The origins of the marine barometer, 1700-1800

Dr Anita McConnell

While portable barometers were available before the end of the 17th century, the construction of a mercury barometer able to be read on a moving ship, to give warning of storms, eluded those principally in England and France, who put their minds to it. Some scientists proposed modifying their mercury barometer by varying the shape of the tube to prevent the mercury surging with the pitch and roll of the ship. Others chose to abandon the mercury barometer in favour of the piezometer.

As voyages through seas subject to hurricanes became more frequent, scientists in France and England made determined attempts to construct and test various forms of marine barometer. Competition, politics and craft skill all played their part; the race was won when Captain Cook took two barometers designed by Edward Nairne on his second voyage of 1772-1775. But France, and perhaps Spain, remained for some years ignorant of Nairne’s design, while the French Revolution put an end to developments in that country. With Nairne’s barometer a commonplace, descriptions ceased to appear, obscuring the further stages culminating in the marine barometer in a form that endured throughout the 19th century.

This paper is based on recent research in English, French and Spanish archive sources.

We need the best instruments: the response of donors to the appeal of scientists in 19th-century Greece

Efthymios Nicolaïdis

The foundation of the Greek State at the last century has been related with the ideology of ‘modernity’. Science, experiment and instruments were part of this ideology.

The State did not have the possibility of furnishing the University laboratories and the Observatory with instruments. Its role was played by sponsors, Greeks of the Diaspora who wanted to reinforce the ‘European’ profile of the country.

In this paper, we will present the dialogue between the scientists, the State and the sponsors, and also the results of this dialogue, the instruments bought with the funds of the sponsors.

On matters meteorological

Miss Jane Insley

2000 is turning out to be a very meteorological year. It sees the 150th anniversary of the Royal Meteorological Society, the 50th anniversary of the founding of the World Meteorological Organisation, and a flurry of openings, conferences and events, both millennial and otherwise. Extreme weather in Mozambique and Tanzania, and the early onset of the British springtime, has brought the problem of global warming squarely into the view of the general public.

What is a curator of environmental sciences, charged with the care of collections of scientific instruments, to make of it all? The early history of meteorology is charged with stories of people battling to have prediction (based on good understanding and knowledge) accepted as a scientific activity. The data from weather diaries have been included in the source material for the most powerful number crunchers in the computing world. Ground truthing is still required for remote sensing (but potentially, not for longer in the case of rainfall).

This paper is a brief survey of recent activities and events in the history of meteorology.