Abstract
IT is reported in the Moscow Daily News that an expedition, organised by the Arctic Institute of the U.S.S.R. which has recently returned to Leningrad, has discovered relics of the Barents expedition which perished in 1597. William Barents was a Dutch navigator born about the middle of the sixteenth century. In 1594 he left Amsterdam with two ships to search for a north-east passage to eastern Asia, but failed. He commanded another expedition of seven ships in the following year, but was too late to find open water. His third journey resulted in catastrophe. After rounding the north of Novaya Zemlya in 1596, Barent's vessel was beset by ice and compelled to winter in the north. It was the first winter ever experienced by Europeans in polar regions. Barent's ship was not released until 1597. His party left in two open boats on June 13, and most of its members escaped. Barents himself died on June 30, 1597, with four members of his crew. The expedition of the Arctic Institute of the U.S.S.R. discovered on August 18 last some relics of the hut in which Barents wintered on the north-east extremity of Cape Spora Novolsk. These relics will be preserved in the Museum of the Arctic Institute in Leningrad.
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Relics of the Barents Expedition. Nature 132, 852 (1933). https://doi.org/10.1038/132852b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/132852b0