Olfert Dapper was a Dutch geographer and historian born in Amsterdam in 1639. He attended the University of Utrecht where he was registered as a student in 1658. Shortly thereafter he began signing himself "doctor medicine " although there is no record of him having had any medical training.
In 1663 Dapper published a five volume work on the history of Amsterdam. His best known work is the Description of Africa published in 1668 however he never travelled there and for his publication assembled stories from other travellers. This practice was common in those times when travel was very expensive and also dangerous.
This work, published many years after his death in 1689, includes the islands of Cyprus, Rhodes, Lemnos etc.
