Richard Kirwan, J. H. de Magellan, and the early history of specific heat

Abstract

Summary In the spring of 1780 there appeared a short work by J. H. de Magellan, published in London but written in French, which contained the first table of specific heats (and the first use of this term) to appear in print. Magellan attributed the table to Richard Kirwan, but in none of his published works does Kirwan refer to it, so that the circumstances of its compilation are obscure. Kirwan's correspondence, however, provides evidence both of his association with Magellan and of his long concern with theories of heat. In a series of letters concerned principally with his forthcoming publication, written to James Watt at the beginning of 1780, Magellan attacked Joseph Black for his failure to publish his own work on heat.

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