Field guides and publications

We have a long tradition of publishing information and advice for those undertaking exploratory journeys and carrying out field research in remote and challenging environments around the world.

The pocket guidebook Hints to Travellers – perhaps the Victorian equivalent of a Lonely Planet guide – was first published by the Society in 1854, and Hints to Lady Travellers in 1889, followed by a variety of travel medicine publications. Specialist articles on field research techniques often appeared in the Society’s periodicals, including The Geographical Journal, and were later distributed as off-prints.

In the early 1980s, the Society’s Expedition Advisory Centre began to publish a series of logistics manuals for those exploring remote and challenging environments, followed in the 1990s by a series of field research manuals for expeditionary scientists undertaking biodiversity surveys and field mapping.

The Oxford Handbook of Expedition and Wilderness Medicine (Oxford University Press, 2023), derived from the RGS Expedition Medicine Manual (Profile Books, 2002), is now in its third edition and remains the authoritative work on the subject.

More recently, the much-respected RGS Expedition Handbook (Profile Books, 2004) – a direct descendant of Hints to Travellers and the Expedition Planners’ Handbook series – has been reimagined as a collection of digital resources in the RGS Explore Resource Hub.

The Society’s publishing tradition continues today in support of modern geographical exploration, with in-house publications available to order and download in print and digital formats.

Out-of-print titles are available to consult in the Foyle Reading Room, and those under contract to external publishers or endorsed by the Society via major booksellers and libraries.