19 March 2013 marks the bicentennial of the birth of
David Livingston in 1813. (It was only later in life, during the 1850s, that he
added the ‘e’ at the end of his surname.) He was born in Blantyre ,
Lanarkshire, to Neil Livingston and Agnes Hunter.
Perhaps no explorer’s name is as familiar to us as
Livingstone’s, though he started out in Africa
as a missionary and became renowned and revered as an anti-slavery campaigner.
He had his detractors, yet when news of his death on 4 May 1873 reached Britain there
was a tremendous public outpouring of grief. His body was interred at
Westminster Abbey after a state funeral, but his heart still lies buried under a tree
in Africa (Zambia ).
Livingstone was the first European to cross the Kalahari, which he did in 1849. In 1845 he married Mary, the daughter of another famous
missionary, Robert Moffat; the latter worked among the Bechuana at Kuruman for 50
years. Livingstone joined Moffat at Kuruman before commencing his travels in
The National Museum of Scotland, in Edinburgh , is currently holding an exhibition
commemorating the bicentennial. Among the exhibits are the hats worn by
Livingstone and Stanley at their legendary meeting at Ujiji, near Lake Tanganyika .
According to biographer Tim Jeal, the evidence suggests that
Stanley did not
utter the phrase ‘Dr Livingstone, I presume’, on that occasion, but thought it
up later.
Chronology of Livingstone’s life http://www.livingstoneonline.ucl.ac.uk/biog/dl/chron.html
Brief biography http://www.wholesomewords.org/missions/bliving18.html
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| Keeping vigil at Livingstone Tree, Victoria Falls |
Tim Jeal: Stanley, The Impossible Life of Africa’s Greatest
Explorer (2007)
“ “
Livingstone (1973)
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