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Timepiece linked to Darwin voyage cannot leave UK

Tanya Gupta
BBC News, West Midlands
Getty Images Charles Darwin seen in a black and white engraving from a photograph by Ernest Edwards, dated 1871. He has very bushy eyebrows and a long beard, and he is wearing a Victorian suit and shirt.Getty Images
Charles Darwin was an English naturalist, born in Shrewsbury

A timepiece used on a seagoing voyage by the HMS Beagle – the ship that carried Charles Darwin on his travels – has been placed under an export bar, meaning it cannot leave the UK.

The move by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport is to allow time for a UK gallery or institution to buy the pocket chronometer, used aboard the vessel from 1831 to 1836.

The voyage is known for taking Shropshire-born naturalist Darwin to the Galapagos islands, where he carried out work that led to his groundbreaking theory of evolution.

Work also took place to test scientific instruments, helping to establish Greenwich in London as the home of timekeeping.

Chronometers are highly-accurate timepieces made for marine navigation, and this device had been made in London in 1830, a year before the ship embarked

By the time the HMS Beagle returned to Britain, it had only lost 33 seconds over five years.

Dr Tim Pestell, a member of the reviewing committee on the Export of Works of Art, said the 1831-36 voyage was "most popularly associated" with Darwin, but its role in testing scientific instruments was less well known.

He said it would be a "tragedy" for the chronometer to be lost to the nation.

Getty Images A black and white illustration of the HMS Beagle in Straits of Magellan, dated 1890. Mountains can be seen in the distance and there are smaller boats nearby, with people on them.Getty Images
Scientific instruments were also being tested on HMS Beagle

Arts Minister Sir Chris Bryant said Darwin was one of the most well-known figures in the nation's history.

He said the chronometer not only played a part in Darwin's research, but also strengthened Britain's leading position in navigation.

Getty Images Illustrations of finches with beaks adapted to different diets observed by Charles Darwin in September-October 1835 in the Galapagos Islands. The black and white drawings show four pictures of birds, each with differently-shaped beaks. The drawings are numbered and the page is headed Ornithology.Getty Images
Charles Darwin, who observed these finches and their varying beaks on the voyage, developed his theory of evolution during the period

The success of the voyage was put down to the use of chronometers, which measure time with great precision and determine longitude - the imaginary, vertical lines on maps and globes that converge at the North Pole and South Pole.

Greenwich, after the voyage, became internationally-accepted as the Prime Meridian, where longitude is zero.

The Greenwich Meridian provides the measurement and name for the time zone, Greenwich Mean Time.

Valued at £200,000, the chronometer went out of service in 1906 and later passed through the hands of collectors in London and Cambridge.

The export bar remains in place until 10 October.

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