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Tom Sharpe @tomsharperocks.bsky.social

25 July 1829: Bristol artist & fossil collector George Cumberland publishes an article about fossil marine reptiles, highlighting the important contributions of 'three female pioneers' at Lyme Regis: #MaryAnning, Anne Congreve and Elizabeth Philpot, and of Etheldred Benett in Wiltshire.

Extract from Cumberland's article: 'Fossil Saurians. Several beautiful specimens of fossil saurians, or animals of the lizard tribe, have, as our scientific readers are aware, been found at Lyme, in Dorsetshire; but the world would to this day have remained ignorant of the treasures England possessed, but for the patient labours of three female pioneers in this service, viz. Mary Anning, a dealer; Miss Congrieve, and Miss Philpots, residents, who for years had been collecting and preserving these bodies from the wreck of the coast; the two last without any other view than the gratification of a laudable curiosity, and who, with unequalled liberality, communicated their collections to every man of science that visited the place; and it is to liberal minds like theirs, and Miss Bennet's, of Wiltshire that we owe the first rescuing of these natural gens from the spoilers.'
jul 25, 2025, 8:55 am • 37 12

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