Wilhelm Filchner was born in Munich on September 13, 18771. Soon after his birth the family moved to Bayreuth, but after the sudden death of his father, the family moved back to Munich where Filchner spent his youth. He soon showed interest in fine arts and received various artistic inspirations, mainly by the famous artists Lenbach, Stuck, Böcklin, Siegfried Wagner and others. The family, however, decided that the young son should take up a career as an officer.
In 1900, being a cadet in the military (Fig. 4-1), he used a three-month leave to undertake his own first expedition to Russia, the Caucasus and Turkestan. With his -for this time rather spectacular- ride over the Pamirs2, he soon found sup-port for further plans. Due to an accusation for being a spy he got no permit to enter the territory of the Russian Empire for a certain period.
Figure 4-1:Wilhelm Filchner 1905 (Filchner Archive, BAdW, Munich).
Figure 4-2: Travelling in Central Asia at Fil-chner’s time (Filchner: 1938)
1 Filchner 1950.
2 Filchner’s list of publications is given in the appendix of the paper.
For getting a scientific basis for preparing and carrying out his expeditions, he studied surveying and geography at the Technical University of Munich followed by practical education (mostly in Berlin) especially in geophysics at various military and civil institutions. In this time he had close contacts to various trav-elling scientists such as Sven Hedin (1855-1952), Ferdinand Frh. von Richt-hofen (1833-1905), Armin Vámbéry (1832-1913) and numerous others.
Filchner’s next expedition led to North-East Tibet and Western Chinain 1903-1905 with the main goal to carry out Earth-magnetic measurements as well as mapping (Fig. 4-2). For preparing an expedition to Antarctica, Filchner had intensive contacts with Otto Nordenskjöld (1869-1928), Ernest Shackleton (1874-1922), Fridtjof Nansen (1861-1930), and Georg von Neumayer (1826-1909). A test voyage to Spitsbergen/Svalbard) was undertaken in 1910 (Fig. 4-3, 4-4). The expedition comprised six people, who crossed the main island from the Advent Bay to the Wiche Bay.
Figure 4-3: Spitsbergen 1910, the crew: up-per row, left-right: Barkow, Seelheim, Phi-lipp, lower row: Przybyllok, Filchner, Pot-peschnigg) (Filchner und Seelheim 1911:
Tafel 11).
Figure 4-4 Spitsbergen 1910, crossing the ice field (Filchner und Seelheim 1911: Tafel 5).
In the same time period as Roald Amundsen (1872-1928), Robert Falcon Scott (1868-1912), and the Japanese Nobu Shirase (1861-1946) Filchner started the Second German Antarctic Expedition (1911-1912). For more details see below.
The plans to participate in a further expedition to the Arctic organized by Amundsen failed due to the beginning of World War I, in which Filchner parti-cipated as an officer3.
From 1926 till 1928 a long expedition to Central Asia followed (Fig. 4-5). The goals were similar to those of the expedition of 1903-1905. As a special task the connection of the Earth-magnetic networks observed in Europe to Western Asia, China and India was planned and finally carried out in a 6000 km long loop from Tashkent to Leh. The geographic coordinates of the observed sta-tions were determined by astro-geodetic methods. Besides these registrasta-tions
3 Filchner 1950: 140-143.
detailed route mapping was done, too, together with meteorological measure ments and other data collection.
As a famous result of this expedition, the film "Mönche, Tänzer und Soldaten (Monks, Dancers and Soldiers)" has to be mentioned. The film follows the course of the route of the expedition from Tashkent via Ili (former Russian gouvernement Turkestan), Urumtschi (Sinkiang) and Lan-chou (Kansu, China) to the Monastery Kumbum (Province Amdo, Tibet, west of Sinning-Fu). Espe-cially the chapters referring the Monastery Kumbum present a historically val-uable documentation of this famous site, which at the time accommodated up to 7000 monks. The film shows various scenes of the monastic life at that time. In the Chinese Cultural Revolution 1966-1976, the monastery was severely da-maged, only a few original buildings remained. At present a rather small group of monks is allowed to continue the religious practices.
In order to stabilize the loop of Earth-magnetic observations another expedition to Central Asia followed in the years 1934-38 (Fig. 5-5), the main work resulted in a 3500 km long line Lan-tschou - Leh connecting the most eastern and west-ern points of the previous loop.
Figure 4-5: Filchner‘s expeditions 1926-28 and 1934-38 to Central Asia and the observed Earth-magnetic lines (Filchner 1950: 180).
In 1939 a new expedition to Afghanistan and Iran for similar purposes as before was started, but having arrived in India, Filchner changed his plans and turned
to Nepal where magnetic surveys were carried out in the Western and South-Eastern regions. Due to severe health problems Filchner returned early on to India hoping for and finally receiving medical help. World War II then had fully broken out, so, together with many others, Filchner was interned in a British military campwhere, however, he was allowed to work and move rather freely.
After the ending of the war he stood in Poona, but finally returned to Europe in 1949 to settle in Zürich, where he spent his last years and died on May 7, 1957.
In Zürich he became familiar with the professors for geodesy at the ETH Zürich, F. Baeschlin and F. Kobold who were members of the German Geodetic Com-mission, so by them connections to his home town Munich followed. By these contacts Filchner’s estate finally found its place in the Filchner-Archive at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities (<http://dgk.badw.de>).
4.2 Filchner and the Second German Antarctic Expedition 1911-1912