PREHISTORIC ANIMAL SCULPTURES, GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND LEAD MINE ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE

PREHISTORIC ANIMAL SCULPTURES, GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND LEAD MINE ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE, CRYSTAL PALACE PARK SE19

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Overview

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: I
List Entry Number:: 1067798
Date first listed:: 29-Jun-1973
List Entry Name:: PREHISTORIC ANIMAL SCULPTURES, GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND LEAD MINE ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE
Statutory Address:: PREHISTORIC ANIMAL SCULPTURES, GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND LEAD MINE ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE, CRYSTAL PALACE PARK SE19

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Date:: 1999-08-16
Reference:: IOE01/01142/07
Rights:: © Mr Robert Smedley. Source: Historic England Archive

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: I
List Entry Number:: 1067798
Date first listed:: 29-Jun-1973
Date of most recent amendment:: 06-Aug-2007
List Entry Name:: PREHISTORIC ANIMAL SCULPTURES, GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND LEAD MINE ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE
Statutory Address 1:: PREHISTORIC ANIMAL SCULPTURES, GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND LEAD MINE ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE, CRYSTAL PALACE PARK SE19

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:: PREHISTORIC ANIMAL SCULPTURES, GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND LEAD MINE ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE, CRYSTAL PALACE PARK SE19

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

County:: Greater London Authority
District:: Bromley (London Borough)
Parish:: Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:: TQ3447970494

Details

This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 12/08/2011

785/4/209 29-JUN-73

CRYSTAL PALACE PARK SE19 PENGE / BECKENHAM PREHISTORIC ANIMAL SCULPTURES, GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS AND LEAD MINE ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE (Formerly listed as: CRYSTAL PALACE PARK SE19 PENGE / BECKENHAM 27 PREHISTORIC MONSTERS ON ISLANDS AND ON LAND FACING THE LOWER LAKE)

GV

I Sculptures of prehistoric animals with associated geological strata including lead mine. Constructed between 1852 and 1855 for The Crystal Palace Company on a twenty acre site. The prehistoric animals were constructed out of re-constituted stone on a framework of iron rods on brick plinths by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, an artist and sculptor who specialised in natural history subjects, with advice on their authenticity by Sir Richard Owen. The associated geological strata and lead mine were probably laid out by David Thomas Ansted, consulting geologist, but constructed by James Campbell using geological rocks. The landscape was designed to represent the geology of Britain from the Primary (Pre-Cambrian and Lower Palaeolithic) rocks through the Secondary (Upper Palaeolithic-Upper Cretaceous) and Tertiary (Tertiary and Quaternary) eras with economic rocks, geological structures and reconstructions of associated animals and reptiles on the lakeside and islands. To the south west of the site facing the lower lake is a cliff constructed to illustrate the coal formation with old red sandstone at the base, new red sandstone above and mountain limestone and millstone grit above this. To the south west of this is a three quarters scale representation of a Derbyshire lead mine with cave complete with stalactites. To the east is the Secondary island illustrating the Secondary era with geological features including tilted red sandstone and in turn Lias Oolite and Wealden rocks, surmounted by chalk at the head of the island. On top of the rocks are reconstructions of animals recovered from these geological formations, two Dicynodonts and three Labrinthodonts from New Red Sandstone, three Icthyosaurs and three Plesiosaurs from the Lias, two Teleosaurus, two Pterodactyls re-constructed in fibreglass of the Oolite and Chalk, one Megalosaurus from Stonefield Slate and its prey from the Weald, two Iguanodons and one Hyaelosaurus and the chalk marine monster Mosasaurus. Originally the lake water rose and fell as the park fountains played, alternately submerging and revealing the aquatic animals. Separated from the Secondary island by a weir is the Tertiary island with animals placed on a geological backdrop of worked aggregates representing this era's relatively unconsolidated rocks. These comprise two Palaeotheriums and three Anoplotheriums from the Paris basin, one Megatherium from South America and four Megaceros or "Irish Elk". Further planned reconstructions for the Secondary era and none of the Primary era were ever constructed because the project ran into financial difficulties and was terminated in 1855.

STATEMENT OF IMPORTANCE: This was the first attempt to accurately re-construct the three dinosaur species known to the scientific world by the 1850s within their geological environment and the sculptures and associated geological strata form a unique display of the state of palaeological understanding in the 1850s, opened five years before the publication of Darwin's "Origin of Species". Of exceptional historic interest in a national and probably international context.

[Samuel Phillips "Guide of the Crystal Palace Park" 1854. "Country Life" 14th Nov 1968. Steve McCarthy and Mick Gilbert "The story of the world's fist prehistoric sculptures" Published by The Crystal PAlace Foundation 1994. Various publications by Peter Doyle 1993-2002.]

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:: 358429
Legacy System:: LBS

Sources

Books and journals
McCarthy, S, Gilbert, M, Crystal Palace Dinosaurs: The Story of the World's First Prehistoric Sculptures, (1994)
'Country Life' in 14 November, (1968)

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.