EXPLORER

Friedrich Welwitsch

1806 - 1872

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Friedrich Martin Josef Welwitsch (25 February 1806 – 20 October 1872) was an Austrian explorer and botanist who in Angola was the first European to describe the plant Welwitschia mirabilis. His report received wide attention among the botanists and general public, comparable only to the discovery of two other plants in the 19th century, namely Victoria amazonica and Rafflesia arnoldii. In Angola, Welwitsch also discovered Rhipsalis baccifera, the only cactus species naturally occurring outside the New World. It was found a few years later in Sri Lanka too, which reignited the now already one-and-a-half-century-old debate on the origin of cacti in Africa and Asia. Read more on Wikipedia

His biography is available in different languages on Wikipedia. Friedrich Welwitsch is the 251st most popular explorer (up from 329th in 2019), the 564th most popular biography from Austria (up from 727th in 2019) and the most popular Austrian Explorer.

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Among EXPLORERS

Among explorers, Friedrich Welwitsch ranks 251 out of 498. Before him are Nikolaus Federmann, St John Philby, Yerofey Khabarov, Dmitry Laptev, Jan Czerski, and Francisco Serrão. After him are Diego de Almagro II, Julius Klaproth, Thorvald Eiriksson, Dinis Dias, Thekla Resvoll, and Karl Weyprecht.

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1806, Friedrich Welwitsch ranks 32. Before him are Antoine Wiertz, Teodolfo Mertel, Juliette Drouet, Lionel Kieseritzky, Infanta Ana de Jesus Maria of Braganza, and Giacomo Antonelli. After him are Johann Kaspar Mertz, George Newbold Lawrence, Julius Weisbach, Henriette Sontag, Michel Chevalier, and Count Anton Alexander von Auersperg. Among people deceased in 1872, Friedrich Welwitsch ranks 35. Before him are John Bowring, Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld, Friedrich Adolf Trendelenburg, Alfred Clebsch, Andrew Smith, and Petar Preradović. After him are Avram Iancu, Horace Greeley, Jacques Babinet, Kamehameha V, Carl Jaenisch, and Pavel Kiselyov.

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In Austria

Among people born in Austria, Friedrich Welwitsch ranks 564 out of 1,424. Before him are Dezső Kosztolányi (1885), Karl Rappan (1905), Annemarie Moser-Pröll (1953), Berta Karlik (1904), Gottfried Helnwein (1948), and Raul Hilberg (1926). After him are Ulrich von Liechtenstein (1200), Joseph Leopold Eybler (1765), Fritz Machlup (1902), Barbara Valentin (1940), Antun Augustinčić (1900), and Clemens von Pirquet (1874).

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Among EXPLORERS In Austria

Among explorers born in Austria, Friedrich Welwitsch ranks 1. After him are László Almásy (1895), Franz de Paula Adam von Waldstein (1759), and Oscar Baumann (1864).

Austrian born Explorers

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