Explorers of Africa

Karl Gottlieb Mauch (7 May 1837 – 4 April 1875) was a German explorer and geographer of Africa. He reported on the archaeological ruins of Great Zimbabwe in 1871 during his search for the biblical land of Ophir.

Joseph Thomson (14 February 1858 – 2 August 1895) was a British geologist and explorer who played an important part in the Scramble for Africa. Thomson's gazelle and Thomson's Falls, Nyahururu, are named after him. Excelling as an explorer rather than an exact scientist, he avoided confrontations among his porters or with indigenous peoples, neither killing any native nor losing any of his men to violence. His motto is often quoted to be "He who goes gently, goes safely; he who goes safely, goes far."

Théodore André Monod (9 April 1902 – 22 November 2000) was a French naturalist, humanist, scholar and explorer.

Pierre Paul François Camille Savorgnan de Brazza (born Pietro Paolo Savorgnan di Brazzà; 26 January 1852 – 14 September 1905) was an Italian-French explorer. With his family's financial help, he explored the Ogooué region of Central Africa, and later with the backing of the Société de Géographie de Paris, he reached far into the interior along the right bank of the Congo River. He has often been depicted as a man of friendly manner, great charm and peaceful approach towards the Africans he met and worked with on his journeys, but recent research has revealed that he in fact alternated this kind of approach with more calculated deceit and at times relentless armed violence towards local populations. Under French colonial rule, the capital of the Republic of the Congo was named Brazzaville after him and the name was retained by the post-colonial rulers, one of the few African nations to do so. (Other exceptions are Pretoria, South Africa, Port Louis, Mauritius, Libreville ,Gabon, and Victoria, Seychelles.)

Alexandrine "Alexine" Pieternella Françoise Tinne (17 October 1835 – 1 August 1869) was a Dutch explorer in Africa who was the first European woman to attempt to cross the Sahara. She was an early photographer.

Gustav Nachtigal (German: [ˈɡʊstaf ˈnaxtɪɡal]; born 23 February 1834 – 20 April 1885) was a German military surgeon and explorer of Central and West Africa. He is further known as the German Empire's consul-general for Tunisia and Commissioner for West Africa. His mission as commissioner resulted in Togoland and Kamerun becoming the first colonies of a German colonial empire. The Gustav-Nachtigal-Medal, awarded by the Berlin Geographical Society, is named after him.

Louis-Gustave Binger (French pronunciation: [lwi ɡystav bɛ̃ʒe]; 14 October 1856 – 10 November 1936) was a French officer and explorer who claimed the Côte d'Ivoire for France.
Binger was born at Strasbourg in the Bas-Rhin departement. In 1887 he traveled from Senegal up to the Niger River, arriving at Grand Bassam in 1889. During this expedition he discovered that the Mountains of Kong did not exist. He described this journey in his work Du Niger au golfe de Guinée par le pays de Kong et le Mossi (From the Niger to the Gulf of Guinea though the land of the Kong and the Mossi) (1891).In 1892 he returned to the Guinea Coast to superintend the forming of the boundaries between the British and French colonies. In 1893 Binger was appointed governor of the Côte d'Ivoire, where he remained until 1898. He returned to France that year, to an administrative post in Paris at the French Colonial Ministry. In 1899 the Royal Geographical Society awarded him their Founder's Medal for his exploratory work.Louis Gustave Binger died at L'Isle-Adam, Île-de-France, France and was buried in the Cimetière du Montparnasse in Paris. The city of Bingerville in the Ivory Coast is named after him.