at work in the industry (Mullen 2013:19).
Photograph of Shuttle Cottages, Blantyre. Copyright David Livingstone Centre. May not be reproduced without the express written consent of the National Trust for Scotland, on behalf of the Scottish National Memorial to David Livingstone Trust (David Livingstone Centre).
The mill, however, did pay better than many and while the
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Beginning from the early 15th century until the middle of the 17th century, European explorers took to the seas in search of trade, knowledge, and power.
The story of human exploration is as old as the story of civilisation, and many of the stories of these explorers have become legends over the centuries.
Here are 15 of the most famous explorers during the Age of Exploration, before and after.
1. Marco Polo (1254-1324)
A Venetian merchant and adventurer, Marco Polo travelled along the Silk Road from Europe to Asia between 1271 and 1295.
Originally invited to the court of Kublai Khan (1215-1294) with his father and uncle, he remained in China for 17 years where the Mongol ruler sent him on fact-finding missions to distant parts of the empire.
Polo wearing a Tartar outfit, print from the 18th century
Image Credit: Grevembrock, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Upon his return to Venice, Polo was imprisoned in Genoa alongside the writer Rustichello da Pisa. The result of their encounter was Il milione (“The Million”) or ‘The Travels of Marco Polo’, which described his voyage to and experiences in Asia.
Polo was not the first European to reach China, but his travelogue inspired many explorers – among them, Christopher Columbus.
His w
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List of explorers
Explorers are registered below go one better than their customary names, countries of trigger (modern alight former), centuries of concentration and bazaar areas obvious exploration.