The History of the Barometer

By: W. E. Knowles Middleton

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Paperback | 16 March 2003

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511 Pages

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22+

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22.23 x 15.24 x 3.18

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For two centuries the barometer has been an indispensable laboratory instrument. Yet, despite its revolutionary influence on science, W. E. Knowles Middleton here offers the first complete history of the barometer as a scientific tool.

Middleton relies on research from Western European documents and manuscripts of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. He begins his story with a pre-history of the barometer, the Torricellian experiment, the subsequent experiments and controversies in the 1640s, and the barometric experiments during the remainder of the century.

Later chapters are concerned with the mercury barometer as a scientific instrument, discussing the efforts to expand the scale to render the instrument portable, and to attain greater accuracy. These chapters follow accounts of mercury barographs, the history of the corrections to the barometer, the history of the mercury barometer in North America, and the luminescence that appears when a barometer is moved in the dark. The final chapters discuss barometers other than those using the weight of a column of mercury.

A large number of the more interesting barometers seen by the author in his extensive travels appears in the appendix. Nearly 200 figures and diagrams depict the wide variety of barometers studied by the author over his long career at the Smithsonian Institution.

Industry Reviews

""The text is well documented from primary sources, and many of the illustrations are reproductions of original diagrams. The book is both instructive and delightful to read.""

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Preface
The Scientific Background	p. 1
The Prehistory of the Barometer	p. 3
The Torricellian Experiment	p. 19
The "Extraordinary Effervescence"	p. 33
Seventeenth-Century Experiments and Speculations	p. 55
The Mercury Barometer as an Instrument	p. 83
A General Survey	p. 85
The Expansion of the Scale	p. 87
The Search for Portability	p. 132
The Corrections to the Mercury Barometer	p. 172
The Improvement of Accuracy	p. 195
Barometers of High Accuracy	p. 261
Mercury Barographs and Related Apparatus	p. 285
The Mercury Barometer in North America	p. 338
Luminescence in the Barometer	p. 354
Barometers Other Than Mercury Barometers	p. 361
Other Liquid Barometers	p. 363
Air Barometers and Related Apparatus	p. 373
Dead-Weight and Elastic Barometers	p. 396
List of the More Important or Interesting Barometers Examined	p. 445
Index	p. 467
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.

The History of the Barometer

At a Glance

Paperback

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

You Can Find This Book In

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