Brazza, Pierre Paul Francois Camille Savorgnan de

(1852–1905)

   A Franco-Italian naval officer, explorer, and colonial official in Equatorial Africa. Although born into an Italian noble family, he enrolled in the French naval academy in Brest and became a French citizen in 1874. Because of the success of his 1874–1878 exploration of the Gabon and Ogoue Rivers, in 1879 the French government sent de Brazza on a mission to thwart Belgian efforts, led by Henry Morton Stanley, to annex the entire Congo River basin. Over the next three years, de Brazza explored portions of the Upper Congo and established a French protectorate centered around the newly created settlement of Brazzaville. After a brief return to France, he served as Governor-General of the French Congo from 1886 to 1897. De Brazza died in Dakar, Senegal in 1905 shortly after completing an investigation into allegations of African exploitation commissioned by the French government.

   See also <>; <>; <>.

   FURTHER READING:

    Carbonnier, Jeanne. Congo Explorer, Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza, 1852-1905 . New York: Scribner, 1960;

    West, Richard. Brazza of the Congo: European Exploration and Exploitation in French Equatorial Africa . London: Cape, 1972.

   KENNETH J. OROSZ