WOLD COTTAGE - THE SKY IS FALLING. ...

Description

WOLD COTTAGE - THE SKY IS FALLING
L5
Wold Cottage, England
Wold Cottage played a crucial role in the scientific community's acceptance that rocks could indeed fall from the sky. In 1795, Wold Cottage crashed to Earth yards from farmworker John Shipley, the only witness to the event, which proved insufficient to convince almost anyone as to what occurred. Fortunately, Shipley's boss and owner of the Wold Cottage estate was well-known bon vivant Edward Topham. Although he'd been a scandal sheet publisher and playwright, Topham had a reputation as an honest man, which proved vital in swaying public opinion in favor of accepting his workman's claim. Certain that the stone was of great import, Topham arranged to have Wold Cottage placed on public exhibition in London. The scientific community took note, especially after it compared favorably to a rock from a similar event in Siena, Italy one year earlier. Up to this point in time, such events were either simply denied, explained away, or never fell into the embrace of science (see lot 49041); the Sienna event was dismissed by many as a fantasy of overly romantic Italians, in much the same way that Thomas Jefferson dismissed the l'Aigle event (see lot 49022). The fact that two stones from different localities had important common characteristics convinced many scientists of the stones' possible extraterrestrial origins. No one, however, imagined these rocks traveled farther away than the Moon, where it was believed volcanic eruptions propelled them to Earth. The partial slice of Wold Cottage offered here is decidedly not from the Moon but the asteroid belt. Featuring a vein of impact melt arcing across its creamy matrix, metalflake scattered throughout, this is an uncommon offering of an extremely historic meteorite. 33 x 37 x 3 mm (1.33 x 1.5 x .2 inches) and 10.28 grams.

Provenance: The Natural History Museum, London (formerly the British Museum of Natural History)



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