The Belgica & Beyond


amateur translations, scans, & assorted research by m.w.
actively under construction.

WRITTEN FROM THE BELGICA 1897-1899

  1. Racovitza’s cartoons 
  2. Racovitza’s shipboard diary
  3. Racovitza’s letters home
  4. Lecointe’s meeting notes

CORRESPONDENCE

  1. before
  2. after

    NEWS OF THE BELGICA 1896-1900

    1. coverage in the Belgian press, translated
    2. coverage in the British press
    3. coverage in the American press
    4. scientific lectures, translated
    5. list of Expedition publications
      6.        a) Lecointe on Danco’s contributions

    QUELQUES EXPÉDITIONS SUIVANTES

    1. de Gerlache & Charcot (the Français)
    2. de Gerlache & the Duke of Orléans (the Belgica in the Arctic)
    3. the failed Second Belgian Antarctic Expedition (Arctowski & Lecointe)
    4. the successful Second Belgian Antarctic Expedition (Gaston de Gerlache)
    5.  the Royal Belgian Observatory
    6. Georges Lecointe’s 20th Century

      MARRIAGES & OTHER LIFE EVENTS

      1. Lecointe Family
      2. Arctowski
      3. de Gerlache
      4. Racovitza
      5. van Mirlo
      6. van Rysselberghe

      ASSORTED BELGICA RESOURCES

      1. bibliography
      2. associated persons
      3. contemporary photographs


      the sailors of the Belgica performing a “starlight concert” on Sept. 26, 1897, from Johan Koren’s diary

      contact: packloafertranslations@gmail.com

      Conferences & Talks



      Packed crowds and lots of beautiful women — all the way to the press table.

      — L’INDEPENDENCE BELGE REVIEWING THE BELGICA TALKS, 8 DECEMBER 1899

      Here you will find my translation of Émile Racovitza’s “Towards the South Pole” lecture delivered at the Sorbonne on 23 February 1900, available in the original French here. I’ve done my best to balance Racovitza’s spoken cadence and word choice with minor editing for legibility. In the original text, Racovitza uses Latin names for some species that have since been renamed; I’ve taken the liberty of updating those terms for clarity. Regarding his terms for the various types of Antarctic ice, however, I decided to stick more closely to direct translations of Racovitza’s words as the vocabulary around ice was still actively being developed in both French and English and I cannot be sure that Racovitza’s word choice would match the terminology used by, for example, the Belgica’s assistant meteorologist Antoni Dobrowolski in his publications on Antarctic cryology.

      There is also a series of lectures from the Bulletin of the Royal Geographic Society of Belgium (v. 24, 1900), which can be found in the original French here, that I hope to translate soon.


      Hydrography in the “Belgica Strait” and Astronomical and Magnetic Observations in the Austral Zone

      Physical Geography in the Antarctic Region Explored by the Belgica Expedition

      The Animal and Plant Life in the Antarctic


      Georges Lecointe, 18 November 1899



      Georges Lecointe, 6 December 1899





      Henryk Arctowski, 20 December 1899


      Emile Racovitza, 22 December 1899
      Please do reach out if you have any corrections or suggestions, especially regarding scientific or sailing terminology.