LONDON (Reuters) – A microscope that Charles Darwin gave to his son Leonard and which has remained in the family for nearly 200 years will be auctioned in December and is expected to raise up to $480,000.
The instrument was designed by Charles Gould for the Cary company around 1825, and is one of six still extant microscopes associated with the British naturalist, according to auction house Christie’s.
The date of its production coincides with the time when Darwin was studying zoophiles, organisms such as corals and sea anemones.
“It’s amazing to look through this and see the microscopic world that Darwin would have seen in the 1820s and 1830s,” James Hyslop, head of Department, Scientific Instruments, Globes and Natural History at Christie’s, told Reuters.
“In the later part of his life, in 1858, there is a wonderful letter he wrote to his eldest son saying that young Lenny was under his microscope and he said ‘oh daddy, I would be so happy with this all my life ‘. It’s wonderful to have this familiar Charles Darwin connection just before he became internationally famous.”
Darwin published his groundbreaking work “The Origin of Species” in 1859.
The microscope will be offered at Christie’s Valuable Books and Manuscripts auction on December 15, and the price is estimated at between 250,000 and 350,000 pounds ($343,050 and $480,270).
(By Marissa Davison)
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