Evolution.- Teilhard de Chardin (Pierre) Le Phénomène Humain, privately issued, Rome, [28 October 1948].

Evolution.- Teilhard de Chardin (Pierre) Le Phénomène Humain, privately issued, original roan-backed wrappers, later paper label taped to spine, spine ends worn, 4to, Rome, [28 October 1948].

*** Extremely rare and seemingly unrecorded privately issued edition of Teilhard de Chardin's famous work on evolution.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was born in 1881 and died in New York 1955. He was a Jesuit priest, paleontologist and one of the most important and original thinkers of the 20th century. The years 1908-1912 were critical in his intellectual formation. He was profoundly influenced by Henri Bergson's 'Evolution Creatice' which began his lifelong interest in evolution. He became professor of geology at the Catholic Institute of Paris. However soon his ideas about evolution were considered unorthodox by his religious superiors and he was forbidden to teach. He stayed for a long time in China doing extensive research on mammalian fossil fauna. He was an advisor to the Geological Survey of China and undertook many expeditions one of which unearthed the skull of the Peking man (Sinanthropus pekinensis). The Church later forbade the publication of this work in 1950, and it was not until after his death in 1955 that it was published.