In 1865, Augustinian friar Gregor Mendel, the father of modern genetics, presented his laws of heredity to the Natural Science Society in Brunn, Austria. The scientific world, focused on Darwin’s new theory of evolution, payed no attention to Mendel’s discoveries.

Mendel was familiar with Darwin’s books, having read and annotated German translations of them, whereas all available evidence indicates that Darwin knew nothing of Mendel.