Thomas Falkner (6 October 1707 – 30 January 1784) was an English Jesuit missionary, explorer and physician, active in the Patagonia region for nearly forty years.
His primary work, The Description of Patagonia, was written towards the idea of English colonization (similar to Mungo Park and other explorers of his era), but it remains valuable as a record of early life, flora and fauna of the region.
On reaching Buenos Aires he was so ill that the captain was compelled to leave him there in the care of Father Mahoney, the superior of the Jesuit College, where he was nursed back to health.
[3][1] In 1740 or soon after he was sent to assist Father Matthias Strobel in his mission to the northern Tehuelche people at Laguna de los Padres, 12 miles (19 km) west of the present day city of Mar del Plata,[4] the first permanent human settlement in the region.
He wrote an account of his Patagonian experiences, which was published at Hereford in 1774 under the title A Description of Patagonia and the adjoining parts of South America, with a grammar and a short vocabulary, and some particulars relating to Falkland's Islands.