Geological background to fossil man / Геологическая предыстория ископаемого человека

In relation to modern lines of communication it seems surprising that the Gregory Rift Valley was the last part of the system to become known. Much of the earlier exploration had however been centred on the problem of the sources of the Nile, and in consequence the Western or Albertine Rift was explored by Samuel Baker as early as 1862/63 (Baker 1866). Additionally there was a strong tendency to use the convenient base at Zanzibar Island for journeys inland by the Arab slave trading routes from Pangani and Bagamoyo; these led to the Tanganyika Rift and Nyasaland rather than to the area of modern Kenya. The first penetrations into the Gregory Rift area were in I883; Joseph Thomson made an extensive journey into Central Kenya which he described in his book of 1887, 'Through Masai Land' which had as a subtitle, 'a journey of exploration among the snowclad volcanic mountains and strange tribes of Eastern Equatorial Africa--being the narrative of the Royal Geographical Society's Expedition to Mount Kenya and Lake Victoria Nyanza i883-84'.<...>