Ruge was born in the Frisian town of
Dorum located near
Geestemünde in the
Kingdom of Hanover. His father of Christoph August Ruge (1790–1834) was from
Neuhaus/Oste and was a doctor in medicine. During the
Battle of Waterloo, he was an English field doctor, he later moved to
Cuxhaven and in 1817, he was physician in Dorum, there he later married the lawyer's daughter Elise Hennings (1804–?). Ruge later studied in
Göttingen and
Halle. In 1872, he became professor in geography and ethnography at the
Technische Hochschule de Dresden (Dresden Technical High School) where he headed until his death. He later married Anna Caecilie Busse (1830–1903) and had children including Frieda Elisa (1860–?), Reinhold Friedrich (1862–?), Walther Karl Theodor (1865–?, geographer) and Elsbeth Sophie (1870–?). He took charge of producing the second edition of the review and enlarged
Geschichte der Erdkunde , by Peschel, published in 1887 which he earned him a recognition and consideration of geographers and historians of the time. One work that was most personal
Geschichte des Zeitalters des Entdeckungen (
History During the Age of Discovery), made between 1881 and 1883 in the Oncken Collection, enshrined his reputation as a geography historian. Ruge started to revise and actualized numerous works about its essays. In 1878, he published
Die Geschichte der Erdkunde (
History of Geography), founded by
Oscar Peschel and in 1887,
Die Erdbeschreibung (
Description of the Land) founded by
Franz Heinrich Ungewitter. He published numerous works, published a large numerous of books related to geographic history, it includes an important study from 1903 about Portuguese discoveries in Africa as well as the Azores. He was one of the most listened critics in the area of historiography of European expansion, with the notable erudition on the security of his options. He intensely contributed to periodicals including
Petermanns Mittelungen and
Jahrbuch de Wagner (
Wagner Yearbook), where he left and important scattered contribution. In 1863, he founded the
Dresden Geographic Society (
Dresdner Verein für Erdkunde) alongside
Karl Andree (sometimes as Karl Andrée), which he headed for around three decades. He was also member of the
Kgl. Sächsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig (
Kingdom of Saxony Academy of Sciences of Leipzig) and the
Saxon Academy of Sciences (
Sächsischen Akademie der Wissenschafte) and many other geographic societies in Germany and abroad. Prof. Dr. Sophus Ruge died on 23 December 1903 at the age of 72 in
Klotzsche, near Dresden. He was later buried at
Alten Friedhof Klotzsche (Old Klotzsche Cemetery). In
Dresdner Sudvörstadt, a street named Rugestraße (
Rugestrasse) is named for him. ==Works==