HORNEMANN, FREDERICK German traveller in Africa, was born at Hildesheim. He was a young man when, early in 1796, he offered his services to the African Asso ciation of London as an explorer in Africa. In Sept. 1797 he arrived in Egypt, and, on Sept. 5, 1798, he joined a caravan returning to the Maghrib from Mecca, attaching himself to a party of Fezzan merchants who accompanied the pilgrims. Horne mann assumed the character of a young mameluke trading to Fezzan ; he was accompanied as servant and interpreter by Joseph Freudenburg, a German convert to Islam, who had thrice made the pilgrimage to Mecca. Travelling by way of the oases of Siwa and Aujila, a "black rocky desert" was traversed to Temissa in Fezzan. Murzuk was reached on Nov. 17, 1798. Here Home mann lived till June 1799, going thence to the city of Tripoli, whence in August of the same year he despatched his journals to London. He then returned to Murzuk. When he left Tripoli it was his intention to go direct to the Hausa country, which region he was the first European definitely to locate. A report reached Murzuk in 1819 that the traveller had gone to "Noofy" (Nupe), and had died there. Hornemann was the first European in modern times to traverse the north-eastern Sahara.
Hornemann's journal was printed at Weimar in 180I ; an English translation, Travels from Cairo to Mourzouk, etc., with maps and dis sertations by Major James Rennell, appeared in London in 5802.