From http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/royalsoc/rshist.htm

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The origins of the Royal Society lie in a group of men who began meeting in the mid-1640s to discuss the new philosophy. Its official foundation date is 28 November 1660, when 12 of them met at Gresham College after a lecture by ChristopherWren, the Gresham Professor of Astronomy and decided to found 'a College for the Promoting of Physico-Mathematicall Experimentall Learning'. This group included Wren himself, Robert Boyle, John Wilkins, Sir Robert Moray, and William, Viscount Brouncker.

The Society was to meet weekly to witness experiments and discuss what we would now call scientific topics. The first Curator of Experiments was RobertHooke. It was Moray who first told the King, Charles II, of this venture and secured his approval and encouragement. At first apparently nameless, the name The Royal Society first appears in print in1661 and in the second Royal Charter of 1663, the Society is referred to as ''The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge''.

The Society found accommodation at Gresham College and rapidly began to acquire a library (the first book was presented in 1661) and a repository or museum of specimens of scientific interest. After the Fire of 1666 it moved for some years to Arundel House, London home of the Dukes of Norfolk, and it was not until 1710 under the Presidency of IsaacNewton, that the Society acquired its own home, two houses in Crane Court, off the Strand.

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These people and events appear in a fictional setting in Quicksilver by NealStephenson.

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CategoryHistory