Perhaps the world's most famous fossil―it's certainly one of the most exquisite―is Archaeopteryx, the feathered bird-dinosaur known from a handful of specimens from the Jurassic limestone of Bavaria. Paul Chambers, a micropalaeontologist turned freelance writer and TV producer, tells lots of good stories about the few specimens found since the first discovery in 1861, which was perfectly timed to follow the publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species. He also shows how they (and other early bird fossils) reflect changes in the scientific and religious worlds since then.
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