Quarter Leather
1854 · Paris
by FOUCAULT, Leon
Paris: Victor Masson, 1854. Quarter Leather. Very Good++. Octavo. Offered is a very good++ entire Vol. 41 of Annales de Chimie et de Physique in nice quarter brown leather binding and marbled paper covered boards with raised bands spine, gilt lettering on black leather spine label. Light rubbing cover edges, scattered foxing. Complete with the foldout plate demonstrating Foucault's apparatus (diagramatically reproduced in DSB VOl. 5, p. 85). A Comparison of this velocity in air and in water would be clear experimental test between the wave and particle theories of light, since the former required light to travel faster in air; the later; in water...Fizeau returned to the rotating mirror to compare light's velocity in rare and dense media, but here he was beaten by Foucault, who announced on 30 April 1850 that "light travels faster in air than in water" ,,,Foucault's first experiment, carried out in 1850 and written up in full in his doctorial thesis of 1853; was purely comparative; he announced no numerical values until 1862. (DSB Vol. 5 pp. 85-85).
(Inventory #: 08799)