The Invention of Nature

Unlike in Latin America, Humboldt was travelling through Russia with a much larger retinue. He was accompanied by Gustav Rose, a twenty-nine-year-old professor of mineralogy from Berlin, and thirty-four-year-old Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg, an experienced naturalist who had already completed an expedition to the Middle East. Then there was Johann Seifert, who was their huntsman for zoological specimens and who would remain Humboldt’s trusted servant and housekeeper in Berlin for many years, a Russian mining official who had joined them in Moscow, a cook, a convoy of Cossacks for their protection, as well as Count Adolphe Polier – an old French acquaintance from Paris, who had married a wealthy Russian countess with an estate on the western side of the Urals, not far from Yekaterinburg. Polier had joined Humboldt in Nizhny Novgorod, some 700 miles south-east of St Petersburg, on his way to his wife’s property. Between them they had three carriages that were filled up with people, instruments, trunks and their steadily increasing collections. Humboldt had prepared for all eventualities, packing everything from a thickly padded overcoat to barometers, reams of paper, vials, medicine and even an iron-free tent in which to make his magnetic observations.

Humboldt had waited decades for this moment. Once Tsar Nicholas I had given permission at the end of 1827, Humboldt had taken his time to plan meticulously. After some back and forth, he and Cancrin had agreed that the expedition should set off from Berlin in early spring 1829. Humboldt had then postponed his departure by a few weeks because Wilhelm’s wife, Caroline, was in rapid decline, suffering from cancer. He had always liked his sister-in-law but also wanted to be there for Wilhelm during this difficult time. Alexander was ‘loving and affectionate’, Caroline wrote in her last letter. When she died on 26 March, after almost forty years of marriage, Wilhelm was devastated. Alexander stayed for another two and a half weeks but then finally left Berlin to embark on his Russian adventure. He promised his brother that he would write regularly.

Humboldt’s plan was to travel from St Petersburg to Moscow and from there east to Yekaterinburg and Tobolsk in Siberia, and then to turn back in one big loop. Humboldt would avoid the area around the Black Sea where Russia was engaged in a war with the Ottoman Empire. This Russo-Turkish War had begun in spring 1828, and as much as Humboldt would have loved to see the Caspian Sea and the snow-capped inactive volcano of Mount Ararat at today’s Turkish–Iranian border, the Russians had told him that it was impossible. His wish for an ‘indiscreet glance to the Caucasus Mountains and Mount Ararat’ would have to wait for more ‘peaceful times’.

Nothing was quite as Humboldt wanted it. The entire expedition was a compromise. It was a journey paid for by Tsar Nicholas I who hoped to learn what gold, platinum and other valuable metals might be mined more efficiently from his vast empire. Though labelled as an expedition for the ‘advancement of the sciences’, the tsar was more interested in the advancement of commerce. In the eighteenth century Russia had been one of Europe’s greatest exporters of ores and the leading iron producer but industrial England had long overtaken it. Feudal labour systems in Russia and antiquated production methods, as well as a partial depletion of some of the mines, were to blame. As a former mining inspector with an immense geological knowledge, Humboldt was a perfect choice for the tsar. It was not ideal for science but Humboldt didn’t see any other way to achieve his goal. He was almost sixty and time was running out.

He duly investigated the mines along their route through Siberia as agreed with Cancrin, but he also injected some excitement into this laborious task. He had an idea that would prove just how smart his comparative view of the world was. Over the years Humboldt had noted that several minerals seemed to occur together. In the mountains of Brazil, for example, diamonds had often been found in gold and platinum deposits. Equipped with detailed geological information from South America, Humboldt now applied his knowledge to Russia. Since there were similar gold and platinum deposits in the Urals as in South America, Humboldt was sure that there were diamonds in Russia. He was so certain that he had got carried away when he met Empress Alexandra in St Petersburg, boldly promising to find her some.

Whenever they stopped at mines, Humboldt searched for diamonds. Arm-deep in the sand, he sifted through fine grains. Magnifying glass in hand, he pored over the sand, believing that he would find his sparkling treasures. It was just a matter of time, he was convinced. Most people who watched him thought he was utterly mad because no one had ever found diamonds outside the tropics. One of their accompanying Cossacks even called him ‘the crazy Prussian prince Humplot’.