The Descent of Humankind

Fernand Cormon (1845–1924) Detail of The Stone Age: Return from a Bear Hunt (detail), 1884

Darwin was convinced that humans had developed from an ape-like ancestor, and he explored the implications of this aspect of evolution in his book, The Descent of Man. In fact, this was the aspect of Darwinism that was by far the most familiar-and notorious-to the nineteenth-century public, and remains so today. Satirists seized on it immediately; Darwin himself was famously caricatured as an ape, while monkeys were often given human features.

Darwin and others argued that the human species was not a separate unique creation but had evolved from an animal state. There had never been a Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve lived in a perfect state and entirely at ease. From the start men had needed to struggle against hostile conditions and the destructive force of their own passions. They had gradually formed social groups with language and a moral code. But only the best-adapted had survived.

Odilon Redon (1840–1916) Les Origines (detail, 1883)

Odilon Redon (1840–1916) “The impotent wing did not lift the animal into that black space,” detail, plate 7 from Les Origines, 1883

George Frederic Watts (1817–1904) Evolution, (detail 1898–1904)

Artists now pictured early human life as harsh, brutish, and violent. Some, such as Fernand Cormon, aimed at realism, but still gave prehistoric man ideal propor­tions, like the figures in ancient classical and Renaissance art that had influenced his own artistic training. Others, such as G.F. Watts, expressed a troubled response to Darwin’s ideas through myths and symbols. Odilon Redon’s series of lithographs Les Origines evoked the mystery of life forms in constant flux, with human features emerging from the shapes of marine, terrestrial, and airborne creatures.

Belief in evolution brought with it the idea that man was still progressing toward ever more advanced states of being. In the age of imperialism, indigenous peoples in colonial territories were looked on as ’savages’, who had failed to develop to the same level as Europeans. Some anthropologists thought that the various races were distinct species. Darwin affirmed that ‘all the races of man’ had a single ancestor, but he assumed that they were very unequal in their mental and cultural attainments, stating, ‘When civilised nations come into contact with barbarians the struggle is short’. In the great struggle for existence, he believed, indigenous peoples such as Australian aborigines and Tasmanians were doomed to extinction.

Thomas Bock (1790–1855) Detail of Jenny, Wife of Timmy, Native of Port Sorell, c. 1837–43

Negretti and Zambra, the models of Zulus at the Crystal Palace, early 1860s

Charles Woolley (1834–1922) Tasmanian Aboriginal women, “Bessy Clarke” and “Patty,” in 1866, (enlarged copies by J. W. Beattie of Hobart, Australia), c. 1895

Notions of race discussed by scientists were shared with the public at large. Photography played a crucial role here, as it did in many aspects of nineteenth-century life. Cheaply available carte de visite (visiting card) photographs included many ‘native types’, which contrasted with the portraits of ‘civilised’ Europeans. Often they highlighted the ‘primitive’ customs that so fascinated the public.

Anonymous ‘Krao’ the ‘Missing Link.’ A Living Proof of Darwin’s Theory of the Descent of Man, (enlarged copies by J. W. Beattie of Hobart, Australia), 1883 (erroneously inscribed 1887)

There was a constant flow of ideas and images between the world of anthropologists and that of commercial entertainment, in which Darwin’s theories were prominent. The display of lifelike models of ‘Bushmen’ and Zulus at the Crystal Palace in Sydenham had, it was claimed, a serious basis in science, and after the publication of On the Origin of Species they could be viewed in an evolutionary light. At the same time, groups of tribal peoples who were exhibited on the London stage were often photographed, and the images were used for scientific purposes.

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