Joseph Prestwich (March 12th 1812 - June 23rd 1896) is a geologist and British businessman known like an expert of the Tertiaire and to have confirmed the discoveries of Boucher of Perthes.

It is born with Pensbury in the Clapham and receives its education with Paris and Reading before entering to the university to London or it studies the Chimie and the Natural history. In 1830 it works in the wine businesses of its family. During the voyages which its profession in the the United Kingdom requires of him, the France and the Belgium it collects a good number of geological observations. He becomes off member of the Geological Society London in 1833 and its report in 1836 based on its observations of 1831 and 1832 establishes its reputation of geologist.

Starting from 1846 its attention concentrates on the deposits of the Tertiaire of the basin of London which it classifies and correlates with the deposits of the same time of the remainder of the England, of the France and the Belgium. In 1858 Hugh Falconer persuades it to visit Abbeville where Boucher of Perthes clamp to have discovered flint tools in the gravel deposits of the valley of the Somme establishing the antiquity of the human being thus. In company of John Evans it explores the gravel beds of Saint-Acheul and confirms the discoveries of Stopping of Perthes. The report of Prestwich in the Proceedings off the Royal Society - acts of the Company Royal (1859 - 1860) is noted by certain historians of science like the birth of the modern Archéologie.

During the end of the Années 1860 it is useful in two commissions: Royal Coal Commission and the Royal Commission one the Metropolitan Toilets Supply . In 1874 it obtains the pulpit of Géologie of the Université of Oxford. He writes Geology, Chemical and Physical, Stratigraphical and Palaeontological in two volumes. In 1888 it is withdrawn with Shoreham in the Kent or it continues to work until its death in 1896. Prestwich is elected member of the Royal Society in 1853, it is made Chevalier in 1896, receives the Médaille Wollaston in 1849 and the Royal Medal in 1865. It Marie with Grace Anne McCall in 1870.

Reference

• “Obituary Notes off Fellows Deceased”, Proceedings off the Royal Society off London , Volume 60. (1896--1897), pp. I--xxxv .