NIEBUHR, Carsten, a celebrated traveller, and the father of the great Niebuhr, was the son of a farmer, and was born in the duchy of Lauenburg in 1733. His parents died when he was very young, and left him in the condition of a poor peasant boy. Yet at the age of twenty-one he had raised himself to the position of land-surveyor of his native district, and was busily engaged in studying geometry. The vigorous start which he had thus made in life soon carried him on to higher preferments. While he was deeply immersed in 1758 in the study of mathematics at the university of Göttingen, the Count Bernstorff, the minister of Frederick V. of Denmark, began to carry out a project which had been suggested by Michaelis of sending a staff of scientific men to explore the countries of the East. The place of mathematician was offered to Niebuhr. He accepted the office, but his modesty would not permit him to accept the title of professor, which was intended to add dignity to the office. It was in January 1761 that Niebuhr, in company with Von Haven the orientalist, Cramer the physician, Forskål the naturalist, and Baurenfeind the painter, set sail from Copenhagen. After exploring the gigantic architectural remains of Lower Egypt, the expedition sailed down the Red Sea, touching at various places on the coast of Arabia, and finally landed and established their head-quarters at Mocha. The rest of the journey was saddened by a series of fatal disasters. All the explorers, with the exception of the judicious Niebuhr, had been persisting in living on European diet, and were now sick unto death. Accordingly, when the expedition set sail for Bombay in 1763, Von Haven and Forskål were left behind in foreign graves; Baurenfeind was buried at sea; and Cramer died at the end of the voyage, leaving Niebuhr to betake himself homeward alone. He lost no time in re-embarking; and after passing through Persia, Syria, and Asia Minor, and marking these countries with an attentive eye, he arrived at Copenhagen in November 1767. It now became his chief business to lay the results of his travels before the world. He therefore published a Description of Arabia, in 4to, Copenhagen, 1772; and Travels in Arabia and the Circumjacent Countries, in 2 vols., 4to, Copenhagen, 1774–78. These works were remarkable for their new and correct information, expressed in a plain unaffected style; and they soon brought the author into general recognition. The government at Meldorf in Holstein, made him their land-surveyor in 1778; many learned men throughout Europe began to seek his acquaintance; and the Danish government conferred upon him the cross of Danebrog, and the title of councillor of state, and continued to cherish him till the close of his life. He died in April 1815.
Carsten Niebuhr wrote for a German periodical accounts of The Interior of Africa, and The Political and Military State of the Turkish Empire, and several other papers. His principal works have been translated from the German into French and Dutch. A Life of him by his eminent son was published at Kiel in 8vo, 1817.