The Dragon Seekers : The Discovery of Dinosaurs Before Darwin - Softcover

Christopher Mcgowan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0349117101 ISBN 13: 9780349117102

Publisher: Abacus, 2003

Synopsis

THE DRAGON SEEKERS is a book about the early fossilists, that 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.THE DRAGON SEEKERS chronicles the story of a circle of English men and - famously - one woman whose palaeontological findings transformed people's perceptions of geological history and the remote past. Its 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. It is an inspiring and fascinating 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. Previous books have focused on individual fossilists. THE DRAGON SEEKERS treats them as a distinct group charting their rivalries alongside their discoveries.

About this title

About the Author

Christopher McGowan is Professor of Zoology at the University of Toronto and curator of vertebrate palaeontology at the Royal Ontario Museum.

From AudioFile

McGowan is a zoology professor at the University of Toronto and curator of paleobiology at the Royal Museum of Ontario, so he knows whereof he speaks. Here he recounts the intriguing story of the early nineteenth-century English fossil hunters, who collectively established that very large reptiles (dinosaurs) once roamed the earth. Attempts to reconcile this growing body of evidence with the Genesis creation story occupied much attention in the decades preceding Darwin's ORIGIN OF THE SPECIES. Stuart Langston's reading is admirably straightforward. He speaks clearly, seems comfortable with reptilian nomenclature, and tells the story in a full-speed-ahead manner. R.E.K. © AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Edition details

• Publisher: Abacus
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0349117101
• ISBN 13: 9780349117102
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English