Abstract
Blowpipe analysis was pioneered in Sweden in the eighteenth century. The blowpipe has secured a place in chemical hagiography by being an instrument with which Swedish chemists such as Axel Cronstedt and Carl Scheele isolated a number of elements including nickel, manganese, molybdenum, and tungsten. Other chemists, such as Gustaf von Engeström, Torbern Bergman, and Jacob Berzelius, were well-known authors of chemical treatises which espoused the utility of blowpipe analysis. This instrument was valued because of the simplicity of the apparatus and its portability. It was small (capable of fitting into a pencil case) and inexpensive. hi design, it was a thin, curved metal tube, through which a practitioner would blow air in order to concentrate a candle flame onto a mineral specimen. The intense reducing flame caused rapid decomposition of the mineral, and, with the use of chemical reagents, the chemical constituents of the specimen could often be determined. Analysis could be performed on small mineral samples to provide instant results in the field.’ Economic, social, and political conditions in Sweden aided the development of this form of chemical analysis. Training in blowpipe analysis was an important dimension in the education of Swedish civil servants, who conducted on-site analyses to determine the location and nature of metals for the increasingly important mining industry.
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Notes
For a survey of the literature on the history of the blowpipe, see Brian Dolan, “Blowpipe,” in A. Hessenbruch, ed. Reader’s Guide to the History of Science (London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2001), 87–88; useful studies which should be mentioned include U. Burchard, “The History and Apparatus of Blowpipe Analysis,” The Mineralogical Record, 25 (1994) 251–277; W.B. Jensen, “The Development of Blowpipe Analysis,” in J.T. Stock and M.V. Orna, eds., The History and Preservation of Chemical Instrumentation (D. Reidell Publishing Company, 1986), pp. 123–149; and W.A. Campbell, “The Development of Qualitative Analysis 1750–1850: The Use of the Blowpipe,” The University of Newcastle Upon Tyne Philosophical Society, 2 (1971–2), 17–24.
G. von Engeström, Description and Use of a Mineralogical Pocket Laboratory,and especially the use of the Blowpipe in Mineralogy (London, 1770), added as an addendum to his translation of A.F. Cronstedt, Försök till Mineralogie eller Mineral-Rikets upstâllning (1758).
[Thomas Thomson] “Improvements in Physical Science during the Year 1816,” Annals of Philosophy, 9 (1817), 6–13, 8.
Jan Golinski, Science as Public Culture: Chemistry and Enlightenment in Britain, 17601820 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), particularly chap. 6, for good discussion of analytical community, although he simplifies debates over blowpipe results.
Ian Inkster, “Science and Society in the Metropolis: A Preliminary Examination of the Social and Institutional Context of the Askesian Society of London, 1796–1807,” Annals of Science, 34 (1977), 1–32; G. Averley, “The Social Chemists”: English Chemical Societies in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Century,“ Ambix, 33 (1986), 99–128.
For an account of the market for chemical apparatus and attempts to write chemical textbooks in the early nineteenth century, see Brian Dolan, “The Language of Experiment in Chemical Textbooks: Some examples from early-nineteenth-century Britain,” in A. Lundgren and B. Bensaude-Vincent, eds., Communicating Chemistry: Textbooks and their Audiences, 1789–1939 (Canton, MA: Science History Publications, 2000), pp. 141164.
J.J. Griffin, Practical Treatise on the Use of the Blowpipe in Chemical and Mineral Analysis (Glasgow, 1827), p. iii.
B. Gee and W. Brock, “The Case of John Joseph Griffin: From Artisan-Chemist and Author-Instructor to Business-Leader,” Ambix, 38 (1991), 29–62, 39; Inskster, op.cit. (5).
It is worth noting, as Gee and Brock also pointed out, that Griffin’s interests in blowpipe analysis probably grew from his personal acquaintance with Aikin, who was one of the original members of the Askesian Society. In this respect it is significant that Smithson Tennant was also one of the founding members of the Askesian Society; Gee and Brock, op. cit. (8), 39.
For distinctions between dry and wet analysis, see W.A. Campbell, “Analytical Chemistry,” in C.A. Russell, ed., Recent Developments in the History of Chemistry (London: Royal Society of Chemistry, 1985), pp. 176–190, pp. 178–179; A.G. Debus, “Fire Analysis and the Elements in the Sixteenth and the Seventeenth Centuries,” Annals of Science, 23 (1967), 127–147; A.G. Debus, “Solution Analyses prior to Roberty Boyle,” Chymia, 8 (1962), 41–61.
F.L. Holmes, “Analysis by fire and solvent extractions: the metamorphosis of a tradition,” Isis, 62 (1971), 129–148; R. Siegfried and B.J. Dobbs, “Composition: A neglected aspect of the chemical revolution,” Annals of Science, 24 (1968), 275–293; H. Cassebaum and G.B Kauffman, “The Analytical Concept of a Chemical Element in the Work of Bergman and Scheele,” Annals of Science, 33 (1976), 447–456.
R. Hooykaas, “The species concept in 18th century mineralogy”, Archives Internationales d’Histoire des Sciences, 5th year (1952), 45–55; D.R. Oldroyd, “Mineralogy and the ”Chemical Revolution,“ Centaurus, 19 (1975), 54–71.
R. Laudan, From Mineralogy to Geology: The Foundations of a Science,1650–1830 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), for discussion of external characteristics and crystallography.
Hooke quoted in Campbell, op. cit. (1), p. 17; also F. Greenaway, Chemistry: 1: Chemical Laboratories and Apparatus to 1850 (London, 1966); G. Turner, Nineteenth-Century Scientific Instruments (London: Philip Wilson Publishers Ltd., 1983); M. Dumas, Scientific Instruments of the 17th and 18th Centuries (New York: Praeger, 1972), for chronological catalogue of blowpipes.
T.M. Porter, “The Promotion of Mining and the Advancement of Science: the Chemical Revolution of Mineralogy,” Annals of Science, 38 (1981), 543–570; B. Earl, Cornish Mining: The Techniques of Metal Mining in the West of England, Past and Present (Cornwall: D. Bradford Barton Ltd., 1968), for examples in Britain; Frangsmyr, “Science in Sweden;” see Gee and Brock, op. cit. (8) for discussion of later significance of continental theory for British chemistry and mineralogy, 39–41.
For example, in 1731 two well-known London natural philosophers published a book describing a “portable laboratory” for various chemical analyses. They described small, portable furnaces, the uses of which extended from testing mineral composition of minerals at mines to providing a means for families to brew their own alcohol. See P. Shaw and F. Hauksbee, An Essay for Introducing a Portable Laboratory: By Means where all of the Chemical Operations are Commodiously Perform’d, for the Purpose of Philosophy,Medicine, Metallurgy, and a Family (London, 1731) for broader conception of portable labs, which include blowpipe kits, see W.A. Smeaton, “The Portable Chemical Laboratories of Guyton de Morveau, Cronstedt and Gottling,” Ambix, 13 (1966), 84–91.
D.R. Oldroyd, “Some Phlogistic Mineralogical Schemes, Illustrative of the Evolution of the Concept of ”Earth“ in the 17th and 18th Centuries,” Annals of Science, 31 (1974), 269305; A. Lundgren, “The Changing Role of Numbers in 18th-Century Chemistry,” in T. Frangsmyr, J. Heilbron, and R. Rider, eds., The Quantifying Spirit in the 18th Century (Berkeley and Oxford: University of California Press, 1990), 245–266, for suggestive comments about bringing the quantifying spirit to blowpipe analysis.
See Campbell, op. cit. (1) for chart of simple colour scheme in blowpipe analysis, p. 23.
J.J. Berzelius, The Use of the Blowpipe in Chemical Analysis, and in the Examination of Minerals trans. J.G. Children (London, 1822), p. 13.
A. Rees, The Cyclopaedia; or Universal Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and Literature, 39 vols (London, 1819), “Blow-pipe” (probably written by Arthur Aikin, vol. IV, no pagination, published in 1805).
S. Lindroth, A History of Uppsala University,1477–1977 (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1976).
M. Beretta, “T.O. Bergman and the Definition of Chemistry,” Lychnos, (1988), 37–67, pp. 37–38.
Qtd. in J. Jorpes, Jac. Berzelius: His Life and Work,trans. B. Steele (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1966), pp.87–88.
Berzelius, op. cit. (19), p. 5; a translation of a paper penned by Gahn did appear: see [J.G. Gahn], “On the Blow-pipe;” for more information on Gahn, see Jan Trofast, Johan Gottlieb Gahn (Lund: Wallin & Dalholm, 1994).
S Lindqvist, Technology on Trial: The Introduction of Steam Power Technology into Sweden, 1715–1736 (Uppsala. Almqvist & Wiksell, 1984), pp. 95–107 for discussion of the work of the Board of Mines.
Some might wonder why Anton von Svab, who was assessor to the Mining Academy at Stockholm in the 1730s, is not added to this list; Gee and Brock op. cit. (8), for example, cite Svab as the first in Sweden to use the blowpipe in chemical mineralogy, but Campbell op. cit. (1) suggests that this was a mistaken claim which originated with a reference by Linnaeus; Burchard op. cit. (1) observed that a reference by Bergman to “Swab” as the first to use the blowpipe was not to Anton, but to Andreas, who died before alleged blowpipe experiments took place, which may have further confused the point. It should also be noted that Jensen op. cit. (1) recognised the importance of examining communities of chemists amongst whom skilled techniques could be transmitted, but preferred to trace a chronology of blowpipe literature.
D. McDonald, “Smithson Tennant, F.R.S. (1761–1815),” Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London, 17 (1962), 77–94.
S. Tennant, “Journey to Stockholm 1784,” diary transcribed by Henry Warburton, Cambridge University Library, MSS ADD 7736, entries for 28 July and 26 August.
William Wollaston’s account of Milner in Cambridge University Library, MSS ADD 7736, Box 2, Envelope B, ff. 2–3; for income and entertainment, see J. Golinski, “Utility and Audience in Eighteenth-Century Chemistry: Case Studies of William Cullen and Joseph Priestley,” British Journal for the History of Science, 21 (1988), 1–31.
I. Milner, A Plan of a Course of Chemical Lectures (Cambridge, 1788); F.J.H. Wollaston, A Plan of a Course of Chemical Lectures (Cambridge, 1794); Cambridge University Library has an annotated copy of Wollaston’s syllabus: class-mark 7360.d.11.
Cambridge University Library, MSS ADD 7736, Box 2, Envelope B, f. 2, “Biographical Sketch of Tennant.”
B. Gee, “Amusement Chests and Portable Laboratories: Practical Alternatives to the Regular Laboratory” in F.A.J.L. James, The Development of the Laboratory: Essays on the Place of Experiment in Industrial Civilization (London: Macmillan Press, 1989), pp. 37–58, mistakenly claims that Wollaston travelled to Sweden, whereas Tennant was the traveller, p. 46.
Berzelius qtd. in D. Goodman, “William Hyde Wollaston and His Influence on Early Nineteenth-Century Science” (Ph.D. Thesis, Oxford University, 1965), p. 129.
Wollaston’s experiments in his notebook, Cambridge University Library, MSS ADD 7736, Box 2; Wollaston, “Description of a Portable Blow-Pipe.”
For Tennant -Berzelius correspondence, see manuscripts in Royal Academy of Sciences, Stockholm, Saml. 3, ff. 96–101.
A. Lundgren, “The New Chemistry in Sweden: The Debate that Wasn’t,” Osiris, 2nd series, 4 (1988), 146–168, p. 165; E.M. Melhado, Jacob Berzelius: The Emergence of His Chemical System (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1980), p. 130.
For brief discussion about Hailstone’s experiments, see B. Dolan, Governing Matters: The Values of an English Education in the Earth Sciences (Cambridge University, unpublished PhD thesis, 1995), pp. 165–166; Hailstone’s experiments described in correspondence at West Sussex Record Office, Hawkins Papers.
A.L. Lavoisier, “De l’action du feu animé par l’air vital sur les substances minerals les plus réfractaires,” OEuvres de Lavoisier, 6 vols (Paris, 1864–1893), Vol. III, pp. 451–502; Oldroyd, op. cit. (12), pp. 60–61; E.L. Gonzalez, “Bochard de Saron and the Oxyhydrogen Blowpipe,” Bulletin for the History of Chemistry 4 (1989), 11–15, T. Levere, “Lavoisier: Language, Instruments, and the Chemical Revolution,” in T. Levere and W. Shea, eds., Nature,Experiment, and the Sciences (Dordrecht & London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1990), 207–223; Jan Golinski, “The Nicety of Experiment: Precision of Measurement and Precision of Reasoning in Late Eighteenth-Century Chemistry,” in M. Norton Wise, ed., The Values of Precision (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), for the processes of persuasion used by the anti-phlogistonists to argue the accuracy of the instruments used to “prove” the new chemistry.
E.D. Clarke, Travels in Various Countries of Europe,Asia, and Africa, 6 vols (London: Cadell and Davies, 1810–1823), references in Vol. V.
For more thorough discussion of Clarke’s travels, within the context of the cultures of scientific travel in the late eighteenth-century, see B. Dolan, Exploring European Frontiers: British Travellers in the Age of Enlightenment (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2000).
Clarke, op. cit. (40), Vol. V, p. 171; see also H. Sandblad, “Edward D. Clarke och Giuseppe Acerbi, upptacktsresande i Norden 1798–1800,” Lychnos (1979–80), 155–205.
J.M.F. Wright, Alma Mater: or, Seven Years at the University of Cambridge, 2 vols (London: Black, Young & Young, 1827), Vol. II, pp. 30–31.
E.D. Clarke, A Methodical Distribution of the Mineral Kingdom (Lewes, 1806); E.D. Clarke, A Syllabus of Lectures in Mineralogy (Cambridge, 1807).
J.B. Morrell, “Thomas Thomson: Professor of Chemistry and University Reformer,” British Journal for the History of Science, 4 (1969), 245–265, 246.
T. Thomson, Travels through Sweden, during the autumn of 1812 (London, 1813), p. 1.
Historians interested in travellers must exercise caution when using published accounts of journeys as if they were field-notes. Published accounts, sometimes written years after the journey took place, were often embellished to meet the demands of an audience eager for new information or exciting narratives. Also, authors often swapped travel-notes and letters in order to reconstruct the journey. What may appear a spontaneous quip about local customs in the published narrative, for example, may have been thought of when relaying stories of the journey at dinner parties back home. The case of Thomson and Clarke is an example. Much of Thomson’s observations of Swedish mines and reflections on the “state of chemistry,” published in 1813, appear verbatim in Clarke’s account, published in 1819. In fact, this was not unusual, and for this reason consulting as many contemporary accounts as possible helps capture the spirit of the genre of travel literature published in a particular era. Many travel writers “borrowed” text from other authors, but usually claimed the uniqueness of their books lay in their additional observations. Published travel accounts can generally be relied on as records of where people went, when they arrived, and who they met. Particulars, such as what they thought about individuals or what they gathered along the way, are best cross-referenced with correspondence (often published in Life and Letters, as in Clarke’s case) or manuscript diaries, when extant.
Berzelius, op. cit. (19), p.3; for another discussion of skill in laboratory practice compared to textual accounts, see H.O. Sibum, “Reworking the Mechanical Value of Heat: Instruments of Precision and Gestures of Accuracy in Early Victorian England,” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 26 (1995), 73–96.
A. Tilloch, “Account of some interesting Experiments, performed at the London Philosophical Society,” Philosophical Magazine, 8 (1800), 21–29, 262–266, 322–326; R. Hare, “Memoir on the Supply and Application of the Blowpipe,” Philosophical Magazine, 14 (1802), 238–245, 298–306.
“N. N.”, “Description of a cheap and simple Apparatus or Blow-pipe, in which the flame of Oil or Tallow is impelled by Vapour of Alcohol,” Journal of Natural Philosophy, Chemistry, and the Arts, 3 (1802), 1–3, 2.
For the wider transition in the discipline of chemistry as a whole, see L. Roberts, “Filling the Space of Possibilities: Eighteenth-Century Chemistry’s Transition from Art to Science,” Science in Context, 6 (1993), 511–533.
J.R. Harris, “Skills, Coal and British Industry in the Eighteenth Century,” History, 61 (1976), 167–82; H. Torrens, “Some Thoughts on the Complex and Forgotten History of Mineral Exploration,” DUGS Journal, 17 (1996), 1–12, although Torrens does mention that in 1818 a short-lived “School of Mines” was run by James Ryan in Montgomeryshire: p. 5; Ross, a late-eighteenth-century writer on blowpipe analysis, expressed his dissatisfaction with The City Guilds of London Institute and the Royal School of Mines, for their lack of interest in teaching blowpipe analysis earlier in the century; W.A. Ross, The Blowpipe in Chemistry, Mineralogy and Geology (London, 1889), p. x; as a side-note, however, by the 1840s Durham University was training engineers in blowpipe analysis; see Durham chemistry papers (I would like to thank Professor David Knight for this reference).
J Tilley, “Description of a Hydro-pneumatic Blow-pipe for the Use of Chemists, Enamellers, Assayers, and Glass-Blowers,” Philosophical Magazine, 43 (1814), 280–284, p. 280; this article is a reprint of the letter in the Transactions.
For the Society of Arts award system and its role in the promotion of scientific instrumentation in the early nineteenth century, see J.A. Bennett, “Instrument Makers and the ”Decline of Science in England“: the effects of institutional change on the elite makers of the early nineteenth century,” in P.R. de Clercq, ed., Nineteenth-Century Scientific Instruments and their Makers (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1985), pp. 13–27, pp. 21–22.
H. Brooke, “Description of a new Blow-Pipe,” Annals of Philosophy, 7 (1816), 367.
E.D. Clarke, The Gas Blow-Pipe, or Art of Fusion by Burning Gaseous Constituents of Water (London: Cadell and Davies, 1819), a catalogue of the results of his experiments, together with brief history and discussion of the use of the instrument.
For more on this debate and a comparison of the development of analysis with blowpipes and galvanic batteries in early nineteenth-century England, see B. Dolan, “Blowpipes & Batteries: Humphry Davy, Edward Daniel Clarke, and Experimental Chemistry in Georgian Britain,” Ambix, 45 (1998), 137–162.
E. Darwin to C. Darwin, 25 October 1822, printed in F. Burkhardt and S. Smith, eds, The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, 10 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985-present), Vol. I, pp. 1–2.
J.A. Secord, “The Discovery of a Vocation: Darwin’s early geology,” British Journal for the History of Science, 24 (1991), 133–157; L. Wilson, Charles Lyell: the years to 1841: the revolution in geology (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1972), p. 111.
The 1984 publication is J. Landauer, Blowpipe Analysis, trans. James Taylor (London, 189; reprint, New York, 1984); for a more thorough bibliography of texts relating to blowpipe analysis, mainly from the period covered in this article, see the appendix to B. Dolan, “Transferring Skill: Blowpipe Analysis in Sweden and England, 1750–1850,” in B. Dolan, ed., Science Unbound: Geography, Space & Discipline (Umeå: Umeå Universitet Shifter, 1998), pp. 92–125.
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Dolan, B. (2003). Embodied Skills and Travelling Savants. In: Simões, A., Carneiro, A., Diogo, M.P. (eds) Travels of Learning. Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol 233. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-3584-1_6
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