Burchell's African Odyssey: Revealing the return journey 1812-1815
by Roger Stewart & Marion Whitehead, Struik Nature
R400 in bookstores
The English naturalist William Burchell only spent five years in South Africa about two centuries ago, but many animal, bird and plant species still carry his name. During his visit, he set off on an epic expedition through the largely unexplored interior of South Africa – heading towards the Kalahari from Cape Town – to collect, document and illustrate thousands of specimens of fauna and flora. He detailed this leg of his trek in his famous book, Travels in the Interior of Southern Africa.
However, little is known about his three-year return journey, which took him to the Great Fish River Mouth in the Eastern Cape and back to Cape Town along thechast. Only one of his journals of the time has been preserved. This is where authors Roger Stewart and Marion Whitehead come in:They have schured many different sources like
