Victor von hagen biography

American explorer (1908–1985)Victor von Hagen 1984 at Boggioli, Toscana

Victor Wolfgang von Hagen (St. Louis, Missouri, United States, February 29, 1908 – Italy, March 8, 1985) was an American explorer author, archaeological historian, naturalist and anthropologist who traveled in South America with his wife (Christine, later Silvia).

Mainly between 1940 and 1965, he published a large number of widely acclaimed books about the ancient people of the Inca, Maya, and Aztecs.

Victor Wolfgang von Hagen was born on February 29, 1908, in St. Louis, Missouri, the son of Henry von Hagen and Eleanor Josephine (Stippe-Hornbach) Von Hagen.

He attended Morgan Park Military Academy, a college preparatory school in Chicago. He then went to New York University, the San Francisco University of Quito, and the University of Göttingen. During World War II he served in the US Army, 13th Infantry.

His first book, Off With Their Heads (1937), was based on an eight-month stay with a tribe of head-hunt