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The notebook also includes a sketch of Darwin's "Tree of Life" (see image), which illustrates the common descent of all living things
Photo: STUART ROBERTS / AFP
21 years after their disappearance, the University Library in Cambridge has recovered two valuable notebooks belonging to the British naturalist Charles Darwin.
According to the university library, the manuscripts were found on the floor in a public area of the library.
They were packaged in a pink gift bag, which included an Easter greeting to the librarian: "Librarian/ Happy Easter/ X," read the message, printed on a brown envelope.
"My sense of relief at the safe return of the notebooks is immense and can hardly be adequately expressed," said University Librarian Jessica Gardner.
The manuscripts, estimated to be worth millions of pounds, are said to be in good condition and appear undamaged.
Darwin used the leather-bound notebooks in 1837 after circumnavigating the world on board the HMS Beagle and developing his theory of evolution.
One of the notebooks contains a sketch of his famous Tree of Life, the basis for his theory of natural selection and the only illustration in his major work The Origin of Species.
The family tree became a symbol of evolutionary research.
According to the university, the notebooks were taken from their room in September 2000 for a photo shoot.
They went missing for the first time during a routine check in January 2001, but for years the librarians assumed that they had simply been wrongly admitted - the library contains around ten million books, manuscripts and maps.
But even the most comprehensive search in the library's history in 2020 did not turn up Darwin's notebooks again.
Gardner then officially reported them as stolen.
The case was turned over to the police and the manuscripts were added to Interpol's database of stolen artworks.
Gardner also called on the public to help find the missing works.
According to Gardner, the library now wants to put the works on public display this summer "to give everyone the opportunity to see these remarkable notebooks in real life".
ime/AFP
