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On 11 July 1890, he and three others climbed Mount Damavand where he collected primary material for his dissertation.
Starting in September he traveled on the Silk Road via cities Mashhad, Ashgabat, Bukhara, Samarkand, Tashkent and Kashgar to the western outskirts of the Taklamakan Desert.
On the trip home, he visited the grave of the Russian Asian scholar, Nikolai Przhevalsky in Karakol on the shore of Lake Issyk Kul.
On 29 March 1891, he was back in Stockholm.
He published the books "King Oscar's Legation to the Shah of Persia in 1890" and "Through Chorasan and Turkestan" about this journey.
On 27 April 1892, Hedin traveled to Berlin to continue his studies under Ferdinand Freiherr von Richthofen.
Beginning of July he went to University of Halle-Wittenberg, Halle, attending lectures by Alfred Kirchhoff.
Yet in the same month, he received the degree of "Doctor of Philosophy" with a 28-page dissertation entitled "Personal Observations of Damavand".
This dissertation is a summary of one part of his book, "King Oscar's Legation to the Shah of Persia in 1890".
Eric Wennerholm remarked on the subject:
I can only come to the conclusion that Sven [Hedin] received his doctorate when he was 27 years old after studying for a grand total of only eight months and collecting primary material for one-and-a-half days on the snow-clad peak of Mount Damavand.
Ferdinand Freiherr von Richthofen not only encouraged Hedin to absolve cursory studies, but also to become thoroughly acquainted with all branches of geographic science and the methodologies of the salient research work, so that he could later work as an explorer.
Hedin abstained from doing this with an explanation he supplied in old age:
I was not up to this challenge.
I had gotten out onto the wild routes of Asia too early, I had perceived too much of the splendor and magnificence of the Orient, the silence of the deserts and the loneliness of long journeys.
I could not get used to the idea of spending a long period of time back in school.
Hedin had therewith decided to become an explorer.
He was attracted to the idea of traveling to the last mysterious portions of Asia and filling in the gaps by mapping an area completely unknown in Europe.
As an explorer, Hedin became important for the Asian and European powers, who courted him, invited him to give numerous lectures, and hoped to obtain from him in return topographic, economic and strategic information about inner Asia, which they considered part of their sphere of influence.
As the era of discovery came to a close around 1920, Hedin contented himself with organizing the Sino-Swedish Expedition for qualified scientific explorers.
Between 1893 and 1897, Hedin investigated the Pamir Mountains, travelling through the Tarim Basin in Xinjiang region, across the Taklamakan Desert, Lake Kara-Koshun and Lake Bosten, proceeding to study northern Tibet.
He covered on this journey and mapped of them on 552 sheets.
Approximately led through previously uncharted areas.
He started out on this expedition on 16 October 1893, from Stockholm, traveling via Saint Petersburg and Tashkent to the Pamir Mountains.
Several attempts to climb the high Muztagata—called the Father of the Glaciers—in the Pamir Mountains were unsuccessful.
He remained in Kashgar until April 1895 and then left on 10 April with three local escorts from the village of Merket in order to cross the Taklamakan Desert via Tusluk to the Khotan River.
Since their water supply was insufficient, seven camels died of thirst, as did two of his escorts (according to Hedin's dramatized and probably inaccurate account).
Bruno Baumann traveled on this route in April 2000 with a camel caravan and ascertained that at least one of the escorts who, according to Hedin, had died of thirst had survived, and that it is impossible for a camel caravan traveling in springtime on this route to carry enough drinking water for both camels and travelers.
According to other sources, Hedin had neglected to completely fill the drinking water containers for his caravan at the beginning of the expedition and set out for the desert with only half as much water as could actually be carried.
When he noticed the mistake, it was too late to return.
Obsessed by his urge to carry out his research, Hedin deserted the caravan and proceeded alone on horseback with his servant.
When that escort also collapsed from thirst, Hedin left him behind as well, but managed to reach a water source at the last desperate moment.
He did, however, return to his servant with water and rescued him.
Nevertheless, his ruthless behavior earned him massive criticism.
In January 1896, after a stopover in Kashgar, Hedin visited the 1,500-year-old abandoned cities of Dandan Oilik and Kara Dung, which are located northeast of Khotan in the Taklamakan Desert.
At the beginning of March, he discovered Lake Bosten, one of the largest inland bodies of water in Central Asia.
He reported that this lake is supplied by a single mighty feeder stream, the Kaidu River.
He mapped Lake Kara-Koshun and returned on 27 May to Khotan.
On 29 June, he started out from there with his caravan across northern Tibet and China to Beijing, where he arrived on 2 March 1897.
He returned to Stockholm via Mongolia and Russia.
Another expedition in Central Asia followed in 1899-1902 through the Tarim Basin, Tibet and Kashmir to Calcutta.
Hedin navigated the Yarkand, Tarim and Kaidu rivers and found the dry riverbed of the Kum-darja as well as the dried out lake bed of Lop Nur.
Near Lop Nur, he discovered the ruins of the former walled royal city and later Chinese garrison town of Loulan, containing the brick building of the Chinese military commander, a stupa, and 19 dwellings built of poplar wood.
He also found a wooden wheel from a horse-drawn cart (called an arabas) as well as several hundred documents written on wood, paper and silk in the Kharosthi script.
These provided information about the history of the city of Loulan, which had once been located on the shores of Lop Nur but had been abandoned around the year 330 CE because the lake had dried out, depriving the inhabitants of drinking water.
During his travels in 1900 and 1901 he attempted in vain to reach the city of Lhasa, which was forbidden to Europeans.
He continued to Leh, in Ladakh district, India.
From Leh, Hedin's route took him to Lahore, Delhi, Agra, Lucknow, Benares to Calcutta, meeting there with George Nathaniel Curzon, England's then Viceroy to India.
This expedition resulted in 1,149 pages of maps, on which Hedin depicted newly discovered lands.
He was the first to describe yardang formations in the Lop Desert.
Between 1905 and 1908, Hedin investigated the Central Iranian desert basins, the western highlands of Tibet and the Transhimalaya, which for a time was afterward called the Hedin Range.
He visited the 9th Panchen Lama in the cloistered city of Tashilhunpo in Shigatse.
Hedin was the first European to reach the Kailash region, including the sacred Lake Manasarovar and Mount Kailash, the midpoint of the earth according to Buddhist and Hindu mythology.
The most important goal of the expedition was the search for the sources of the Indus and Brahmaputra Rivers, both of which Hedin found.
From India, he returned via Japan and Russia to Stockholm.
He returned from this expedition with a collection of geological samples which are kept and studied in the Bavarian State Collection of Paleontology and Geology of Munich University.
These sedimentary rocks—such as breccia, conglomerate, limestone, and slate, as well as volcanic rock and granite—highlight the geological diversity of the regions visited by Hedin during this expedition.
In 1923, Hedin traveled to Beijing via the USA—where he visited the Grand Canyon—and Japan.
Because of political and social unrest in China, he had to abandon an expedition to Xinjiang.
Instead, he traveled with Frans August Larson (called the "Duke of Mongolia") in November and December in a Dodge automobile from Peking through Mongolia via Ulaanbaatar to Ulan-Ude, Russia and from there on the Trans-Siberian Railway to Moscow.
Between 1927 and 1935, Hedin led an international Sino-Swedish Expedition which investigated the meteorological, topographic and prehistoric situation in Mongolia, the Gobi Desert and Xinjiang.
Hedin described it as a peripatetic university in which the participating scientists worked almost independently, while he—like a local manager—negotiated with local authorities, made decisions, organized whatever was necessary, raised funds and recorded the route followed.
He gave archaeologists, astronomers, botanists, geographers, geologists, meteorologists and zoologists from Sweden, Germany and China an opportunity to participate in the expedition and carry out research in their areas of specialty.
Hedin met Chiang Kai-shek in Nanjing, who thereupon became a patron of the expedition.
The Sino-Swedish Expedition was honored with a Chinese postage stamp series which had a print run of 25,000.
The four stamps show camels at a camp with the expedition flag and bear the Chinese text, "Postal Service of the Prosperous Middle Kingdom" and in Latin underneath, "Scientific Expedition to the Northwestern Province of China 1927-1933".
A painting in the Beijing Palace Museum entitled "Nomads in the Desert" served as model for the series.
Of the 25,000 sets, 4,000 were sold across the counter and 21,500 came into the possession of the expedition.
Hedin used them to finance the expedition, selling them for a price of five dollars per set.
The stamps were unwelcome at the time due to the high price Hedin was selling them at, but years later became valuable treasures among collectors.
The first part of the expedition, from 1927 to 1932, led from Beijing via Baotou to Mongolia, over the Gobi Desert, through Xinjiang to Ürümqi, and into the northern and eastern parts of the Tarim Basin.
The expedition had a wealth of scientific results which are being published up to the present time.
For example, the discovery of specific deposits of iron, manganese, oil, coal and gold reserves was of great economic relevance for China.
In recognition of his achievements, the Berlin Geographical Society presented him with the "Ferdinand von Richthofen Medal" in 1933; the same honor was also awarded to Erich von Drygalski for his Gauss Expedition to the Antarctic; and to Alfred Philippson for his research on the Aegean Region.
From the end of 1933 to 1934, Hedin led—on behalf of the Kuomintang government under Chiang Kai-shek in Nanjing—a Chinese expedition to investigate irrigation measures and draw up plans and maps for the construction of two roads suitable for automobiles along the Silk Road from Beijing to Xinjiang.
Following his plans, major irrigation facilities were constructed, settlements erected, and roads built on the Silk Road from Beijing to Kashgar, which made it possible to completely bypass the rough terrain of Tarim Basin.
One aspect of the geography of central Asia which intensively occupied Hedin for decades was what he called the “wandering lake” Lop Nur.
In May 1934, he began a river expedition to this lake.
For two months he navigated the Kaidu River and the Kum-Darja to Lop Nur, which had been filled with water since 1921.
After the lake dried out in 1971 as a consequence of irrigation activities, the above-mentioned transportation link enabled the People's Republic of China to construct a nuclear weapon test site at Lop Nur.
His caravan of truck lorries was hijacked by the Chinese Muslim General Ma Zhongying who was retreating from northern Xinjiang along with his Kuomintang 36th Division (National Revolutionary Army) from the Soviet Invasion of Xinjiang.
While Hedin was detained by Ma Zhongying, he met General Ma Hushan, and Kemal Kaya Effendi.
Ma Zhongying's adjutant claimed to Hedin that Ma Zhongying had the entire region of Tian-shan-nan-lu (southern Xinjiang) under his control and Sven could pass through safely without any trouble.
Hedin did not believe his assertions.
Some of Ma Zhongying's Tungan (Chinese speaking Muslim) troops attacked Hedin's expedition by shooting at their vehicles.
For the return trip, Hedin selected the southern Silk Road route via Hotan to Xi'an, where the expedition arrived on 7 February 1935.
He continued on to Beijing to meet with President Lin Sen and to Nanjing to Chiang Kai-shek.
He celebrated his 70th birthday on 19 February 1935 in the presence of 250 members of the Kuomintang government, to whom he reported interesting facts about the Sino-Swedish Expedition.
On this day, he was awarded the Brilliant Jade Order, Second Class.
At the end of the expedition, Hedin was in a difficult financial situation.
He had considerable debts at the German-Asian Bank in Beijing, which he repaid with the royalties and fees received for his books and lectures.
In the months after his return, he held 111 lectures in 91 German cities as well as 19 lectures in neighboring countries.
To accomplish this lecture tour, he covered a stretch as long as the equator, by train and by car—in a time period of five months.
He met Adolf Hitler in Berlin before his lecture on 14 April 1935.
Hedin was a monarchist.
From 1905 onwards he took a stand against the move toward democracy in his Swedish homeland.
He warned of the dangers he assumed to be coming from Czarist Russia, and called for an alliance with the German Empire.
Therefore, he advocated a strengthened national defence, with a vigilant military preparedness.
August Strindberg was one of his opponents on this issue, which divided Swedish politics at the time.
In 1912 Hedin publicly supported the "Swedish coastal defense ship Society".