Burnes, Sir Alexander,1805–41, British traveler in India. As an army officer in India, he studied Asian languages. In 1832 he left Lahore in Afghan dress and traveled by way of Peshawar and Kabul across the Hindu Kush to Balkh and from there by Bukhara, Asterabad, and Tehran to Bushire. In 1839 he was appointed political resident at Kabul, where he was assassinated two years later.
See his Narrative of a Visit to the Court of Scinde (1830) and Travels into Bokhara (1834).
