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Cambridge University Library: Decades of searching
Photo: Cambridge University Library / dpa
Two precious notebooks by the British naturalist Charles Darwin were probably stolen from the University Library in Cambridge around 20 years ago.
The case has now been forwarded to the police, said library director Jessica Gardner.
The manuscripts were added to Interpol's database of stolen works of art.
At the same time, she called on the public to help find the missing works.
One of the notebooks from 1837 contained a sketch of Darwin's later "Tree of Life", the basis for his theory of natural selection and the only illustration in his main work "The Origin of Species".
The family tree became a symbol of evolutionary research.
Missed for 20 years
According to the university, the two notebooks were removed from her room in September 2000 for a photo op.
They were first missing during a routine inspection in January 2001, but an oversight was suspected - the library contains around ten million books, manuscripts and maps.
After the disappearance of the manuscripts, your predecessors assumed for years that the books had been put on the wrong shelf and would reappear, said director Jessica Gardner, who has headed the library since 2017.
"As a new team, we rolled out what happened back then and came to the conclusion that the steps taken so far were not enough."
But even after the most comprehensive search in the history of the university library this year, the two notebooks did not turn up again.
Therefore, according to the library, the curators now assume “that they were probably stolen”.
They were valued at several million pounds.
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lmd / AFP