Description Set against a broad sweep of European and Pacific history, this comprehensive new biography of explorer Jules Sébastien César Dumont d’Urville (1790–1842) reveals his life and times as never before. Dumont d’Urville (1790–1842) is one of the most famous explorers of the age of sail, an exceptionally erudite navigator who has been called France’s Captain Cook. D’Urville cultivated a profound engagement not only with maritime exploration but also with botany, entomology, ethnography and the diverse languages of the world. He lived through a tumultuous period of revolution, territorial expansion and scientific discovery. As a young ensign he was decorated for his pivotal part in the acquisition of the famous Vénus de Milo. This book also surveys d’Urville’s scientific contribution and the plant and animal species he collected. And it discusses his conceptualisation of the peoples of Pacific—it was d’Urville who coined the terms ‘Melanesia’ and ‘Micronesia’. D’Urville made an invaluable contribution to Pacific exploration as well as to the ethnography and natural history of Australia and New Zealand. Using primary documents that have long been overlooked by other historians, including D’Urville’s personal journal, author Edward Duyker charts the multiple facets of d’Urville: his passionate but emotionally fraught marriage; his scientific legacy in the Pacific, Australia, New Zealand and Antarctica and his secret orders to search for the site for a French penal colony in the Antipodes. This is an unrivalled biographical work, fully encompassing the private and public world of this indubitably larger than life figure.
