Christian Ferdinand Friedrich Krauss

He was an apothecary's apprentice and worked as a pharmacist for a while, but then took up the study of mineralogy, zoology and chemistry at Tübingen and Heidelberg, where he excelled academically and was awarded a PhD summa cum laude in 1836.

Krauss started collecting and studying the fauna, flora and geology of Cape Town and environs in earnest after a short trip to Tulbagh.

Leaving Genadendal he travelled southwards to Caledon, to Walker Bay, Elim, Prinskraal, Cape Agulhas, along Struisbaai to De Hoop and Swellendam.

Thomas Henry Duthie (friend of Charles Collier Michell) on the farm Belvidere, before joining George Rex at Melkhout Kraal.

Travelling east along the Langkloof, he made an excursion lasting a week on horseback to Toorwater at the point where the Olifants River cuts through the Swartberg, returning over Antoniesberg and the Kouga Mountains and meeting up with his wagon, which had gone ahead, on 1 March.

He spent 3 weeks in this locality, referring to it as Tsitsikamma, before moving across the Gamtoos River and on to Uitenhage where he stayed with the pharmacist and plant collector Joachim Brehm.

Krauss enjoyed the company of 2 other naturalists for the eight-day voyage to Port Natal - the Swede Wahlberg and the Frenchman Adulphe Delegorgue.

At this time he joined a Volksraad deputation under Landdrost Roos, sent to visit the Zulu chief Mpanda at his kraal between the Umdhloti and Umvoti Rivers.

With his collections taking up 16 crates, he left Cape Town on 22 April 1840 aboard the "Vernon", a new type of ship sporting an auxiliary engine.

Back in Stuttgart, Krauss was appointed to the Natural History Museum of which he became director in 1856, partly because of the reputation he acquired from his published works.

His factual and rather dry accounts provided an accurate record of conditions in the Cape, in particular his description of the Zulus and their way of life has been found most reliable.