Nicholas Miklouho-Maclay

Nicholas Miklouho-Maclay

Nicholas Miklouho-Maclay (Russian: Николай Николаевич Миклухо-Маклай, Ukrainian: Микола Миколайович Миклухо-Маклай; English variations include: Nicolai Nicolaevich de Miklouho-Maclay, and Baron de Miklouho-Maklai; 1846–1888) was a Russian ethnologist, anthropologist and biologist who conducted his research work while living and travelling in Australia, New Guinea and the Pacific. One of the earliest followers of Charles Darwin, Miklouho-Maclay is probably best remembered today as a humanist scholar who, on the basis of his comparative anatomical research, was one of the first anthropologists to refute the prevailing view that the different 'races' of mankind belonged to different species.

Ancestry and early years

Miklouho-Maclay was born in a temporary workers camp in Novgorod Governorate (currently Okulovsky District of Novgorod Oblast) in Imperial Russia, a son of a civil engineer working on the construction of the Moscow-Saint Petersburg Railway. His Ukrainian father was descended from Stepan Myklukha, a Zaporozhian Cossack, who was awarded the title of noble of the Empire by Catherine II for his military exploits during the Russo-Turkish War (1787–1792), which included the capture of the Ochakov fortress. His mother, Ekaterina Semenovna, née Bekker, was of German and Polish descent (her three brothers took part in the January Uprising of 1863). Nicholas attended a grammar school in Saint Petersburg, then went on to study at St. Petersburg University. After 1873, the Miklouho-Maclay family owned a country estate in Malyn, 150 kilometres (93 mi) northwest of Kiev.

He travelled and studied widely in Europe, was for a time a student of Ernst Haeckel, and became a close friend of the biologist Anton Dohrn, with whom he helped conceive the idea of research stations while staying with him at Messina, Italy.

Humanist views

In scientific and anthropological circles during the 1850s and 1860s there was much discussion connected with the study of human races and the interpretation of racial peculiarities. There were some anthropologists like Samuel Morton, who tried to prove that not all human races are of equal worth, and that "white people" are predestined by "natural selection" to rule over the "coloured" races. This attitude was used to justify slavery and colonialism.

Scientists like Ernst Haeckel, a teacher of the young Miklouho-Maclay, relegated what they regarded as culturally "backward" people like Papuans, Bushmen and others to the role of 'intermediate links' between Europeans and their animal ancestors. While adhering to Darwin's theory of evolution, Miklouho-Maclay diverged from these racist concepts, and it was this question that led Miklouho-Maclay to gather scientific facts and to study the dark-skinned inhabitants of New Guinea. On the basis of his comparative anatomical research, Miklouho-Maclay was one of first anthropologists to refute polygenism and scientific racism, the view that the different races of mankind belonged to different species and that some human races were inferior.

You were the first to demonstrate beyond question by your experience that man is man everywhere, that is, a kind, sociable being with whom communication can and should be established through kindness and truth, not guns and spirits. I do not know what contribution your collections and discoveries will make to the science for which you serve, but your experience of contacting the primitive peoples will make an epoch in the science for which I serve i. e. the science which teaches how human beings should live with one another.

— Leo Tolstoy, to N. N. Miklhouho-Maclay, September 1886

Australia

The Marine Biological Station (centre of photo) at Watson's Bay circa 1881.

Miklouho-Maclay, ca. 1880 in Queensland, Australia. A typically posed shot from the period to emphasize the "explorer" persona — note the Eucalyptus leaves, and explorer "tools".

Miklouho-Maclay left St Petersburg for Australia on the steam corvette Vityaz. He arrived in Sydney on 18 July 1878. A few days after arriving, he approached the Linnean Society and offered to organise a zoological centre. In September 1878 his offer was approved. The centre, known as the Marine Biological Station, was constructed by prominent Sydney architect, John Kirkpatrick. This facility, located in Watsons Bay on the east side of the Greater Sydney, was the first marine biological research institute in Australia. He married Margaret-Emma Robertson, daughter of the Premier of New South Wales, John Robertson.

Anthropological work in New Guinea and the Pacific

He visited north-eastern New Guinea, Philippines and Indonesia on a number of occasions, and lived amongst the native tribes, writing a comprehensive treatise on their way of life and customs.

Opposition to slavery

The humanists views of Miklouho-Maclay led him to actively oppose the slave trade. In November 1878 the Dutch government informed him that on his recommendations it was checking the slave traffic at Ternate and Tidore. From 1879 onwards he wrote to Sir Arthur Gordon, high commissioner for the Western Pacific, on protecting the land rights of his friends on the Maclay Coast, and ending the traffic in arms and intoxicants in the South Pacific.

Ill-health and death in Russia

In 1887 he left Australia and returned to St Petersburg to present his work to the Imperial Russian Geographical Society, taking his young family with him. Miklouho-Maclay was in poor health at this time and it was a trip from which he did not return. Despite treatment from Sergei Botkin, Miklouho-Maclay died of an undiagnosed brain tumour, aged 42, in St Petersburg. He was buried in the Volkovo cemetery, and left his skull to the St. Petersburg Military and Medical Academy.

Post-death

Miklouho-Maclay's widow returned to Sydney with their children. Until 1917 the scientist's family received a Russian pension. The money was first allocated by Alexander III and then by Nicholas II. One of his sons, Alexander, married a daughter of R. E. O'Connor.

Commemoration

Australia

Bust of Miklouho-Maclay, Macleay Museum at University of Sydney.

Miklouho-Maclay's name is commemorated in many parts of the world. In Australia, the building of the Marine Biological Station was commandeered by the Ministry of Defence in 1899 as a barracks for officers. However, in the 1980s the Miklouho-Maclay Society lobbied for the centre to be made into a historical landmark in memory of Miklouho-Maclay's scientific work, as well as for a park to be named in his honour.

A bust of Miklouho-Maclay was unveiled in front of the Macleay Museum at the University of Sydney to commemorate 100 years of his death. The Macleay Miklouho-Maclay Fellowship is available from the University of Sydney each year, and a de Miklouho-Maclay Prize for Excellence in Chemistry is awarded each year to New South Wales students in the National Titration Competition in Australia.

Papua New Guinea

The Maclay Coast, which Miklouho-Maclay named, is still used as the name for the North-east coast of Papua New Guinea. The Maclay Coast is defined by Miklouho-Maclay as extending for 150 miles between Cape Croisilles and Cape King William, and 30-50 miles inland to the mountains of Mana-Boro-Boro (Finisterre Mountains).

In Madang, Papua New Guinea — not far from where the explorer stayed in the 1870s — a street has been named after him.

He is also commemorated in the scientific name of the New Guinea tree species Pouteria maclayana.

Russia

In Russia there is an Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology and a street in South-West Moscow (where the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia is situated) named in his honor. The district museum in Okulovka, Novgorod Oblast, is named after him.

A Khabarov class river passenger ship was named after him. Based at Khabarovsk, it was used on the Amur River between the 1960s and 1990s.

Ukraine

Monument to Miklouho-Maclay in Malyn, Ukraine.

A monument to Miklouho-Maclay is erected in Malyn, Ukraine, where his family owned a country estate. There is also a bust of him in Sevastopol, Ukraine.

References

• Greenop, F. S. (1944) Who Travels Alone, K. G. Murray Publishing, Sydney
• Ogloblin, A. K. (1998) 'Commemorating N. N. Miklukho-Maclay (Recent Russian publications)', in Perspectives on the Bird's Head of Irian Jaya, Indonesia: Proceedings of the Conference, pages.487–502. 1998. ISBN 90-420-0644-7. Partial view on Google Books.
• Webster, E. M. (1984). The Moon Man: A Biography of Nikolai Miklouho-Maclay. University of California Press, Berkeley. 421 pages. ISBN 0-520-05435-0.

External links

• Maclay Coast, Papua New Guinea on Google Maps.
• Paper in the Proceedings of the Linnean Society of NSW by N. Miklouho-Maclay vol. 8, 1883
• Mikloucho-Maclay: New Guinea Diaries 1871—1883, translated from the Russian with biographical and historical notes by C. L. Sentinella. Kristen Press, Madang, Papua New Guinea] ISBN 0-85804-152-9