Description

George V. 1910-1936. Gold Medal 1910 (awarded 1928), 296.99 g. Royal Society, King's Medal. By B. Mackennal. Bust, bare. GEORGIVS V REX SOC : REG : LOND : PATRONVS MDCCCX. Rv. Statue of NEWTON between drawings of his theories of the planetary solar system and the 66th proposition of the Principia. REGIS MVNIFICENTIA ARBITRIO SOCIETATIS. Edge engraving: PROF. ROBERT BROOM, F.R.S. 1928. 72.4 mm. Eimer 1915. BHM 4003. Vorzüglich-FDC / About Uncirculated. Im beschädigten Originaletui / In heavily worn original box.

From the auction Gerhard Hirsch Nachf. 243/244, Munich, February 2006, lot 4400.

The Royal Society is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, recognising excellence in science, supporting outstanding science, providing scientific advice for policy, education and public engagement and fostering international and global co-operation.

Founded on 28 November 1660, it was granted a royal charter by King Charles II and is the oldest continuously existing scientific academy in the world.

In 1703, Sir Isaac Newton (25 December 1642 - 20 March 1727) was made president of the Royal Society. He was an English polymath active as a mathematician, physicist, astronomer, alchemist, theologian, and author. Newton was a key figure in the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment that followed. His book Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy), first published in 1687, achieved the first great unification in physics and established classical mechanics. Newton also made seminal contributions to optics, and shares credit with German mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz for formulating infinitesimal calculus, though he developed the calculus years before Leibniz. He contributed to and refined the scientific method, and his work is considered the most influential in bringing forth modern science.

The medal was awarded to Robert Broom (30 November 1866 - 6 April 1951) who was a British-South African medical doctor and palaeontologist. He qualified as a medical practitioner in 1895 and received his DSc in 1905 from the University of Glasgow.