No. 116/2024

From Mexico to France: This example of the rare Lophophora cactus was confiscated at a Paris airport and is now part of the collection in the Botanical Gardens at Villers-lès-Nancy. WESTERN SCIENCE HAS LONG BEEN RELIANT ON THE KNOWLEDGE AND THE EXPLOITATION OF COLONISED PEOPLES.” MARLEEN HABOUD “ and medicinal plants.” Usually, the leaders of the European expeditions did not speak the languages of the regions they were visiting and thus depended on their Indigenous attendants inmany ways. But that was rarelymentioned in travelogues or was deleted during publishing history – for various reasons, such as racist resentment and the cultural limitations of what could be said at the time as well as attempts to increase the books’ sales figures by means of clichéd descriptions. Moreover, the Europeans seldom had to explore “the wild” on their expeditions as the accounts sometimes suggest: travellers to Africa, for example, could utilise existing infrastructures with teams of porters and caravan routes. In India, European travellers on some routes could stay comfortably in hotels. “Of course, this contradicts the image we have of overseas expeditions,” says von Brescius. “When we are talking about discoveries, we simply have to always ask ourselves: discoveries for whom?” What was new to European travellers was usually only too familiar to the people in the region and they were often willing to share their knowledge. “Local people showed the conquerors natural medicinal plants, for example. This led to scientific insights that were used to develop medicines,” explains Marleen Haboud. She is an anthropologist and founder of the Oralidad Photos: Jean-Christophe Verhaegen/AFP via Getty Images, private FOCUS 14 HUMBOLDT KOSMOS 116/2024