The amazing travels of a great naturalist to Sarawak (Malaysia): Odoardo Beccari’s wanderings in Borneo, 1865–1868

Abstract

Odoardo Beccari (1843–1920) is considered to be one of the more important Italian naturalists of the nineteenth century, in particular for his pioneering explorations of the Malaysian Archipelago. During this period, he collected many thousands of botanical, zoological and ethno-anthropological specimens which are now conserved in natural history museums. Based on this conserved material, hundreds of species new to science have been described. In this study, we accurately reconstruct the travel itineraries of Beccari’s first trip to Borneo (Sarawak, 1865–1868). We link modern locations to the names he used, which were Italian transliteration of the local names of the time. We place these locations in time sequence on up-to-date georeferenced topographic maps. We expect our study to be useful to botanists, zoologists, anthropologists, curators of natural history museums and to nature conservators, as it provides precious information on the fauna and flora of Sarawak in the 1860s.

Keywords

• anthropology
• botany
• conservation
• natural history
• tropical asia
• zoology