By Elizaveta Lepikhova
On September 15, 1835 (191 years ago), HMS Beagle arrived in the Galápagos Islands, where Charles Darwin spent several weeks observing the archipelago’s volcanic landscapes and distinctive wildlife. He was especially struck by how closely related animals varied from one island to another.
Darwin did not arrive in the Galápagos with a theory of evolution. But the specimens and observations he gathered there became important evidence as he later developed his theory of evolution by natural selection. More than two decades after the voyage, Darwin published On the Origin of Species (1859), fundamentally changing how scientists understood the diversity of life.
This 1845 map, published in Darwin’s Journal of Researches, captures the islands that helped turn a voyage of exploration into one of the most consequential ideas in the history of science.
Map source:
Galápagos Archipelago, in Charles Darwin, Journal of Researches, 2nd ed. (1845), p. 372. Retrieved September 15th from Darwin Online.