author
Georg Karl Cornelius Gerland
1833–1919
A 19th-century German scholar who moved easily between geography, anthropology, linguistics, and geophysics, he helped shape how people studied both the Earth and the cultures living on it. His work also played a part in the early growth of seismology as an organized international field.
1 Audiobook
Über das Aussterben der Naturvölker
by Georg Karl Cornelius Gerland
About the author
Born in Kassel on January 29, 1833, he studied classical philology, German studies, and anthropology at the universities of Berlin and Marburg. After years teaching at secondary schools in Kassel, Hanau, Magdeburg, and Halle, he was appointed in 1875 to the University of Strasbourg, where he became one of its early professors of geography.
His interests were remarkably wide. Alongside geography, he worked in anthropology and linguistics, and he is especially remembered for contributions to geophysics. He edited and wrote important scientific works and helped promote the international exchange of research on earthquakes and the physical structure of the Earth.
He died in Strasbourg on February 16, 1919. For listeners exploring older scientific writing, his career offers a glimpse of a time when one curious mind could range across many fields and help connect them.