The Dragon Seekers: How An Extraordinary Cicle Of Fossilists Discovered The Dinosaurs And Paved The Way For DarwinAgainst the backdrop of the Industrial Revolution, an extraordinary circle of fossilists struggled to make sense of a mysterious, prehistoric world--a world they had to piece together from the fossilized and often fragmentary remains of animals never before seen. In this transporting, seamlessly written book, Christopher McGowan takes us back to a time when geology and paleontology were as young and vibrant as genetic engineering is today. The nineteenth-century pioneers of these new disciplines were an eccentric lot, from different social classes and sexes, with a range of motivations in fossil hunting. These "Dragon Seekers" sought to persuade a populace raised on a literal interpretation of Genesis that the ground they walked was once a very frightening and unfamiliar place. A sweeping narrative history, The Dragon Seekers shows how these remarkable characters forever changed our interpretation of the world and its inhabitants. |
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Contents
In the Beginning | 4 |
Dragons by the Sea | 14 |
The Scriptures and the Rocks | 32 |
Chalk Pits and Leeches | 44 |
The World of Darkness | 54 |
Revelation | 68 |
The Tooth of the Iguana | 84 |
Just Causes | 96 |
Mr König Regrets | 136 |
The Professor and the Naturalist | 152 |
Landslides Glaciers and Riots | 168 |
Of Dinosaurs and Species | 178 |
Decline and Fall | 196 |
Beside the Sea | 206 |
Notes | 222 |
242 | |
Common terms and phrases
Agassiz ammonites anatomy animals Anning's appeared audience beach Beche belonged Blue Lias bones British Museum Buckland cave chalk Charlesworth cliff coast collection collectors Conybeare Conybeare's creatures Cretaceous Cuckfield Cuvier Darwin dinosaur discovered discovery Dorset Earth England Eurhinosaurus Excalibosaurus extinct feet fish fossil record fossilists Geological Society giant glaciers Hawkins Hawkins's Hunterian hyena ichthyosaur iguana Iguanodon journal entry Kirkdale Konig later lecture length Leptonectes letter he wrote limestone living lizard London Lyell Lyme Regis mammals Mantell marine marl Mary Megalosaurus modern Natural History Museum Noachian flood Origin of Species Owen's Oxford paleontology plaster plesiosaur probably pterosaur published quarry quarrymen reference remains remarkable reptiles restorations ribs Richard Owen rocks Royal shale sils skeleton skull specimen Stonesfield strata Sussex teeth Tilgate tion told took tooth transmutation transmutation of species trustees vertebrae William Buckland