Proceedings of the Linnean Society 1838-1967

Description:

The Proceedings of the Linnean Society commenced in 1838 (the Proceedings for 1856-1865 were published in the Journal of Proceedings of the Linnean Society; its contents over the years varied between scientific papers and reports on annual sessions and other administrative information about the society. The journal was published 1838-1968. Presented here is a scarce run 1838-1967. A remarkable record of the scientific output of the Society. Early volumes which were not illustrated, they included contributions from leading naturalists of the day such as: George Bentham, John Blackwall, John Curtis, Edward Doubleday, Edward Forbes, Joseph Hooker, F.W. Hope, Edwin Quekett, John Obadiah Westwood, etc.

The Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society contains a brief record of one of the most famous events in the history of science the reading of a joint communication at the Linnean Society on 1st July 1858 by the Secretary J. J Bennet of Charles Darwin’s and Alfred Russel Wallace’s revolutionary theories of evolution as follows

‘Read, first, a Letter from Sir Charles Lyell, F.L.S., and Dr. J. D. Hooker, F.L.S., addressed to the Secretary, as introductory to the following Papers on the laws which affect the production of Varieties, Races, and Species, viz.: —

1. An "Extract from a MS. Work on Species, by Charles Darwin, Esq., F.R.S., F.L.S., &c., sketched in 1839 and copied in 1844."

2. An "Abstract of a Letter addressed by Mr. Darwin to Professor Asa Gray, of Boston, U.S., in October 1857."

3. An "Essay on the Tendency of Varieties, &c. to depart indefinitely from the Original Type," by A. R. Wallace, Esq.’

The full scientific papers were published separately by the Society 20th August 1858, in the Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society (Zoology and the Botany Series).

The journal presented here also includes the famous statement about the scientific progress of the Linnean society for 1858, by the President of the Linnean Society Thomas Bell (May 24th, 1859) who spectacularly failed to recognise or understand the significance of the July meeting stating: ‘The year which has passed… has not, indeed, been marked by any of those striking discoveries which at once revolutionise, so to speak, the department of science on which they bear; it is only at remote intervals that we can reasonably expect any sudden and brilliant innovation which shall produce a marked and permanent impress on the character of any branch of knowledge, or confer a lasting and important service on mankind’,

Later volumes included large papers on a wide range of topics and Symposia for example Vol. 169 (1956-57) includes: Botanical Exploration to the Time of Linnaeus, William T. Stearn; Biogeographical Research in High Simien (Northern Ethiopia), 1952-53, Hugh Scott; Symposium on Water Pollution; Symposium on Apomixis; Darwin-Wallace Centenary Celebrations July, 1958 and Linnaeus' Systema Naturae Bi-Centenary etc.

Proceedings for 1888-89 includes an original letter, dated May 21st, 1884 from a member of the famous Royal Vineyard Nursery in Hammersmith, to the botanist James Britten (1846-1924), concerning the possible purchase of a portrait of the botanist and plant collector Frances Masson (1741-1805). The painting was subsequently presented to the Linnean Society by William Carruthers, in 1887.

Condition

28 vols, 8vo, 20 vols in half-leather, scuffed, worn; 8 vols in library buckram; all with leather title pieces; Vol. I: lacks spine, front board detached; bookplate of the British botanist Norman Douglas Simpson, (1890-1974); Vol. 1862-1867: spine torn, front board partly detached, lacking 4 pages. Withdrawn from an institutional library. Good.