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Oxford

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The Footnote June 27, 2026 · Oxford University Museum

The Oxford Meeting on 30 June 1860 Where the Bishop Asked if Thomas Huxley Was Descended From an Ape on His Grandfather's or Grandmother's Side

At the British Association meeting in Oxford on 30 June 1860, seven months after Darwin's *Origin of Species*, the Bishop of Oxford Samuel Wilberforce asked T. H. Huxley whether he claimed descent from apes on his grandfather's or grandmother's side. Huxley reportedly replied that he would rather be descended from an ape than from a bishop who used his great abilities to obscure the truth. The exchange did not happen exactly as the legend records.

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The Footnote June 27, 2026 · Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin

The Ten-Year-Old Pretender Who Was Crowned King of England in Dublin in 1487 and Then Worked in Henry VII's Kitchen

Lambert Simnel was crowned Edward VI of England in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, on 24 May 1487, aged about 10. He was a baker's son being impersonated by Yorkist conspirators as the imprisoned Earl of Warwick. After his army lost the Battle of Stoke Field, Henry VII pardoned him and put him to work in the royal kitchens as a spit-turner.

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The Cabinet June 24, 2026 · Syon Park, London

The English Mathematician Who Saw Sunspots Six Months Before Galileo and Published Nothing

Thomas Harriot observed sunspots in December 1610 — months before Galileo's published priority claim — telescopically observed the Moon weeks before Galileo's *Sidereus Nuncius*, and worked out the law of refraction twenty years before Snell. He published almost none of it. He died in 1621 of nasal cancer leaving over 8,000 pages of unpublished manuscripts.

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