Exploration and travel

Material relating to exploration and travel can be found across our collections, including the following:

• Bruce: images captured by William Speirs Bruce (1867-1921) on expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctic between 1899 and 1914 (stereoscopic glass photographic negatives and albumen prints)
• Euing: wide ranging collection including books on exploration and travel, particularly Americana
• Hunterian: includes a significant number of books on exploration and travel, from the 16th century onwards. Particularly strong in Americana and important materials relating to South East Asia (historically referred to as the East Indies) and voyages to the South Seas
• Ker family papers: including papers of William Paton Ker (1855-1923), who was a keen walker and climber; his travels are well-documented in his letters, diaries and sketchbooks
• MacCallum Scott papers: papers of a politician, including journals containing impressions of his visits to the Soviet Union and the Baltic States in the 1920s
• Alec Lawrence Macfie papers: particularly photographic albums relating to John Mandeville Macfie (1891-1985), with scenes of military service and travel
• Spencer: relating to the ill fated Darien scheme (a 17th century attempt to set up a trading colony on the Isthmus of Darien in Panama)
• Tischendorf: includes a wide range of travelogues relating to Western Asia (historically referred to as the near east).

To search across all our collections, by name or keyword, please use the rare books search (for printed material) and the manuscripts search (for unpublished material including notebooks, papers, photographs and drawings).

Web exhibitions featuring aspects of exploration and travel:

• Scottish tourism and leisure in the 19th century: a list of resources prepared for an Economic and Social History course
• Americana: books and manuscripts from the 16th-19th centuries relating to the history of the Americas
• Maps for a Small Country: maps relating to Scotland, from the 16th-19th centuries
•  Paul Kane: Wanderings of an Artist among the Indians of North America, London: 1859 (Book of the Month: June 2009)
•  John Ross: Narrative of a second voyage in search of a north-west passage, London: 1835 (Book of the Month: September 2006)
• Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels, London: 1726 (Book of the Month: January 2006)
•  Daniell and Ayton: A voyage round Great Britain, London: 1814-1825 (Book of the Month: March 2005)
•  Photographs from the Scotia Antarctica Exhibition, 1902-1904 (Book of the Month: April 2004)
•  Photographs of a Baltic cruise, 1902 (Book of the Month: March 2003)