Abstract
THE Crisp Award and Medal for 1940 of the Linnean Society was presented to Mr. D. J. Scourfield, in recognition of the importance of his paper on “The Oldest Known Fossil Insect”, recently read before the Society and summarized on p. 799 of this issue of NATURE. The Award, which was established in 1912 by a donation from the late Sir Frank Crisp, formerly treasurer of the Society, is given “as a reward for the best paper, dealing with microscopical research by a Fellow, published by the Society since the previous award”. By the terms of the donation it is given “at intervals of not less than five years” but, actually, the period has generally been much longer. No doubt it has been found difficult to define the type of research that could strictly be termed “microscopical”, since there are few branches of biological work which do not require at least the occasional use of the microscope. In the case of Mr. Scourfield's paper, however, no doubt could arise, since it was only his unusual skill and long experience in microscopical manipulation that enabled him to elucidate so convincingly the structure of these minute and obscure fossils from the Rhynie Chert. He had already done the same for another arthropod from the same deposit, the remarkable crustacean Lepido-caris, described in his well-known memoir published by the Royal Society in 1926. The debt that British biology owes to the work of amateur microscopists has often been pointed out. Mr. Scourfield worthily sustains the tradition of a long line of distinguished predecessors.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Linnean Society: Crisp Medallist. Nature 145, 806 (1940). https://doi.org/10.1038/145806b0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/145806b0