Móric Déchy

Móric Déchy (1851–1917) was a Hungarian traveler-explorer, mountaineer, member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and Vice President of the Hungarian Geographical Society.

In the 1880s, he traveled through the Alps, the countries of the Balkan Peninsula, North Africa, Spitsbergen and the Himalayas. He made a significant contribution to the study of the highland regions of the Caucasus.

Between 1884 and 1902, Déchy traveled to the Caucasus seven times. He visited various regions of Georgia (including Abkhazia, Svaneti, Tusheti, and Khevsureti), Ossetia, Balkaria, Karachay, Chechnya, and Dagestan. He visited the central part of the Greater Caucasus Range, ascending peaks of Asmashi, Komito, Mount Kazbegi (Mkinvartsveri), Elbrus, Tetnuldi (along with D. Freshfield), and others. H made excellent photographs throughout various parts of the Caucasus and gathered rich botanical and mineralogical collections.

From 1905 to 1907, Déchy’s three-volume illustrated work titled “The Caucasus” was published in Berlin, in German and Hungarian. The work provides extensive information about the Caucasus Mountains, particularly the glaciers of the western Caucasus, which until the late 19th century was not well-studied. The publication includes a map of the Caucasus (scale 1:400,000). Based on his observations on the glacier of Mount Elbrus, Déchy proposed that the glaciers of the Caucasus, like those in the Alps, were retreating. This idea laid the foundation for subsequent studies of Caucasian glaciers and was later fully confirmed.

Literary works: Kaukasus. Reisen und Forschungen im Kaukasischen Hochgebirge, Bd. 2, B., 1906.

E. Lolua