From childhood Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) held a great interest in the natural world and its study. He received a university education first at Frankfurt an der Oder and later at Göttingen where he became acquainted with the naturalist Georg Forster (1754­–94) who had travelled with James Cook on his second voyage to the Pacific in 1772–5. In 1790, the pair travelled to London where they dined with figures such as Sir Joseph Banks and other members of the Royal Society. On his return to Germany, Humboldt served as inspector of mines, a job that enabled him to pursue his scientific interests and gave him an expertise in geology and mineralogy.

At the death of his mother in 1796, Humboldt decided to travel. While in Paris in 1798, he became friends with the French naturalist Aimé Bonpland (1773–1858) and the pair set off on an expedition to Egypt and North Africa. Following a delay in their departure from Marseille for Tunis, they decided to seek an alternative route from Spain. However, on receiving two audiences with the Spanish king, Charles IV, who was much taken with his geological knowledge, Humboldt was granted free passage to Spain’s empire in the Americas in order to collect botanical and mineral specimens. Unable to resist the opportunity, Humboldt and Bonpland set off from A Coruña for Venezuela in January 1799.

From Venezuela, the pair travelled the course of the Orinoco River before sailing northward to Cuba and then to Mexico. From Mexico, Humboldt intended to travel to the Philippines but changed his mind and returned to South America, travelling across New Granada (now Colombia) to Bogota and thence into Peru in the hopes of rendezvousing with Nicolas Baudin on his expedition to the Pacific. In November 1802, the party reached Quito (now the capital of Ecuador) where they climbed Mount Chimborazo. On reaching Lima and discovering that Baudin had instead sailed to the Pacific via the Cape of Good Hope, Humboldt and Bonpland returned to Mexico. They arrived at Acapulco in March 1803 and crossed the country overland. After a brief diversion to Philadelphia on their return to Europe, the pair reached Bordeaux in August 1804.

On his return to Europe, Humboldt almost immediately set about publishing his findings. The resulting work Le voyage aux regions equinoxiales du Nouveau Continent (The Voyage to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent) was published in 30 volumes (20 in folio and ten in large quarto) between 1807 and 1828. Five additional volumes by other authors were printed up to 1834. Employing around 50 artists, cartographers, naturalists and engravers and produced by a consortium of publishers, the project was principally funded by Humboldt himself with some grants from the French and Prussian governments. At the time, it was rumoured to be the most expensive scientific book ever published, costing twice as much as the official account of the French survey of Egypt (Description de l’Egypte,1809–22, see RCINs 1079287–295; 1190944–57). The work included theories that would come to influence scientific thought throughout the nineteenth century and serves as an important milestone in the scientific exploration and natural history of the Americas.