Orang-Outang, sive Homo Sylvestris; or, The Anatomy of a Pygmie

London: Thomas Bennet and Daniel Brown, 1699. First Edition. Hardcover. Near fine. 1st edition. Tyson's groundbreaking treatise, the first significant study in post-renaissance comparative morphology, the forerunner of all the science that connected man to his earlier ancestors, and the underpinning for Huxley's Man's Place in Nature (1863) and Darwin's Descent of Man (1871). It is in this book that Tyson established a new family of anthropoid apes standing between monkey and man, and though the results he deduced from his anatomical descriptions proved misguided, he was the first to recognize that man was a close relative of certain lower animals. Tyson did not foresee the theory of evolution, but this work stimulated others to ponder the possibility over the next 160 years, and thus contributed meaningfully to its formulation. Full dark red morocco, signed in gilt on the front inner dentelle by Sangorski (typically plain binding, as was Sangorski's custom on science books), title page foxed and with 3 former owner's signatures, folding plates with minor tears or chips to the inside corners where they are usually pulled on to open them, else a near fine copy, with the 2 pages of ads at the end. Among the foundational books of science and a beautiful copy of it, a combination not often encountered. Reference: Printing and the Mind of Man number 169 (see page 101). If we go back to the beginning, humans descended from a wormlike creature, but it shows more on some people.