NEWTON’S 1704 “TREATISE ON OPTICS”. “Sir Isaac Newton, the 17th- and 18th-century British mathematician and physicist, was among the first to suggest that tiny, layered structures were responsible for producing color in peacock feathers, and other iridescent insects and birds.”
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/10/1016_031017_peacockcolors.html