This edition, which was offered at Anderson and Garland’s sale in Newcastle on November 7, had been consigned from the city library to raise funds for new technology. The five volumes had been published in quarto format in two bindings of half calf from 1840-3 with 166 lithographs, half of them coloured. Edited by Darwin and featuring contributions by ornithologist John Gould and zoologist Richard Owen, the copy was sold to the London trade at £43,000, plus an amount in buyer’s premium (15%) that was more than the auctioneers had expected the book as a whole to fetch.
The Voyage of H.M.S Beagle edited by Charles Darwin
UK: The Voyage of H.M.S Beagle is a summary of fauna discovered by Charles Darwin on his travels through the Southern Hemisphere from 1831-6, and became crucial to the formulation of his brutal creed: “survival of the fittest”.
