Darwin’s voyage of discovery

Posted on August 30, 2013 | in CRC | by

Freeman 10dsmall

Rare Books & Manuscripts has begun a mini-project to catalogue our new collection of first editions of the works of Charles Darwin.  This collection, generously presented by the Heiskell Bibliographical Foundation, complements our existing holdings of lifetime editions of the scientist, giving us more than 100 volumes – mostly in outstanding condition.  Darwin, whose medical studies at the University of Edinburgh were a formative influence on his later work, is now highly collectable and this is a unique opportunity to develop such a collection.   It includes two copies of the first edition of his masterpiece, “On the origin of species” (1859).  The books will be catalogued to the highest standard over the next few weeks and made available in the Centre for Research Collections.

This is a scene from the voyage of the Beagle, which famously led to Darwin developing his theory of natural selection. This is a plate showing a scene in Chile (from “Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of His Majesty’s Ships Adventure and Beagle”, London, 1839).

Comments are closed.

Follow @EdUniLibraries on Twitter

Collections

Default utility Image Archival Provenance Project: Emily’s finds               My name is Emily, and I’m the second of the two archive interns that...
Default utility Image Archival Provenance Project: a glimpse into the university’s history through some of its oldest manuscripts               My name is Madeleine Reynolds, a fourth year PhD candidate in History of Art....

Projects

Sustainable Exhibition Making: Recyclable Book Cradles In this post, our Technician, Robyn Rogers, discusses the recyclable book cradles she has developed...
Default utility Image Giving Decorated Paper a Home … Rehousing Books and Paper Bindings In the first post of this two part series, our Collection Care Technician, Robyn Rogers,...

Archives

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.