Ernst Dieffenbach

Who was Ernst Dieffenbach?

Johann Karl Ernst Dieffenbach, also known as Ernest Dieffenbach, was a German physician, geologist and naturalist, the first trained scientist to live and work in New Zealand, where he travelled widely under the auspices of the New Zealand Company, returning in 1841–42 and publishing in English his Travels in New Zealand in 1843.

Dieffenbach was born in Giessen. He gained a degree at the university of Giessen and then, accused by authorities in the Grand Duchy of Hesse of being subversive, he fled, first to Zurich, where he received a degree in medicine before being expelled in 1836 for politics and duelling; in 1837 he arrived in London, where he eked out a living teaching German, but gained a reputation by his contributions to medical and scientific journals and made friendships with geologists Charles Lyell and Richard Owen among others. Recommendations put him aboard the Tory bound for New Zealand, travelling in the capacity of surgeon, surveyor and naturalist.

During the 1840s he was a correspondent of Charles Darwin, whose Journal of Researches Dieffenbach translated into German and published, with Darwin's notes and corrections, as Naturwissenschaftlichen Reisen.