The Society's manuscript holdings date back to those of Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778) and among those of his pupils, Thunberg, Sparrman, Solander, and Osbeck all travelled down the West Coast of Africa en route to India, the Far East and Australia. Afzelius was the only one to explore the natural history of West Africa, landing in Sierra Leone, but there is no known material recorded from Guinea. The only specific reference in the Linnaean archives is an undated hand-written note with a description of a monkey “…ex Costa Guinea”.

The Society was founded in 1788 and holds the papers of its precursor: the Society for the promotion of Natural History. These include an account of the Harmattan by Henry Smeathmam. His account of the Tarantula is among the Linnean Society papers, but both probably refer to Sierra Leone where Smeathmam collected.