James Bruce - Youth, To North Africa, The Nile & Ethiopia, The Return, Trivia, Biographies

Explorer, born in Larbert, Falkirk, C Scotland, UK. He became consul-general in Algiers (1763–5), and in 1768 journeyed to Abyssinia by the Nile, Aswan, the Red Sea, and Massowah. In 1770 he reached the source of the Abbai, or headstream of the Blue Nile. His Travels to Discover the Sources of the Nile was published in 1790.

James Bruce (December 14, 1730 – April 27, 1794) was a Scottish traveller and travel writer who spent more than a dozen years in North Africa and Abyssinia (Ethiopia) where he traced the Blue Nile.

Youth

Bruce was born at the family seat of Kinnaird, Perthshire, and educated at Harrow School and Edinburgh University, and began to study for the bar; His wife died in October 1754, within nine months of marriage, and Bruce thereafter travelled in Portugal and Spain.

To North Africa

On the outbreak of war with Spain in 1762 he submitted to the British government a plan for an attack on Ferrol. His suggestion was not adopted, but it led to his selection by the 2nd Earl of Halifax for the post of British consul at Algiers, with a commission to study the ancient ruins in that country, in which interest had been excited by the descriptions sent home by Thomas Shaw (1694–1751), who was consular chaplain at Algiers. Having spent six months in Italy studying antiquities, Bruce reached Algiers in March 1763. But in August 1765, a successor in the consulate having arrived, Bruce began his exploration of the Roman ruins in Barbary. Throughout his journeyings in Barbary and the Levant, Bruce made careful drawings of the many ruins he examined.

The Nile & Ethiopia

In June 1768 he arrived at Alexandria, having resolved to endeavour to discover the source of the Nile, which he believed to rise in Ethiopia. He reached Gondar, then the capital of Ethiopia, on February 14, 1770, where he was well received by the nəgusä nägäst Tekle Haymanot II, by Ras Mikael Sehul, the real ruler of the country, by Ozoro Esther, wife of the Ras, and by the Ethiopians generally. On November 14, 1770 he reached Lake Tana, the long-sought source of the Blue Nile. Though admitting that the White Nile was the larger stream, Bruce claimed that the Blue Nile was the Nile of the ancients and that he was thus the discoverer of its source. Bruce, however, disputed his claim and suggested that the relevant passage in Paez's memoirs had been fabricated by Athanasius Kircher.

The Return

Setting out from Gondar in December 1771, Bruce made his way, in spite of enormous difficulties, by Sennar to Nubia, being the first to trace the Blue Nile to its confluence with the White Nile. On November 29, 1772 he reached Aswan, presently returning to the desert to recover his journals and his baggage, which had been abandoned in consequence of the death of all his camels. Cairo was reached in January 1773, and in March Bruce arrived in France, where he was welcomed by Buffon and other savants. It was not until 1790 that, urged by his friend Daines Barrington, he published his Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile, In the Years 1768, 1769,1770, 1771, 1772 and 1773, but was assailed by other travellers as being unworthy of credence.

Trivia

Places named for Bruce Bruce Trail Bruce Peninsula Bruce Peninsula National Park Bruce County Several of Bruce's drawings were presented to King George III and are in the royal collection at Windsor Castle. Bruce was the first to ever use the word "Wonderland" thus predating Lewis Carroll.

Biographies

Major (afterwards Sir Francis) Head, editor of an abridgment of the Travels, wrote the well-informed Life of Bruce (London, 1830). The best 19th Century account of Bruce's travels is contained in Sir R.