Johann Ludwig Burckhardt

Johann Ludwig (also known as John Lewis, Jean Louis) Burckhardt (24 November 1784 – 15 October 1817) was a Swiss traveller, geographer and Orientalist. Burckhardt assumed the alias Sheikh Ibrahim Ibn Abdallah during his travels in Arabia. He wrote his letters in French and signed Louis. He is best known for rediscovering two of the world's most famous examples of rock-cut architecture – the ruins of the ancient Nabataean city of Petra in Jordan and the temples of Abu Simbel in Egypt.

Youth and early travels

Burckhardt was born on 24 November 1784 in

On the road to Cairo along the more dangerous inland route to

I was particularly desirous of visiting Wady Mousa, of the antiquities of which I had heard the country people speak in terms of great admiration... I hired a guide at Eldjy, to conduct me to

Haroun's tomb

... I was without protection in the midst of a desert where no traveller had ever before been seen… Future travellers may visit the spot under the protection of an armed force; the inhabitants will become more accustomed to the researches of strangers; and the antiquities of Wady Mousa will then be found to rank amongst the most curious remains of ancient art…

An excavated mausoleum came in view, the situation and beauty of which are calculated to make an extraordinary impression upon the traveller, after having traversed for nearly half an hour such a gloomy and almost subterraneous passage as I have described. The natives call this monument Kaszr Faraoun, or Pharaoh's castle; and pretend that it was the residence of a prince. But it was rather the sepulchre of a prince, and great must have been the opulence of a city, which could dedicate such monuments to the memory of its rulers...

In comparing the testimonies of the authors cited in Reland's Palastina, it appears very probable that the ruins in Wady Mousa are those of the ancient Petra, and it is remarkable that Eusebius says the tomb of Aaron was shewn near Petra. Of this at least I am persuaded, from all the information I procured, that there is no other ruin between the extremities of the Dead sea and Red sea, of sufficient importance to answer to that city. Whether or not I have discovered the remains of the capital of Arabia Petraea, I leave to the decision of Greek scholars.

— Johann Burckhardt, Travels in Syria and the Holy Land, p.418–431

He could not remain long at the ruins or take detailed notes due to his fears of being unmasked as a treasure-seeking infidel. Seeing no evidence of the name of the ruins, he could only speculate that they were in fact the ruins of Petra which he had been informed about on his journey to Syria.^[6] He continued his travels and after crossing the southern deserts of Transjordan and the Sinai Peninsula, he arrived at Cairo on 4 September 1812.^[1]

After spending four months in Cairo with no westbound caravans across the Sahara available, Burckhardt decided to journey up the Nile River to Upper Egypt and

Burckhardt wrote of his travels in Egypt and Nubia, where he witnessed slave trading: "I frequently witnessed scenes of the most shameless indecency, which the traders, who were the principal actors, only laughed at. I may venture to state, that very few female slaves who have passed their tenth year, reach Egypt or Arabia in a state of virginity."^[7]

After crossing the Red Sea, he entered Jeddah on 18 July 1814 and became sick with dysentery for the first time in his travels. Here he proved his credentials as a Muslim and was permitted to travel to Mecca. He spent several months in Mecca performing the various rituals associated with the Hajj which was unheard of for a European. He wrote of his detailed observations of the city and the deportment and culture of the local inhabitants.^[8] His journals were a valuable source of information for the African explorer Richard Burton who also later travelled to Mecca a few decades later. He later made a side trip to Medina where he again became sick with dysentery and spent three months recovering. Departing Arabia, he arrived in a state of great exhaustion in the Sinai peninsula and travelled overland to Cairo, arriving on 24 June 1815.^[1]

Burckhardt witnessed the plague epidemics that ravaged the Hejaz and Egypt between 1812 and 1816. He wrote: "In five or six days after my arrival [in Yanbu] the mortality increased; forty or fifty persons died in a day, which, in a population of five or six thousand, was a terrible mortality."^[9]

Burckhardt spent the remaining two years of his life editing his journals and living modestly in Cairo while waiting and preparing for the caravan that would take him west across the Sahara to Timbuktu and the Niger river. He made a trip to

• Travels in Nubia (to which is prefixed a biographical memoir) (1819)
• Travels in Syria and the Holy Land (1822)
• Travels in Arabia (1829)
• Arabic Proverbs, or the Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians (1830)
• Notes on the Bedouins and Wahábys (1830).^[10]

References

Sources

• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Burckhardt, John Lewis" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
• Paul Lunde, "The Lure of Mecca," Saudi Aramco World, November/December 1974, pp. 14–21.
• "The Blue Nile", Alan Moorehead, Harper and Row, 1962.
• Eduard His: Johann Ludwig Burckhardt (Scheik Ibrahim), in: Basler Gelehrte des 19. Jahrhunderts. Benno Schwabe & Co., Basel 1941, S. 25 – 31.
• ISBN 978-1-135-45663-4
  .

• Works by or about Johann Ludwig Burckhardt at Wikisource
• Works by John Lewis Burckhardt at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Johann Ludwig Burckhardt at Internet Archive
• Travels in Arabia from 1892, featuring Johann Ludwig Burckhardt