Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener - Survey of Western Palestine

Survey of Western Palestine

In 1874, at age 24, Kitchener was assigned by the Palestine Exploration Fund to a mapping-survey of the Holy Land, replacing Charles Tyrwhitt-Drake, who had died of malaria. Kitchener, then an officer in the Royal Engineers, joined fellow Royal Engineer Claude R. Conder, and between 1874 and 1877 they surveyed what is today Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza, returning to England only briefly in 1875 after an attack by locals in the Galilee, at Safed.

Conder and Kitchener’s expedition became known as the Survey of Western Palestine because it was largely confined to the area west of the Jordan River (Hodson 1997). The survey collected data on the topography and toponomy of the area, as well as local flora and fauna. The results of the survey were published in an eight-volume series, with Kitchener’s contribution in the first three tomes (Conder and Kitchener 1881–1885).

This survey has had a lasting effect on the Middle East for several reasons:

• The ordnance survey serves as the basis for the grid system used in the modern maps of Israel and Palestine.
• The collection of data compiled by Conder and Kitchener are still consulted by archaeologists and geographers working in the southern Levant.
• The survey itself effectively delineated and defined the political borders of the southern Levant. For instance, the modern border between Israel and Lebanon is established at the point in the upper Galilee where Conder and Kitchener’s survey stopped.