Which theory of competition came first, free market capitalism or biological evolution?

[Apocalypse Cow]

I don't feel like googling today. Also I don't like how people think evolution is some kind of Communist plot.

[SDD]

The word evolution appeared in English in the 17th century.
Industrial capitalism as a construct emerged in the 18th century, though people had been practicing capitalism long beofre anyone wrote about it.

[simplicitus]

Neither.

(1) Neither the original classical economics "free market" theory, nor Darwin's theory of evolution driven by natural selection are _primarily_ theories of competition.

For example, Ricardo's trade theory and argument for free trade is all about how both parties benefit by specializing in different goods.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_advantage
Darwin's theory was hailed by Russian scientists as a way of explaining the complex symbiotic relationships they found in how organisms dealt with the harsh weather and terrain.
http://sfgirl-thealiennextdoor.blogspot....ssive.html

It is true that competition is important in both, but the element of competition has been over-emphasized (see #3 below)

(2) As the previous answer pointed out, market competition has a long history. It was certainly an important factor in Rome and in the Greek empire that preceded it. Even Mercantilism, which is what the classical economists were fighting, was all about competition between nations and the economic policies that would put one nation ahead of the other.

(3) If you are looking for the effect of one on the other, then the answer is Social Darwinism, where extreme free market advocates used a dumbed down version of Darwinian evolution - with emphasis on competition - to justify their behavior.
http://library.thinkquest.org/C004367/eh4.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Darwinism

It is clear that Adam Smith and the other classical economists would not agree with this notion of the free market. For example, Adam Smith noted in The Wealth of Nations:

"No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable."
Book I Chapter VIII, p.96, para. 36.

"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices."
Book IV Chapter VIII, p. 145, para. c27.

And note the qualification on the benefits of competition here:
"In general, if any branch of trade, or any division of labour, be advantageous to the public, the freer and more general the competition, it will always be the more so."
Book II, Chapter II, p.329, para. 106.

recognizing full well that a free market was not always advantageous to the public.