E-Book Overview
Ever since the boom of spectrum analysis in the 1860s, spectroscopy has become one of the most fruitful research technologies in analytic chemistry, physics, astronomy, and other sciences. This book is the first in-depth study of the ways in which various types of spectra, especially the sun's Fraunhofer lines, have been recorded, displayed, and interpreted. The book assesses the virtues and pitfalls of various types of depictions, including hand sketches, woodcuts, engravings, lithographs and, from the late 1870s onwards, photomechanical reproductions. The material of a 19th-century engraver or lithographer, the daily research practice of a spectroscopist in the laboratory, or a student's use of spectrum posters in the classroom, all are looked at and documented here. For pioneers of photography such as John Herschel or Hermann Wilhelm Vogel, the spectrum even served as a prime test object for gauging the color sensitivity of their processes. This is a broad, contextual portrayal of the visual culture of spectroscopy in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The illustrations are not confined to spectra--they show instruments, laboratories, people at work, and plates of printing manuals. The result is a multifacetted description, focusing on the period from Fraunhofer up to the beginning of Bohr's quantum theory. A great deal of new and fascinating material from two dozen archives has been included. A must for anyone interested in the history of modern science or in research practice using visual representations.
E-Book Content
Title Pages
Mapping the Spectrum: Techniques of Visual Representation in Research and Teaching Prof. Dr. Klaus Hentschel
Print publication date: 2002 Print ISBN-13: 9780198509530 Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: January 2010 DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198509530.001.0001
Title Pages (p.i) Mapping The Spectrum (p.ii) (p.iii) Mapping the Spectrum
(p.iv) This book has been printed digitally and produced in a standard specification in order to ensure its continuing availability
Great Clarendon Street, Oxford 0X2 6DP Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan South Korea Poland Portugal Singapore Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries
Page 1 of 2
Title Pages Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © Oxford University Press 2002 Not to be reprinted without permission The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) Reprinted 2009 Colour plates printed with the support from the Georg-Agricola-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften und der Technik e. V. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover And you must impose this same condition on any acquirer ISBN 978-0-19-850953-0 Cover illustration: The luminous, thermal, and chemical spectrum, as depicted in Rober