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Founded in 1807, the Geological Society of London became the world's first learned society devoted to the Earth sciences. In celebration of the Society's 200-year history, this book commemorates the lives of the Society's 13 founders and sets geology in its national and European context at the turn of the nineteenth century. In Britain, geology was emerging as a subject in its own right from three closely related disciplines - chemistry, mineralogy and medicine - disciplines that reflect the principal professions and interests of the founders. The tremendous energy and cooperation of these 13 men, about whom little was previously known, quickly mobilized like-minded men around the country and fuelled the nation's passion for geology; an enthusiasm that soon spread to America and Australia.

Two previously unpublished works from this period, essential to understanding the founding of the Society, are reproduced here for the first time. The book closes with a review of the Society's 2007 Bicentenary celebrations.