Matisen, Fedor

Matisen, Fedor Andreevich 

Born May 20 (June 1), 1872, in St. Petersburg; died Dec. 19, 1921, in Irkutsk. Russian military hydrographer and traveler.

In 1897, Matisen graduated from the Naval Cadet Corps. He was a member of the Spitzbergen degree expedition of 1899 and the polar expedition of the Russian Academy of Sciences in 1900-03. In the latter expedition he was captain and commander of the yacht Zaria (1902-03; after the death of E. V. Toll’ he was head of the expedition). Matisen was one of the organizers of a hydrographic expedition to study the Arctic Ocean (1910-15). He organized and led the first Soviet hydrographic expedition to the mouths of the Lena and Olenek. Matisen investigated Tiksi Bay and proved its suitability for the construction of a seaport. The strait between Vil’kitskii, Taimyr, and Nansen islands on the north coast of the Taimyr Peninsula is named after Matisen.

WORKS

“Kratkii obzor plavaniia iakhty Russkoi poliarnoi ekspeditsii ’Zaria’ v navigatsiiu 1901 g.” Izv. AN, 1902, vol. 16, no. 5.
Ekspeditsiia k ust’iu r. Leny v sviazi s ispol’zovaniem Severnogo morskogo putl Irkutsk, 1921.

REFERENCES

Toll’, E. V. Plavanie na iakhte “Zaria.” Moscow, 1959. (Translated from German.)
“F. A. Matisen (1872-1921).” In Materialy ekspeditsii k ust’iam rek Leny i Oleneka pod nachal’stvom F. A. Matisena v 1920 g. i N. I. Evgenova v 1921 g. Leningrad, 1929. (Trudy Komissii po izucheniiu Iakutskoi ASSR, vol. 3, part 1.)

A. V. MEL’NIKOV