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World citizen, explorer, writer and scientist, Thor Heyerdahl’s legacy is an archive of unusual richness that encompasses photographs, films, manuscripts and documents of historical, artistic and cultural value. The archive was in 2011 inscribed into UNESCO’s Memory of the World list, of invaluable documentary heritage.

October 4^th 1989 Thor Heyerdahl donated his life work, including his manuscripts, document archive, and all photographs from his scientific expeditions to the Kon-Tiki Museum. Included in the donation were also his private book collection, a collection of editions of his own books, newspaper clippings, and film and audio tapes. The archive is divided into seven collections.

Document archive
Photography collection
Library
Book-editions collection
Newspaper clippings
Film and audio collection
Thor Heyerdahl’s Film Collection at the Norwegian National Library

Thor Heyerdahl set up his office in a 16th century hunting tower on his property in the Italian village of Colla Micheri, from 1958-1988.

An explorer and writer

The Thor Heyerdahl Archive provides a unique insight into the life and work of the most famous explorer, adventurer and writer of non-fiction in the 20th century. His expeditions and books were a source of inspiration for generations of adventurers, scientists, and people all around the globe.

The Kon-Tiki Expedition (1947) was an amazing adventure of six young men pitted against the greatest force on earth – the Pacific Ocean. The book manuscript, photos and film documentary of the Kon-Tiki Expedition in 1947 had tremendous impact on history and popular culture in the 1950s and 1960s, making Kon-Tiki synonymous with adventure.

Heyerdahl’s maritime expeditions (Ra, Ra II, Tigris) and his archaeological projects produced iconic photos of modern exploration. Documenting these projects also resulted in unique photo and film material being collected from places soon after affected by modernisation. The communities on Easter Island and Rapa Iti in the Pacific Ocean (1955-56) and the Marsh Arab-culture in Iraq (1976-77) are examples of the modern transformation of local peoples, cultures, and places.

The document archive contains Heyerdahl’s original book manuscripts, papers, and speeches from 1947 to the end of his life. Correspondence and notes associated with organizing his world-famous expeditions, his research into prehistoric voyaging and contacts between cultures, and his fight against pollution of the ocean and a world with less borders makes up the rest of the archive.

A feature documentary from the Kon-Tiki voyage was released in 1951.

From the archive: Exhibition of photos and artefacts from the Fatuhiva expedition, Oslo 1939.

From the archive: Thor Heyerdahl's own design for a poster to his lecture "Our life as savages on the South Sea Island of Fatuhiva", 1938.

Contents of the document archive

Thor Heyerdahl’s document archive contains: book manuscripts, articles and speeches manuscripts, diaries, note books, letters, research notes and miscellaneous files. The collection has been sorted into 17 main categories. Sub-division is done by year and expeditions/names.

Download the complete list of categories of the Thor Heyerdahl Document Archive.

Book manuscripts
Article manuscripts
Lectures and speeches
Film Manuscripts
Drawings
Personal notes
Diaries
Expeditions
Science and academics
Environment
Politics (One World, etc.)
Prizes, awards, and honors
Membership (associations, unions, clubs etc.)
Correspondence
Economy
Books, pamphlets, etc. (not TH)
Miscellaneous

Page 1, Chapter one, handwritten manuscript of the Kon-Tiki. On Raft Across the South Seas (1950), catalogued under category 1: Book Manuscripts, No.

Book manuscripts

The Thor Heyerdahl Archive contains twenty-three of Thor Heyerdahl’s book manuscripts, from Kon-Tiki. On Raft Across the South Seas, first published in Norwegian in 1948, to his last book Jakten på Odin [The Hunt for Odin] published the year before his passing. In the archives there are also three unpublished manuscripts.

Download a list of manuscripts.

Library

Thor Heyerdahl's academic publications

American Indians in the Pacific. The theory behind the Kon-Tiki Expedition, 1952

Prior to the Kon-Tiki Expedition in 1947, Thor Heyerdahl had only published a brief paper entitled Did Polynesian Culture Originate in America? in the first and only edition of International Science, a journal intended for researchers fleeing the growing war in Europe.

After “Kon-Tiki” landed successfully crash-landing at Raroia Atoll in the Tuamotuan Islands on August 7th, 1947, began writing the popular account of the voyage, published as Kon-Tiki. On raft across the South Seas in 1950 by Allen Unwin in London. The book became an international bestseller and only after finishing the cinematic documentary, which won Oscar for best documentary feature in 1951, did he have time to sit down to finalize a manuscript, being in the works since 1940, giving an academic argument for his theory.

In 1952 Thor Heyerdahl’s magnum opus American Indians in the Pacific. The theory behind the Kon-Tiki Expedition, a volume of 821 pages including almost one thousand references and index, was published. Sifting through all available publications on archaeological, ethnological, historical, mythological, and botanical evidence, Heyerdahl tries like a detective to puzzle together the pieces of how the islands in Polynesia was discovered and settled.

The publication attracted the same criticism and controversy Thor Heyerdahl experienced after the Kon-Tiki voyage, but this time most of his adversaries also respected the effort which he had put into his research.

Do you have a Norwegian IP address? Read the book here.

Collection of various editions of Thor Heyerdahl's own books

Thor Heyerdahl became an international best seller with Kon-Tiki. On Raft Across the South Seas (1950). To date it has been translated into 74 languages and published in a host of different editions. Many of his subsequent books have also enjoyed an international audience, and received widely publication and translation.

Thor Heyerdahl Book’s Edition Collection contains various language editions of his various books, particularly from the 1950s to the 1980s. Today, this collection is housed in the General Document Archive, while a part of it is on display in the Library exhibition.

A list of the editions of Kon-Tiki. On Raft Across the South Seas can be downloaded here.

"Kon-Tiki. On Raft Across the South Seas" (1950) has been published in more than 74 different language editions.

Heyerdahl's private library

A part of Thor Heyerdahl’s private book collection that he no longer used actively was donated to the Kon-Tiki Museum in 1983, at the same time as his photo collection and document archive were given to the museum.

The collection consists of 1.131 books mainly covering topics of exploration, archaeology, anthropology and history in the Pacific, the Americas, and the Old World cultures around the Mediterranean.

A list of books in the collection can be downloaded here.

Thor Heyerdahl and Knut M. Haugland in Colla Micheri, Italy, ready to begin transporting books to the Kon-Tiki Museum, Norway.