Revolution French

Sadi Carnot, French physicist and engineer, was born in Paris during the French Revolution. Fie was the... 

The son of a tailor, Joseph Fourier was a member of a large family. Both of his parents died by the time he was nine. His education began at a local, church-run, military school, where he quickly showed talent in his studies and especially in mathematics. His school persuaded him to tram as a priest. While preparing to take holy orders he taught his fellow novices mathematics. Fourier may well have entered the priesthood, but due to the French Revolution new priests were banned from taking holy orders. Instead he returned to his home town of Auxerre and taught at the militaiy school. His friend and mathematics teacher, Bonard, encouraged him to develop his mathematical research, and at the end of 1789 Fourier travelled to Paris to report on this research to the Academic des Sciences. 

Wittkower, Rudolf and Margot Wittkower. Bom under Saturn the character and conduct of artists a documented history from antiquity to the French Revolution. London New York Wiedenfeld Nicolson Random House, 1963. xxiv, 344 p. 

The black product was extracted with water and the sodium carbonate in it was recovered by concentration and crystallization. The residue, chiefly calcium sulfide, known as galigu, was dumped on land and created an environmental nuisance for many years because it never hardened. The process was invented by N. Leblanc in France in 1789, in response to a competition organized by the French Academy of Sciences. Operation of the first factory was delayed for several years because of the French Revolution. The process was operated widely until it was progressively superseded by the Ammonia-soda process in 1872. But it was still in use in Bolton, UK, until 1938, and the last plant in Europe closed in 1992. See also Black ash. 

While feet and yards are still used in Britain and other countries, the usual length is now the metre. At the time of the French Revolution in the 18th century and soon after, the French Academy of Sciences sought to systemize the measurement of all scientific quantities. This work led eventually to the concept of the Systeme Internationale, or SI for short. Within this system, all units and definitions are self-consistent. The SI unit of length is the metre. 

These genealogies, of course, take their point of origin not in ordinary people but in heroic figures who fought enemies, even villains, and who won their battles by wit and dexterity. Lavoisier s triumph over the evil forces of Georg Stahl and phlogiston theory is well known, and unlike most heroic scientists, Lavoisier met a martyr s end in the epic events of the French Revolution. This is historical mythology, a crucial constitutive element of the discipline. 3 5... 

Illustrated History, London, 1991, pp. 74-80 Una Birch, Secret Societies of the French Revolution, London, 1911, pp. 29—42. 

Wittkower, R., and M. Wittkower. Born Under Saturn The Character and Conduct of Artists. A Documented History, From Antiquity to the French Revolution. New York Norton, 1963. 

Duveen, Denis, Antoine Laurent Lavoisier and the French Revolution, ibid.,... 

However, this setback was nothing compared to some historical examples. According to Robert Hendrickson in The Literary Life, British historian Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) had to rewrite the entire first volume of his History of the French Revolution when a maid burned the manuscript, mistaking it for trash. In a fit of rage, the wife of William Ainsworth (1805-1882) tossed the manuscript for his Latin dictionary into the fire, and it took Ainsworth three years to rewrite it. 

Compare the goals and achievements of the French Revolution with those of the American Revolution. 

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