The year 1840 in
science
Science is a systematic endeavor that Scientific method, builds and organizes knowledge in the form of Testability, testable explanations and predictions about the universe.
Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earli ...
and
technology
Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in medicine, scie ...
involved some significant events, listed below.
Events
*
William Whewell
William Whewell ( ; 24 May 17946 March 1866) was an English polymath, scientist, Anglican priest, philosopher, theologian, and historian of science. He was Master of Trinity College, Cambridge. In his time as a student there, he achieved ...
publishes ''The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences'', introducing the terms ''
scientist
A scientist is a person who conducts scientific research to advance knowledge in an area of the natural sciences.
In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engaged in the philosophica ...
'' (for the second time) and ''
physicist
A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe.
Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate ca ...
''.
*
Justus von Liebig
Justus Freiherr von Liebig (12 May 1803 – 20 April 1873) was a German scientist who made major contributions to agricultural and biology, biological chemistry, and is considered one of the principal founders of organic chemistry. As a profess ...
publishes ''Die Organische Chemie in ihre Anwendung auf Agricultur und Physiologie'' in
Braunschweig
Braunschweig () or Brunswick ( , from Low German ''Brunswiek'' , Braunschweig dialect: ''Bronswiek'') is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany, north of the Harz Mountains at the farthest navigable point of the river Oker, which connects it to the ...
, emphasising the importance of agricultural chemistry in crop production; it will go through at least eight editions.
* The first known photograph of
Niagara Falls
Niagara Falls () is a group of three waterfalls at the southern end of Niagara Gorge, spanning the border between the province of Ontario in Canada and the state of New York in the United States. The largest of the three is Horseshoe Fall ...
, a
daguerreotype
Daguerreotype (; french: daguerréotype) was the first publicly available photographic process; it was widely used during the 1840s and 1850s. "Daguerreotype" also refers to an image created through this process.
Invented by Louis Daguerre ...
, is taken by English chemist
Hugh Lee Pattinson
Hugh Lee Pattinson FRS (25 December 1796 – 11 November 1858) was an English industrial chemist. He was also an entrepreneur, sharing the risk of major industrial developments with famous ironmaster Isaac Lowthian Bell and cable manufacturer ...
.
Astronomy
*
John William Draper
John William Draper (May 5, 1811 – January 4, 1882) was an English-born American scientist, philosopher, physician, chemist, historian and photographer. He is credited with producing the first clear photograph of a female face (1839–40) and ...
invents
astronomical photography
Astrophotography, also known as astronomical imaging, is the photography or imaging of astronomical objects, celestial events, or areas of the night sky. The first photograph of an astronomical object (the Moon) was taken in 1840, but it wa ...
and photographs the
Moon
The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width ...
.
Biology
*
John Gould
John Gould (; 14 September 1804 – 3 February 1881) was an English ornithologist. He published a number of monographs on birds, illustrated by plates produced by his wife, Elizabeth Gould, and several other artists, including Edward Lear, ...
begins publication of ''
The Birds of Australia''.
Chemistry
*
Germain Hess proposes
Hess's law, an early statement of the
law of conservation of energy
In physics and chemistry, the law of conservation of energy states that the total energy of an isolated system remains constant; it is said to be ''conserved'' over time. This law, first proposed and tested by Émilie du Châtelet, means that ...
, which establishes that energy changes in a chemical process depend only on the states of the starting and product materials and not on the specific pathway taken between the two states.
*
George Richards Elkington
George Richards Elkington (17 October 1801 – 22 September 1865) was a manufacturer from Birmingham, England. He patented the first commercial electroplating process.
Biography
Elkington was born in Birmingham, the son of a spectacle manuf ...
patent
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling disclo ...
s the
electroplating
Electroplating, also known as electrochemical deposition or electrodeposition, is a process for producing a metal coating on a solid substrate through the redox, reduction of cations of that metal by means of a direct current, direct electric cur ...
process invented by surgeon
John Wright of
Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...
in England.
Earth sciences
*
Louis Agassiz
Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz ( ; ) FRS (For) FRSE (May 28, 1807 – December 14, 1873) was a Swiss-born American biologist and geologist who is recognized as a scholar of Earth's natural history.
Spending his early life in Switzerland, he rec ...
publishes his ''Etudes sur les glaciers'', the first major scientific work to propose that the Earth has seen an
ice age
An ice age is a long period of reduction in the temperature of Earth's surface and atmosphere, resulting in the presence or expansion of continental and polar ice sheets and alpine glaciers. Earth's climate alternates between ice ages and gre ...
.
*
Roderick Murchison
Sir Roderick Impey Murchison, 1st Baronet, (19 February 1792 – 22 October 1871) was a Scottish geologist who served as director-general of the British Geological Survey from 1855 until his death in 1871. He is noted for investigating and d ...
identifies
Devonian
The Devonian ( ) is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic era, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the Silurian, million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Carboniferous, Mya. It is named after Devon, England, w ...
stratigraphy in Russia, ending
the Great Devonian Controversy.
Exploration
* January 19 – Captain
Charles Wilkes
Charles Wilkes (April 3, 1798 – February 8, 1877) was an American naval officer, ship's captain, and explorer. He led the United States Exploring Expedition (1838–1842).
During the American Civil War (1861–1865), he commanded ' during the ...
'
United States Exploring Expedition
The United States Exploring Expedition of 1838–1842 was an exploring and surveying expedition of the Pacific Ocean and surrounding lands conducted by the United States. The original appointed commanding officer was Commodore Thomas ap Catesb ...
sights
Wilkes Land
Wilkes Land is a large district of land in eastern Antarctica, formally claimed by Australia as part of the Australian Antarctic Territory, though the validity of this claim has been placed for the period of the operation of the Antarctic Treaty ...
, providing evidence that
Antarctica
Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest co ...
is a complete continent.
* January 21 –
Adélie Land
Adélie Land (french: Terre Adélie, ) is a claimed territory on the continent of Antarctica. It stretches from a portion of the Southern Ocean coastline all the way inland to the South Pole. France has administered it as one of five districts ...
first visited by
Jules Dumont d'Urville
Jules Sébastien César Dumont d'Urville (; 23 May 1790 – 8 May 1842) was a French explorer and naval officer who explored the south and western Pacific, Australia, New Zealand, and Antarctica. As a botanist and cartographer, he gave his nam ...
in the
French ship ''Astrolabe''.
* The
''Nemesis'' (1839) becomes the first iron ship to sail around the
Cape of Good Hope
The Cape of Good Hope ( af, Kaap die Goeie Hoop ) ;''Kaap'' in isolation: pt, Cabo da Boa Esperança is a rocky headland on the Atlantic coast of the Cape Peninsula in South Africa.
A common misconception is that the Cape of Good Hope is ...
, aided by techniques to adjust the compass for the effect of an iron hull developed the year before by
George Biddell Airy
Sir George Biddell Airy (; 27 July 18012 January 1892) was an English mathematician and astronomer, and the seventh Astronomer Royal from 1835 to 1881. His many achievements include work on planetary orbits, measuring the mean density of the ...
, the
Astronomer Royal
Astronomer Royal is a senior post in the Royal Households of the United Kingdom. There are two officers, the senior being the Astronomer Royal dating from 22 June 1675; the junior is the Astronomer Royal for Scotland dating from 1834.
The post ...
.
History of science
* Publication begins in
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. ...
of the ''Œuvres complètes d’
Ambroise Paré'' edited by
Joseph-François Malgaigne
Joseph-François Malgaigne (14 February 1806 – 17 October 1865) was a French surgeon and medical historian born in Charmes-sur-Moselle, Vosges.
He studied medicine in Paris, and was later a surgeon of Parisian hospitals, including Hôpitals S ...
.
Medicine
* April 15 –
King's College Hospital
King's College Hospital is a major teaching hospital and major trauma centre in Denmark Hill, Camberwell in the London Borough of Lambeth, referred to locally and by staff simply as "King's" or abbreviated internally to "KCH". It is managed by ...
opens in
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
.
* July 23 –
Vaccination Act in the United Kingdom provides for free
vaccination
Vaccination is the administration of a vaccine to help the immune system develop immunity from a disease. Vaccines contain a microorganism or virus in a weakened, live or killed state, or proteins or toxins from the organism. In stimulating ...
for the poor and prohibits
variolation
Variolation was the method of inoculation first used to immunize individuals against smallpox (''Variola'') with material taken from a patient or a recently variolated individual, in the hope that a mild, but protective, infection would result. V ...
.
Metrology
*
Joseph Whitworth
Sir Joseph Whitworth, 1st Baronet (21 December 1803 – 22 January 1887) was an English engineer, entrepreneur, inventor and philanthropist. In 1841, he devised the British Standard Whitworth system, which created an accepted standard for scre ...
introduces his precision "end measurements" technique.
Physics
*
Carl Friedrich Gauss
Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss (; german: Gauß ; la, Carolus Fridericus Gauss; 30 April 177723 February 1855) was a German mathematician and physicist who made significant contributions to many fields in mathematics and science. Sometimes refe ...
publishes his ''Dioptrische Untersuchungen'', in which he gives the first systematic analysis of the formation of images under a
paraxial approximation
In geometric optics, the paraxial approximation is a small-angle approximation used in Gaussian optics and ray tracing of light through an optical system (such as a lens).
A paraxial ray is a ray which makes a small angle (''θ'') to the opti ...
(
Gaussian optics
Gaussian optics is a technique in geometrical optics that describes the behaviour of light rays in optical systems by using the paraxial approximation, in which only rays which make small angles with the optical axis of the system are consider ...
).
Technology
*
Robert Bunsen
Robert Wilhelm Eberhard Bunsen (;
30 March 1811
– 16 August 1899) was a German chemist. He investigated emission spectra of heated elements, and discovered caesium (in 1860) and rubidium (in 1861) with the physicist Gustav Kirchhoff. The Bu ...
invents the
Bunsen cell
The Bunsen cell is a zinc-carbon primary cell (colloquially called a "battery") composed of a zinc anode in dilute sulfuric acid separated by a porous pot from a carbon cathode in nitric or chromic acid.
Cell details
The Bunsen cell is about ...
.
*
British
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English ...
inventor
Warren De la Rue creates the first
light bulb
An electric light, lamp, or light bulb is an electrical component that produces light. It is the most common form of artificial lighting. Lamps usually have a base made of ceramic, metal, glass, or plastic, which secures the lamp in the so ...
using a vacuum tube, although its use of a
platinum
Platinum is a chemical element with the symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name originates from Spanish , a diminutive of "silver".
Pla ...
coil makes it commercially unviable.
Awards
*
Copley Medal
The Copley Medal is an award given by the Royal Society, for "outstanding achievements in research in any branch of science". It alternates between the physical sciences or mathematics and the biological sciences. Given every year, the medal is t ...
:
Justus Liebig
Justus Freiherr von Liebig (12 May 1803 – 20 April 1873) was a German scientist who made major contributions to agricultural and biological chemistry, and is considered one of the principal founders of organic chemistry. As a professor at th ...
;
Charles-François Sturm
*
Wollaston Medal
The Wollaston Medal is a scientific award for geology, the highest award granted by the Geological Society of London.
The medal is named after William Hyde Wollaston, and was first awarded in 1831. It was originally made of gold (1831–1845), t ...
:
Andre Hubert Dumont
Births
* January 21 –
Sophia Jex-Blake (died
1912
Events January
* January 1 – The Republic of China is established.
* January 5 – The Prague Conference (6th All-Russian Conference of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party) opens.
* January 6
** German geophysicist Alfred ...
),
English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national id ...
physician
A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
.
* February 4 –
Hiram Maxim
Sir Hiram Stevens Maxim (5 February 1840 – 24 November 1916) was an American- British inventor best known as the creator of the first automatic machine gun, the Maxim gun. Maxim held patents on numerous mechanical devices such as hair-cur ...
(died
1916
Events
Below, the events of the First World War have the "WWI" prefix.
January
* January 1 – The British Royal Army Medical Corps carries out the first successful blood transfusion, using blood that had been stored and cooled.
* ...
),
American inventor
An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an id ...
of the
machine gun
A machine gun is a fully automatic, rifled autoloading firearm designed for sustained direct fire with rifle cartridges. Other automatic firearms such as automatic shotguns and automatic rifles (including assault rifles and battle rifl ...
.
* February 5 –
John Boyd Dunlop
John Boyd Dunlop (5 February 1840 – 23 October 1921) was a Scottish-born inventor and veterinary surgeon who spent most of his career in Ireland. Familiar with making rubber devices, he invented the first practical pneumatic tyres for his c ...
(died
1921
Events
January
* January 2
** The Association football club Cruzeiro Esporte Clube, from Belo Horizonte, is founded as the multi-sports club Palestra Italia by Italian expatriates in Brazil.
** The Spanish liner ''Santa Isabel'' breaks ...
), Scottish-born
inventor
An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an id ...
.
* February 10 –
Per Teodor Cleve
Per Teodor Cleve (10 February 1840 – 18 June 1905) was a Swedish chemist, biologist, mineralogist and oceanographer. He is best known for his discovery of the chemical elements holmium and thulium.
Born in Stockholm in 1840, Cleve earned his ...
(died
1905
As the second year of the massive Russo-Japanese War begins, more than 100,000 die in the largest world battles of that era, and the war chaos leads to the 1905 Russian Revolution against Nicholas II of Russia (Shostakovich's 11th Symphony is ...
), Swedish
chemist
A chemist (from Greek ''chēm(ía)'' alchemy; replacing ''chymist'' from Medieval Latin ''alchemist'') is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties. Chemists carefully describe ...
.
* March 28 –
Emin Pasha
185px, Schnitzer in 1875
Mehmed Emin Pasha (born Isaak Eduard Schnitzer, baptized Eduard Carl Oscar Theodor Schnitzer; March 28, 1840 – October 23, 1892) was an Ottoman physician of German Jewish origin, naturalist, and governor of the Egy ...
, born Isaak Schnitzer (died
1892), Silesian-born
explorer
Exploration refers to the historical practice of discovering remote lands. It is studied by geographers and historians.
Two major eras of exploration occurred in human history: one of convergence, and one of divergence. The first, covering most ...
.
* March 31 –
Benjamin Baker (died
1907
Events
January
* January 14 – 1907 Kingston earthquake: A 6.5 Moment magnitude scale, Mw earthquake in Kingston, Jamaica, kills between 800 and 1,000.
February
* February 11 – The French warship French cruiser Jean Bart ( ...
), English
civil engineer
A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing i ...
.
* April 9 –
Praskovya Uvarova
Countess Praskovya Sergeevna Uvarova (Russian: Прасковья Сергеевна Уварова), Princess Scherbatova (Щербатова); 9 April 1840, Bobriki, Kharkov Governorate – 30 June 1924, Dobrna, Slovenia) was a Russian archae ...
(died
1924
Events
January
* January 12 – Gopinath Saha shoots Ernest Day, whom he has mistaken for Sir Charles Tegart, the police commissioner of Calcutta, and is arrested soon after.
* January 20– 30 – Kuomintang in China h ...
), Russian archaeologist.
* April 22 –
Thomas Clouston
Sir Thomas Smith Clouston (22 April 1840 – 19 April 1915) was a Scottish psychiatrist.
Life
Clouston was the youngest of four sons of Robert Clouston (1786–1857) 3rd of Nisthouse, in the Birsay parish of Orkney, and his wife Janet (né ...
(died
1915
Events
Below, the events of World War I have the "WWI" prefix.
January
*January – British physicist Sir Joseph Larmor publishes his observations on "The Influence of Local Atmospheric Cooling on Astronomical Refraction".
*January 1
...
), Scottish
psychiatrist
A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in psychiatry, the branch of medicine devoted to the diagnosis, prevention, study, and treatment of mental disorders. Psychiatrists are physicians and evaluate patients to determine whether their ...
.
* July 28 –
Edward Drinker Cope
Edward Drinker Cope (July 28, 1840 – April 12, 1897) was an American zoologist, paleontologist, comparative anatomist, herpetologist, and ichthyologist. Born to a wealthy Quaker family, Cope distinguished himself as a child prodigy intereste ...
(died
1897
Events
January–March
* January 2 – The International Alpha Omicron Pi sorority is founded, in New York City.
* January 4 – A British force is ambushed by Chief Ologbosere, son-in-law of the ruler. This leads to a punit ...
), American
paleontologist
Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of foss ...
.
* August 4 –
Richard von Krafft-Ebing
Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing (full name Richard Fridolin Joseph Freiherr Krafft von Festenberg auf Frohnberg, genannt von Ebing; 14 August 1840 – 22 December 1902) was a German psychiatrist and author of the foundational work '' Psychopath ...
(died
1902
Events
January
* January 1
** The Nurses Registration Act 1901 comes into effect in New Zealand, making it the first country in the world to require state registration of nurses. On January 10, Ellen Dougherty becomes the world's ...
), German
sexologist
Sexology is the scientific study of human sexuality, including human sexual interests, behaviors, and functions. The term ''sexology'' does not generally refer to the non-scientific study of sexuality, such as social criticism.
Sexologists ap ...
.
* November 24 –
John Brashear
John Alfred Brashear (November 24, 1840 – April 8, 1920) was an American astronomer and instrument builder.
Life and work
Brashear was born in Brownsville, Pennsylvania, a town 35 miles (56 km) south of Pittsburgh along the Monongah ...
(died
1920
Events January
* January 1
** Polish–Soviet War in 1920: The Russian Red Army increases its troops along the Polish border from 4 divisions to 20.
** Kauniainen, completely surrounded by the city of Espoo, secedes from Espoo as its own m ...
), American
astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either o ...
.
* November 29 –
James Crichton-Browne
Sir James Crichton-Browne MD FRS FRSE (29 November 1840 – 31 January 1938) was a leading Scottish psychiatrist, neurologist and eugenicist. He is known for studies on the relationship of mental illness to brain injury and for the developmen ...
(died
1938), Scottish psychiatrist.
Deaths
* March 2 –
Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers
Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers (; ; 11 October 1758 – 2 March 1840) was a German physician and astronomer.
Life and career
Olbers was born in Arbergen, Germany, today part of Bremen, and studied to be a physician at Göttingen (1777–80 ...
(born
1758
Events
January–March
* January 1 – Swedish biologist Carl Linnaeus (Carl von Linné) publishes in Stockholm the first volume (''Animalia'') of the 10th edition of ''Systema Naturae'', the starting point of modern zoological ...
), German
astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either o ...
.
* March 23 –
William Maclure
William Maclure (27 October 176323 March 1840) was an Americanized Scottish geologist, cartographer and philanthropist. He is known as the 'father of American geology'. As a social experimenter on new types of community life, he collaborated ...
(born
1763
Events
January–March
* January 27 – The seat of colonial administration in the Viceroyalty of Brazil is moved from Salvador to Rio de Janeiro.
* February 1 – The Royal Colony of North Carolina officially creates Meck ...
), Scottish American
geologist
A geologist is a scientist who studies the solid, liquid, and gaseous matter that constitutes Earth and other terrestrial planets, as well as the processes that shape them. Geologists usually study geology, earth science, or geophysics, alt ...
.
* April 25 –
Siméon Denis Poisson
Baron Siméon Denis Poisson FRS FRSE (; 21 June 1781 – 25 April 1840) was a French mathematician and physicist who worked on statistics, complex analysis, partial differential equations, the calculus of variations, analytical mechanics, electr ...
(born
1781
Events
January–March
* January – William Pitt the Younger, later Prime Minister of Great Britain, enters Parliament, aged 21.
* January 1 – Industrial Revolution: The Iron Bridge opens across the River Severn in E ...
), French
mathematician
A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems.
Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...
.
* April 29 –
Pierre Jean Robiquet
Pierre Jean Robiquet (13 January 1780 – 29 April 1840) was a French chemist. He laid founding work in identifying amino acids, the fundamental building blocks of proteins. He did this through recognizing the first of them, asparagine, in 1806 ...
(born
1780
Events
January–March
* January 16 – American Revolutionary War – Battle of Cape St. Vincent: British Admiral Sir George Rodney defeats a Spanish fleet.
* February 19 – The legislature of New York votes to allo ...
), French chemist.
* July 4 –
Karl Ferdinand von Gräfe (born
1787
Events
January–March
* January 9 – The North Carolina General Assembly authorizes nine commissioners to purchase of land for the seat of Chatham County. The town is named Pittsborough (later shortened to Pittsboro), for ...
), German
surgeon.
* August 31 -
Giuseppangelo Fonzi
Giuseppangelo Lucinto Fonzi (18 July 1768, Spoltore in Abruzzo - 31 August 1840, Barcelona in Catalonia) was a Sicilian dental surgeon and dental technician known for having improved the dental prostheses.
Biography
He began to study law in Or ...
, Italian dentist (born
1768
Events
January–March
* January 9 – Philip Astley stages the first modern circus, with acrobats on galloping horses, in London.
* February 11 – Samuel Adams's circular letter is issued by the Massachusetts House of Re ...
)
* September 18 –
Constantine Samuel Rafinesque
Constantine Samuel Rafinesque-Schmaltz (; October 22, 1783September 18, 1840) was a French 19th-century polymath born near Constantinople in the Ottoman Empire and self-educated in France. He traveled as a young man in the United States, ultima ...
(born
1783
Events
January–March
* January 20 – At Versailles, Great Britain signs preliminary peace treaties with the Kingdom of France and the Kingdom of Spain.
* January 23 – The Confederation Congress ratifies two October 8, ...
), French American
polymath
A polymath ( el, πολυμαθής, , "having learned much"; la, homo universalis, "universal human") is an individual whose knowledge spans a substantial number of subjects, known to draw on complex bodies of knowledge to solve specific pro ...
.
* November 2 – Sir
Anthony Carlisle
Sir Anthony Carlisle FRCS, FRS (15 February 1768 in Stillington, County Durham, England – 2 November 1840 in London) was an English surgeon.
Life
He was born in Stillington, County Durham, the third son of Thomas Carlisle and his first wife, ...
(born
1768
Events
January–March
* January 9 – Philip Astley stages the first modern circus, with acrobats on galloping horses, in London.
* February 11 – Samuel Adams's circular letter is issued by the Massachusetts House of Re ...
), English surgeon.
* December 11 –
Franz Bauer
__NOTOC__
Franz Andreas Bauer (later Francis) (14 March 1758 – 11 December 1840) was an Austrian microscopist and botanical artist.
Born in Feldsberg, Lower Austria (now Valtice, Czech Republic), he was the son of Lucas Bauer (died 1761), ...
(born 1758), Moravian-born botanical illustrator.
References
{{reflist
19th century in science
1840s in science