Introduction
Olfert Dapper (January 1636 – 29 December 1689) was a Dutch physician and writer. He wrote books about world history and geography, although he never travelled outside the Netherlands.
Biography
Olfert Dapper was born in early 1636 in the Jordaan in Amsterdam. On 6 January 1636, he was baptized in the Lutheran church in Amsterdam.
In 1663 wrote a book on the history of Amsterdam. His Description of Africa (1668) is a key text for African studies. His book "is one of the most authoritative 17th century accounts on Africa published in Dutch. Translations appeared in English, French, and German. Dapper never traveled to Africa but used reports by Jesuit missionaries and other (Dutch) explorers. Within a few years he published about China, India, Persia, Georgia, and Arabia. His books became well known in his own time. The fine plates include views of Algiers, Benin, Cairo, Cape Town, La Valetta, Marrakech, St. Helena, Tangier, Tripoli, Tunis, as well as, animals and plants.
Dapper was buried on 29 December 1689 in Amsterdam.
Influence
To this day, Dapper's book Description of Africa is an important text for Africanists.
In Amsterdam, the street Dapperstraat was named after him. The Dutch writer Willem Frederik Hermans wrote a book on him with the title Het Evangelie van O. Dapper Dapper (1973).
In Paris, the Musée Dapper named for him opened in 1986. Peter S. Beagle dedicated The Last Unicorn to Dapper for his reports of unicorns in Maine and in 2012wrote a fictional account of Dapper's travels.