Thor Heyerdahl
Thor Heyerdahl (1914- ). Norwegian anthropologist and ethnologist. In 1947 he sailed from Peru to Polynesia on the balsawood raft Kon-Tiki, proving that the Pre-Incans could have made this journey. In a similar experiment, the Ra expedition (1969-70), he sailed a papyrus reed boat from Morocco to Central America. In 1977-78 Heyerdahl sailed from Iraq to the Horn of Africa, later burning his reed boat Tigris in protest at the wars raging in the region. In the late 1980s he led a series of archaeological expeditions to Easter Island.
