Eric John Holmyard (1891–1959) was an English science teacher at

Clifton College ''The spirit nourishes within'' , established = 160 years ago , closed = , type = Public schoolIndependent boarding and day school , religion = Christian , president = , head_label = Head of College , hea ...

, and historian of science and technology.

Scholar

Holmyard studied at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge and was a member of the Royal Asiatic Society. His scholarly work included rectification of accounts of the history of

alchemy Alchemy (from Arabic: ''al-kīmiyā''; from Ancient Greek: χυμεία, ''khumeía'') is an ancient branch of natural philosophy, a philosophical and protoscientific tradition that was historically practiced in China, India, the Muslim world, ...

, particularly in relation with

Islamic science Science in the medieval Islamic world was the science developed and practised during the Islamic Golden Age under the Umayyads of Córdoba, the Abbadids of Seville, the Samanids, the Ziyarids, the Buyids in Persia, the Abbasid Caliphate an ...

. He translated texts from Arabic and Latin, and wrote extensively on Geber. He was responsible with D. C. Mandeville for the re-attribution of the alchemical text ''De Mineralibus'' to an origin in Avicenna. Holmyard served as the founding editor of the scientific review and history of science journal '' Endeavour''.

Textbooks

As a textbook author, he pioneered an approach to science teaching that included historical material. "His historicized science books were an enormous and long-term commercial success, with ''Elementary Chemistry'' (1925) alone selling half-a-million copies by 1960."

Teacher

He taught both

Nevill Mott Sir Nevill Francis Mott (30 September 1905 – 8 August 1996) was a British physicist who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1977 for his work on the electronic structure of magnetic and disordered systems, especially amorphous semiconductors. ...

and

Charles Coulson Charles Alfred Coulson (13 December 1910 – 7 January 1974) was a British applied mathematician and theoretical chemist. Coulson's major scientific work was as a pioneer of the application of the quantum theory of valency to problems of m ...

at Clifton, but his personal influence on them as scientists was low (in Coulson's case, even negative
''… Holmyard — the prolific writer of elementary textbooks — apparently met with no success in attracting him towards Chemistry; indeed, he chose quite firmly the Classics.''). Holmyard also published best seller, A Higher School Inorganic Chemistry, along with W.G. Palmer.

Historical works

*Kitab al-‘Ilm al-maktasab fi zira‘at adh-dhahab: Book of knowledge acquired concerning the cultivation of gold by Abu 'l-Qasim Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-‘Iraqi (1923) translator *Chemistry to the Time of Dalton (1925) *Avicenna De congelatione et conglutinatione lapidum (1927) translator with D. C. Mandeville *The Works of Geber. (1928) with Richard Russell (1678 translator) *Ordinall of Alchemy by Thomas Norton (1929) facsimile, editor *The Great Chemists (1929) *Makers of Chemistry (1931) *Ancestors of An Industry: The story of British scientific achievement (1950) *British Scientists (1951) *Alchemy (1957) *A History of Technology (1954-8) five volumes, with

Charles Singer Charles Joseph Singer (2 November 1876 – 10 June 1960) was a British historian of science, technology, and medicine. He served as medical officer in the British Army. Biography Early years Singer was born in Camberwell in London, where hi ...

Notes

References

*Entry in the ''

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography The ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (''DNB'') is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published since 1885. The updated ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (''ODNB'') was published on 23 September ...

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Holmyard, Eric John 1891 births 1959 deaths Historians of science