Quick Search:    advanced search

GSW Home   GeoRef Home   My GSW Alerts   Contact GSW   About GSW   Journals List   Help

Geological Magazine

This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Palmer, D. Search for Related Content

HERBERT, S. 2005. Charles Darwin, Geologist.

xxi + 485 pp. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Price £21.95, US $39.95 (hard covers). ISBN 0 8014 4348 2.

RUDWICK, M. J. S. 2005. Lyell and Darwin, Geologists. Studies in the Earth Sciences in the Age of Reform. xvii + 316 pp. Aldershot: Ashgate. Price £60.00 (hard covers). ISBN 0 86078 959 4.

The first 20% of the full text of this article appears below.

Everyone knows the outlines of the story of Darwin as the evolutionary theorist, biologist and collector of beetles, but surprisingly the story of Darwin the geologist has not been fully told until now. In some ways this is understandable as Darwin is best known for his evolutionary theory as expounded in The Origin of Species in which he went to such lengths to explain why the geological and fossil record was then so unsuitable and unreliable for his purposes. Then there has been the general misunderstanding about Darwin’s role on the Beagle expedition and the terms under which he was accepted on board by Fitzroy.

However, as Sandra Herbert reminds us in her well researched and eminently readable Charles Darwin, Geologist, Darwin’s first publications following the Beagle voyage were geological and the only ‘job’ that he ever had was as secretary to the Geological Society of London. In 1838, when just . . . [Full Text of this Article]