FRENCH SUDAN

FRENCH SUDAN / SOUDAN FRANÇAIS.

Centenary of René Caillié.
Map of Northwestern Africa and portrait of Caillié.
Second stamp in a set of 3, issued on 05.04.1939.
Face value: 2 French francs.
Design and engraving: René Cottet (1902-1992).
Printed by Institut de Gravure et d'Impression de Papiers-Valeurs, Paris.
Printing: Recess and typography.

Catalogs
- Michel No. 114.
- Scott No. 114.
- StampWorld No. 114.
- Stanley Gibbons No. 199.
- Yvert et Tellier No. 101.

Auguste René Caillié (1799 –1838) was a French explorer and the first European to return alive from the town of Timbuktu. Caillié had been preceded at Timbuktu by a British officer, who was murdered in September 1826 on leaving the city. The map indicates the route that Caillié followed through French West Africa (Afrique Occidentale Française, AOF) from Kakony near Boké, in present-day Gunea, on April 19, 1827, through Tiémé, in present-day Ivory Coast, and Djenné, in present-day Mali. After various adventures, he finally reached Timboktu on April 20, 1828. After spending a fortnight in Timbuktu, Caillié left the city on 4 May 1828 accompanying a caravan of 600 camels heading north across the Sahara Desert until reaching Fez, in August, Rabat and Tangier (Morocco), from where he returned to France by sea. In 1830 he published a description of the city of Timboktu in the Revue des deux mondes, and a Journal d'un voyage à Temboctou et à Jenné dans l'Afrique centrale (‘Diary of a trip to Timbuktu and Djenné in Central Africa’), in three volumes.