the first European to survive a journey to the West African city of Tombouctou ( Timbuktu).

Before Caillié was 20 he had twice voyaged to Senegal and traveled through its interior. In 1824 he began to prepare for his journey to Tombouctou by learning Arabic and studying Islām. Posing as an Arab traveling to Egypt, he left the coast of West Africa in April 1827 and reached Tombouctou on April 20, 1828; his journey was interrupted along the way by five months of illness. He remained at his destination for about two weeks and then returned across the Sahara to France, via Morocco. His narrative of the trip, published in three volumes in 1830, was translated into English that same year. An account of his journey, The Unveiling of Timbuctoo: The Astounding Adventures of Caillié, by Galbraith Welch, appeared in 1938.