FOUCAULT, Jean Bernard Lon (1819-1868). Sur divers signes sensibles du mouvement diurne de la terre . Offprint from: Comptes rendus des sances de l'Acadmie des Sciences 32 (1851) and 35 (1852). Paris: Mallet-Bachelier, 1852. Square 2 o (272 x 214 mm). Collation: s6. 6 leaves, pp. 11 [1]. Stitched with a later half-title "Travaux en mcanique" and 3 leaves (the first is conjugate with the half-title, the last 2 a bifolium of which the second leaf is blank) containing 2 other short articles by Foucault: "Sur un mcanisme destin entretenir les oscillations du pendule, pour la dmonstration de la terre", [1855 or later], 1 p.; "De la chaleur produite par l'influence de l'aimant sur les corps en mouvement", offprint from Comptes rendus des sances de l'Acadmie des Sciences 41 (1855), 2 pp. (Light marginal foxing.) Stab-stitched in later printed wrappers with title "Travaux en mcanique... Paris: Mallet-Bachelier, 1858" (light spotting to lower wrapper). FIRST EDITION, FIRST OR EARLY OFFPRINT ISSUE, of Foucault's famous mechanical demonstration of the rotation of the earth. Foucault was led to his pendulum experiment through his interest in astronomical photography. The long exposure times required by the daguerreotype technique made it necessary to develop a mechanism for keeping telescopes continuously pointed at their heavenly object. "To regulate the drive for such a telescope, Foucault in 1847 brought into practice Christian Huygens' abortive seventeenth-century project for a clock with a conical pendulum. Foucault's clock had a steel rod to support the bob of its pendulum, and he noticed that such a rod, set vibrating while clamped in the chuck of a lathe, tended to maintain its plane of vibration when the lathe was rotated by hand. This unexpected behavior of the rod suggested to Foucault an experimental demonstration of the earth's rotation" (DSB). He set up a pendulum with a five-kilogram bob in the cellar of his house, and on 8 January 1851, his expectation was proved correct, as he observed the plane of the swinging pendulum gradually turning in a clockwise direction, following the movement of the earth's rotation. In his presentation to the Acadmie des Sciences Foucault described his experiment in detail and stated his discovery that the circle described by the plane of the pendulum's swing is inversely proportional to the sine of the latitude, making it possible to determine one's latitude "from the rotation of a body on the surface of the earth, without the aid of any astronomical observations" (p. 10). Foucault's visible demonstration of the earth's rotation --spectacularly repeated later in 1851 before a large crowd in the Panthon--was refined in 1852 by his invention of the gyroscope. His experiments stimulated the development of theoretical mechanics, and showed conclusively that the deflecting force of terrestrial rotation acts in all horizontal directions. This copy is from the first or an early issue, with the date of the first cited session of the Acadmie in the heading on p. [1] misprinted as "3 aut 1851" (corrected in pencil to "fvrier"), with the first 3 leaves signed "1, 2, 2." and with the colophon reading "Paris.--Imprimerie de Mallet-Bachelier" (see following lot). Both issues of the offprint are EXTREMELY RARE. Dibner Heralds of Science 17 (offprint); En franais dans le texte 270 (offprint, this state); PMM 330 (journal article); Norman 818.
FOUCAULT, Jean Bernard Lon (1819-1868). Sur divers signes sensibles du mouvement diurne de la terre . Offprint from: Comptes rendus des sances de l'Acadmie des Sciences 32 (1851) and 35 (1852). Paris: Mallet-Bachelier, 1852. Square 2 o (272 x 214 mm). Collation: s6. 6 leaves, pp. 11 [1]. Stitched with a later half-title "Travaux en mcanique" and 3 leaves (the first is conjugate with the half-title, the last 2 a bifolium of which the second leaf is blank) containing 2 other short articles by Foucault: "Sur un mcanisme destin entretenir les oscillations du pendule, pour la dmonstration de la terre", [1855 or later], 1 p.; "De la chaleur produite par l'influence de l'aimant sur les corps en mouvement", offprint from Comptes rendus des sances de l'Acadmie des Sciences 41 (1855), 2 pp. (Light marginal foxing.) Stab-stitched in later printed wrappers with title "Travaux en mcanique... Paris: Mallet-Bachelier, 1858" (light spotting to lower wrapper). FIRST EDITION, FIRST OR EARLY OFFPRINT ISSUE, of Foucault's famous mechanical demonstration of the rotation of the earth. Foucault was led to his pendulum experiment through his interest in astronomical photography. The long exposure times required by the daguerreotype technique made it necessary to develop a mechanism for keeping telescopes continuously pointed at their heavenly object. "To regulate the drive for such a telescope, Foucault in 1847 brought into practice Christian Huygens' abortive seventeenth-century project for a clock with a conical pendulum. Foucault's clock had a steel rod to support the bob of its pendulum, and he noticed that such a rod, set vibrating while clamped in the chuck of a lathe, tended to maintain its plane of vibration when the lathe was rotated by hand. This unexpected behavior of the rod suggested to Foucault an experimental demonstration of the earth's rotation" (DSB). He set up a pendulum with a five-kilogram bob in the cellar of his house, and on 8 January 1851, his expectation was proved correct, as he observed the plane of the swinging pendulum gradually turning in a clockwise direction, following the movement of the earth's rotation. In his presentation to the Acadmie des Sciences Foucault described his experiment in detail and stated his discovery that the circle described by the plane of the pendulum's swing is inversely proportional to the sine of the latitude, making it possible to determine one's latitude "from the rotation of a body on the surface of the earth, without the aid of any astronomical observations" (p. 10). Foucault's visible demonstration of the earth's rotation --spectacularly repeated later in 1851 before a large crowd in the Panthon--was refined in 1852 by his invention of the gyroscope. His experiments stimulated the development of theoretical mechanics, and showed conclusively that the deflecting force of terrestrial rotation acts in all horizontal directions. This copy is from the first or an early issue, with the date of the first cited session of the Acadmie in the heading on p. [1] misprinted as "3 aut 1851" (corrected in pencil to "fvrier"), with the first 3 leaves signed "1, 2, 2." and with the colophon reading "Paris.--Imprimerie de Mallet-Bachelier" (see following lot). Both issues of the offprint are EXTREMELY RARE. Dibner Heralds of Science 17 (offprint); En franais dans le texte 270 (offprint, this state); PMM 330 (journal article); Norman 818.
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
