1860: Archaeopteryx - The book of science

Archaeopteryx
Ontology (phylogeny)
Making connections
Commentary

Richard Owen, Thomas Henry Huxley evolution

Archaeopteryx

Our little friend Archie
talks to all of us
with feathers and wings even if it cannot fly
claws and teeth even if it cannot frighten
a bird to lovers of birds
an ancient reptile
to lovers of dinosaurs
between pages of limestone
as the rarest pressed flower
induces a state of mind that bridges
present and past
imagines reality
and recognizes the unrecognized
giving us a time, a precedent,
170 million years ago,
when denial of precedent
reached this delicate passage.

Ontology (phylogeny)

The embryo of the bird
recapitulates
its history written in stones.
The Solnhofen limestones of Bavaria
used for fine lithographic printing
were found preprinted
with delicate asymmetrical feathers
and fragile bones
retelling a story finer than history
makes its own world new
and the new world its own.

Making connections

In this light
exposed in the interstices of stone
we think
of fears
errors
failures
yet we may leap instantly
between symbol and name
name and individual
individual and species
believing and seeing.
To say a thing is possible
almost admits it has happened.
A point on the hyperbole
arbitrarily close to the asymptotic
might never be reached.
Faith is as inexplicable as love,
whatever works
and whatever reason cannot muster.
Yet nothing could be easier.
To refuse is almost as if
being human were a weakness
not a strength.

Palaeontologists today think that Archaeopteryx was not the first bird, although it is a good candidate for the transition between dinosaurs and birds. Like a therapod dinosaur, Archaeopteryx had small teeth and a long bony tail. Like a bird, Archaeopteryx had a wishbone, wings with asymmetrical flight feathers, and broad feathers on its tail. It was the size of raven or smaller.