Conder, Claude Regnier°

views updated

CONDER, CLAUDE REGNIER°

CONDER, CLAUDE REGNIER ° (1848–1910), British army officer in charge of the Survey of Western Palestine on behalf of the Palestine Exploration Fund. He worked first with C.F. Tyrwhitt-Drake from 1872–78. During this first survey Conder was attacked and seriously wounded at Safed in 1875. In 1881 he returned to Palestine for the Fund when he worked with H.H. Kitchener (later Lord Kitchener), and discovered Kadesh and also began a survey of Transjordan, discovering many megaliths. He was the coauthor (with H.H. Kitchener) of the Memoirs (vol. 1, pts. 1–3 of Survey of Western Palestine, 1881–83). Conder also wrote Tent-Work in Palestine (1878); Heth and Moab (1883); Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (1897); and edited (with C. Wilson) Palestine Pilgrim's Texts. His later years included service in Egypt (1884–85), Bechuana-land (1895), and Ireland.

bibliography:

Elath, in: Eretz Israel, 7 (1964), 158–70. add. bibliography: ODNB online; Y. Ben-Arieh, The Holy Land in the Nineteenth Century (1979).

[Michael Avi-Yonah]