page_title: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society
section_title: Eighteenth century
hierarchical_section_title: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society / Origins and history / Eighteenth century
caption_attribution_description: English: The first 5 women to be published in the Philosophical Transactions, the Royal Society. Photo taken at the Royal Society, London on 9 April 2015. Part of the exhibition, "Publishing 350 - from foundation to future: Celebrating 350 years of scientific publishing at the Royal Society." https://royalsociety.org/events/2014/12/pubs-350-exhibition/
context_page_description: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society is a scientific journal published by the Royal Society. In its earliest days, it was a private venture of the Royal Society's secretary. It was established in 1665, making it the first journal in the world exclusively devoted to science, and therefore also the world's longest-running scientific journal. It became an official society publication in 1752. The use of the word philosophical in the title refers to natural philosophy, which was the equivalent of what would now be generally called science.
context_section_description: By the mid-eighteenth century, the most notable editors, besides Oldenburg, were Hans Sloane, James Jurin and Cromwell Mortimer. In virtually all cases the journal was edited by the serving secretary of the society (and occasionally by both secretaries working in tandem). These editor-secretaries carried the financial burden of publishing the Philosophical Transactions. By the early 1750s, the Philosophical Transactions came under attack, most prominently by John Hill, an actor, apothecary, and naturalist. Hill published three works in two years, ridiculing the Royal Society and the Philosophical Transactions. The Society was quick to point out that it was not officially responsible for the journal. Yet, in 1752 the Society took over the Philosophical Transactions. The journal would henceforth be published "for the sole use and benefit of this Society"; it would be financially carried by the members' subscriptions; and it would be edited by the Committee of Papers.
  After the takeover of the journal by the Royal Society, management decisions including negotiating with printers and booksellers, were still the task of one of the Secretaries—but editorial control was exercised through the Committee of Papers. The Committee mostly based its judgements on which papers to publish and which to decline on the 300 to 500-word abstracts of papers read during its weekly meetings. But the members could, if they desired, consult the original paper in full. Once the decision to print had been taken, the paper appeared in the volume for that year. It would feature the author's name, the name of the Fellow who had communicated the paper to the Society, and the date on which it was read. The Royal Society covered paper, engraving and printing costs. The Society found the journal to be a money-losing proposition: it cost, on average, upwards of £300 annually to produce, of which they seldom recouped more than £150. Because two-fifths of the copies were distributed for free to the journal's natural market, sales were generally slow, and although back issues sold out gradually it would usually be ten years or more before there were fewer than 100 left of any given print run.
  During the Presidency of Joseph Banks the work of the Committee of Papers continued fairly efficiently, with the President himself in frequent attendance. There was a number of ways in which the President and Secretaries could bypass or subvert the Royal Society's publishing procedures. Papers could be prevented from reaching the Committee by not allowing them to be read in the first place. Also—though papers were rarely subjected to formal review—there is evidence of editorial intervention, with Banks himself or a trusted deputy proposing cuts or emendations to particular contributions. Publishing in the Philosophical Transactions carried a high degree of prestige and Banks himself attributed an attempt to unseat him, relatively early in his Presidency, to the envy of authors whose papers had been rejected from the journal.
caption: In 1787, Caroline Herschel became the first woman published in the journal and the only one in the 18th century. Poster at Publishing 350 Exhibit, 2015
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