The Public Domain Review is an online journal and not-for-profit project dedicated to the exploration of curious and compelling works from the history of art, literature, and ideas.
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Long before they became symbols of climate change, polar bears helped shape Charles Darwin’s revolutionary ideas about how species adapt to their environments.
In Georgian Britain, Edward Jenner’s smallpox vaccine sparked panic over “beastly” side effects, exposing how new science can collide with old beliefs.
Long before modern science warned of global warming, the Founding Fathers believed human activity was reshaping the planet’s climate—and they set out to prove it.
At the turn of the 20th century, mathematicians, mystics, and modernists blurred the line between physics and philosophy. Their search for a hidden spatial realm—the so-called “fourth dimension”—transformed art, inspired the occult, and reimagined the very structure of reality.
With skillful pigeon portraits and a daring act of literary piracy, Pauline Knip secured fame, scandal, and a place in art history.
Centuries before photography, the camera obscura transformed ordinary rooms into magical spaces, casting the outside world inside and revealing how light, shadow, and perspective shaped early modern visions of reality.
In the early 20th century, architects and artists like Hugh Ferriss drew on the myths and monuments of ancient Babylon to imagine futuristic skylines—melding ziggurats with modernism in a visionary blend of the past and the possible.
For centuries, physicians used urine to diagnose disease, predict death, and even determine sexual history—analyzing its color, consistency, and contents with remarkable confidence.
The Mughal emperors in India faced a sartorial quandary: Should they continue wearing their traditional Central Asian attire or adopt the lighter cotton clothing of this warmer climate?
From dissecting hearts to designing ornithopters, James Bell Pettigrew saw spirals as the blueprint of nature—but his grand vision was lost to history.
Labelled a “cretin” and “imbecile” in his lifetime, the Swiss artist Gottfried Mind had profound talents when it came to drafting the feline form and inspired later French Realists, early psychiatric theorists, and Romantic visions of the artist as outsider.
After weeks of watching young tendrils slowly corkscrew their way toward the sun, Charles Darwin invented a system for making botanic motion visible to the naked eye.
Associated Authors
Jon Crabb is an editor at British Library Publishing.
Simran Agarwal is a researcher and writer based in Mumbai.
Dr. Raphael Calel is a Ciriacy-Wantrup Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Berkeley, and a visiting fellow at the London School of Economics.
Michael Engelhard is a writer and wilderness guide.
Kirsten Tambling is an art historian specializing in 18th-century art.
Erica X Eisen researches and writes about art history.
Natalie Lawrence is a writer, researcher, and illustrator living in London.
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