Barclay Raunkiaer

Anders Christian Barclay Raunkiær (11 November 1889 – 13 June 1915) was a Danish explorer and author, who died very young. Barclay Raunkiær was born in Copenhagen as the only child of the plant ecologist Christen C. Raunkiær and the author Ingeborg Raunkiær. After finishing high school in 1908 he began to study at the University of Copenhagen. He accompanied his father to Tunisia and other Mediterranean countries from 1909 to 1910. Here, he studied the cultural geography of Tunisian agriculture, especially irrigation. On behalf of the Royal Danish Geographical Society, he traveled through eastern Arabia from 1911 to 1912. He left Copenhagen in November 1911 for Kuwait via Istanbul and Baghdad. From Kuwait, he went with a caravane to Riyadh and back to the coast of the Persian Gulf via Hofuf to Bahrain. He returned via Mumbai and Trieste to Copenhagen, arriving in June 1912. He left the university and took employment in the East Asiatic Company. However, the journey had cost him his health. He died in Copenhagen from tuberculosis, aged twenty-five.