The Dragon Seekers by Christopher Mcgowan
The early fossilists were the extraordinary group of individuals who first identified the dinosaurs and whose discoveries helped pave the way for Darwin and the publication of "The Origin of Species" in 1859. This text chronicles the story of this circle of English men and - famously - one woman, whose palaeontological findings transformed people's perceptions of geological history and the remote past. This intriguing and eccentric group of characters includes Mary Anning, an uneducated woman who became one of the most successful fossil collectors of all time; Giles Hawkings, the black sheep of palaeontology; and the mentally unstable William Buckland, discoverer of the Megalosaurus, the world's first dinosaur. Theirs is an inspiring story that begins with the discovery of a few random bones and leads up to the recognition that giant lizards once roamed and dominated the earth.
'A most valuable guide to the mysteries of our own pastI warmly recommend it to all who wonder whence our modern world developed' John Fowles'An informative and exciting account there is an affecting lyrical beauty to McGowan's historical account' LOS ANGELES TIMES'[McGowan] writes with livliness and immediacy. The excitement those early 'dragon seekers' must have felt when making a particularly significant discovery is well-conveyed.' IRISH TIMES'The book does a good job of lifting the lid on what seemed like an intriguing sideline at the time, but eventually became one of the most important cornerstones of our current understanding of the natural world.' FOCUS'In The Dragon Seekers, Chris McGowan takes us through the 19th century social world of Jane Austen into that of Charles Dickens and sets the scene in which Charles Darwin grew up both physically and intellectually. McGowan brilliantly introduces the arcane world of early 19th century rocks and fossils for the general reader. Here the main characters are not just the human ones, such as the famous Anning family of Lyme Regis and the eccentric Dr Buckland of Oxford University but also the monsters of the real Jurassic Park with all those unpronounceable names; the extinct sea dragons such as Ichthyosaurus and dinosaurs such as Iguanodon and Hylaeosaurus.The Dragon Seekers shows how history was made
Christopher McGowan is Professor of Zoology at the University of Toronto and curator of vertebrate palaeontology at the Royal Ontario Museum.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780316857833 |
| ISBN 10 | 0316857831 |
| Title | The Dragon Seekers |
| Author | Christopher Mcgowan |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Hardback |
| Publisher | Little, Brown & Company |
| Year published | 2002-02-28 |
| Number of pages | 384 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |