Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature

Description:

Third thousand. First published, 1863. Includes the frontispiece illustrating the progression of skeletons from the lesser apes through to humans. Huxley showed that in the visible characters man differs less from thehigher apes than do the latter from lower members of the same order of primates. Huxley, who earned the nickname 'Darwin's Bulldog' for his outspoken defense of the theory of evolution through natural selection, wrote this present work in response to the well-known Hippocampus minor controversy of the 1860s. Huxley challenged the paleontologist Richard Owen, who asserted that a human's brain differed qualitatively from those of other mammals. After a series of dissections of primate brains, Huxley disproved Owen's claim that only humans possessed a Hippocampus minor, a portion of the brain now known as the calcar avis.

Garrison & Morton 165.

Condition

8vo, orig. dark green cloth, blind-stamped decorative border to both boards, minor wear, some soiling, gilt title to spine, slightly dulled. text block cracked between two gatherings, but still firm. Good.