Catalogue of the "Beagle" Collection of Rocks, made by Darwin during the voyage of H.M.S. "Beagle".

An introduction by John van Wyhe

Charles Darwin's geological specimens collected during the voyage of the Beagle (1831-6) were used in writing his geological accounts of the voyage. See Geology of the Voyage of the Beagle. The collection was later donated to what is today the Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences in Cambridge in 1896-1897.

The petrologist and honorary curator of the Cambridge Petrological Museum, Alfred Harker (1859-1939), made a fair copy of Darwin's original four geological specimen notebooks. Harker explains his annotations here. Records of the original notebooks can be found in the Darwin Online manuscript catalogue: CUL-DAR236.1, CUL-DAR236.2, CUL-DAR236.3, CUL-DAR236.4

The catalogue was photographed by John van Wyhe and Kees Rookmaaker in June 2007 with the kind assistance and permission of Sarah Finney and David Norman of the Sedgwick Museum.

See also: Harker, A. 1907. Notes on the rocks of the "Beagle" Collection. Geological Magazine 5th ser. 4: 100-106. Image A104

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John van Wyhe
June 2007

[Harker, Alfred. c.1907.] Sedgwick Museum. Catalogue of the "Beagle" Collection of Rocks, made by Charles Darwin during the voyage of H.M.S. "Beagle", 1832-6. Text Image HarkerCatalogue

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