Nils Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld (18 November 1832 – 12 August 1901) was a Finland-Swedish aristocrat, geologist, mineralogist and Arctic explorer. He was a member of the noble Nordenskiöld family of scientists and held the title of a friherre (baron).
Born in the Grand Duchy of Finland in the Russian Empire, he was forced to move to Sweden in 1857 due to his political activity, where he became a member of the Parliament of Sweden and of the Swedish Academy. He led the Vega Expedition along the northern coast of Eurasia in 1878–1879. This was the first complete crossing of the Northeast Passage. Initially a troubled enterprise, the successful expedition is considered to be among the highest achievements in the history of Swedish science.
. . .As an explorer, Nordenskiöld was interested in the history of Arctic exploration, especially as evidenced in old maps. This interest in turn led him to collect and systematically study early maps. He wrote two substantial monographs, which both included many facsimiles, on early printed atlases and geographical mapping and medieval marine charts, respectively the Facsimile-Atlas to the Early History of Cartography (1889) and Periplus: An essay on the early history of charts and sailing directions (1897).
He left his huge personal collection of early maps to the University of Helsinki, and it was inscribed on UNESCO's Memory of the World Register in 1997.
. . .In 1878–1879 he was the first to complete the entire Northeast passage along the northern coast of Eurasia. This he accomplished in the voyage of the Vega. Starting from Karlskrona on 22 June 1878, the Vega doubled Cape Chelyuskin in August. Vega was initially accompanied by the ships Lena, Fraser, and Express. The latter two parted way at the mouth of the Yenisei and traveled upstream. Lena navigated up the River Lena to Yakutsk. At the end of September, Vega was frozen in near the Bering Strait and passed the winter among the coastal Chukchi. By sailing through Bering Strait in July 1879, Vega completed the Northeast Passage.
Video Title: Explorer of the Arctic: A.E. Nordenskiöld (1979). Source: FinDok. Date Published: November 4, 2023. Description:
The drama documentary film tells the story of Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld (1832-1901), the Finnish explorer who discovered the North East Passage from the Atlantic Ocean to the pacific in 1879.
