Tree of Life, Charles Darwin

Artwork Overview

Charles Darwin, Tree of Life
Charles Darwin
1860
Tree of Life, 1860
Portfolio/Series title: On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or, The preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life, London: J. Murray
Where object was made: London, England, United Kingdom
Credit line: Spencer Research Library,Department of Special Collections, Ellis Aves B110
Accession number: EL2009.017
Not on display

If you wish to reproduce this image, please submit an image request

Images

Label texts

Exhibition Label: "Trees & Other Ramifications: Branches in Nature & Culture," Mar-2009, Steve Goddard Darwin’s On the origin of species is a founding work in the field of evolutionary biology. This, the only illustration in the book, is a visualization of Darwin’s concept of natural selection with species branching into new species, some becoming extinct while others survive and branch again. Darwin wrote in conclusion to his discussion of this diagram: “As buds give rise by growth to fresh buds, and these, if vigorous, branch out and overtop on all sides many a feebler branch, so by generation I believe it has been with the great Tree of Life, which fills with its dead and broken branches the crust of the earth, and covers the surface with its ever-branching and beautiful ramifications.”