FARADAY, MICHAEL. - COINING THE WORDS ELECTRODE, ANODE, CATHODE, ION, ANION, AND CATION.

Fünfte Reihe von Experimental-Untersuchungen über Elektricität. § 11. Von der elektrochemischen Zerasetzung.

Leipzig, Johann Ambrosius Barth, 1834. 8vo. Contemp. hcalf. Spine gilt and with gilt lettering. Spine slightly rubbed. In: "Annalen der Physik und Chemie. Hrsg.von Poggendorff", Bd. 32 (= 2. Reihe, Bd. 2). VIII,666 pp. a. 5 folded lithographed plates. (Entire volume offered). Faraday's paper: pp. 401-453 a. 1 lithographed plate. Stamp to verso of titlepage and verso of plates. Clean and fine, printed on good paper.

First appearance in German - prepared by Faraday himself for publication in Annalen - of an importent historical paper in chemistry and physics in which Faraday reexamines some of his earlier views on electro-chemical decomposition and critizises in detail the theories of Grotthuss, Davy, Riffault and Chompré, Biot, De la Rive and Hachette. Here Faraday's give coins the names, still in use, for several electrical phenomena.

"For his next series of researches (the paper offered), Faraday reverted to subjects which had been among the first to attract him as an apprentice attending Davy's lectures; the voltaic pile, and the relation of electricity to chemistry......To test the doctrine (of Davy and De La Rive) of the influence of terminals, Faraday moistened a piece of paper in a saline solution, and supported it in the air on wax, so as to occupy part of the interval between two needle points which were connected with an electric machine...under these circumstances it was found thet the salt underwent decomposition......Since in this case no metallic terminals of any kind were in contact with the solution it was evident that all hypotheses which attributed decomposition to the action of the terminals were untenable...many of the perplexities which had harassed the older theories were at once removed when the phenomena were regarded from Faraday's point of view."(Whittaker).

"Faraday's paper, 'on electrochemical decompositions, is mostly a review and criticism of earlier theories of electrolysis and the statement of his own theory tat: 'electr-chemical decomposition does not depend upon any direct attraction and repulsion of the poles (meaning thereby the metallic terminations either of the voltaic battery, or ordinary electrical machine arrangements).' Decomposition occurs on pieces of paper not directly connected with the poles of an electrical machine, the silent discharge passing throug the air." (Partington IV:p. 115).

From 1831 to 1852 Michael Faraday published his "Experimental Researches in Electricity" in The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. These papers contain not only an impressive series of experimental discoveries, but also a collection of heterodox theoretical concepts on the nature of these phenomena expressed in terms of lines of forces and fields. He published 30 papers in all under this general title.They represents Faraday's most importent work, are classics in both chemistry and physics and are the experimental foundations for Maxwell's electro-magnetic theory of light, using Faraday's concepts of lines of force or tubes of magnetic and electrical forces. His many experiments on the effects of electricity and magnetism presented in these papers lead to the fundamental discoveries of 'induced electricity' (the Farday current), the electronic state of matter, the identity of electricity from different sources, equivalents in electro-chemical decomposition, electrostatic induction, hydro-electricity, diamagnetism, relation of gravity to electricity, atmospheric magnetism and many other.

"Among experimental philosophers Faraday holds by universal consent the foremost place. The memoirs in which his discoveries are enshrined will never ceaseto be read with admiration and delight; and future generations will preserve with an affection not less enduring the personal records and familiar letters, which recall the memory of his humble and unselfish spirit."(Edmund Whittaker in A History of the Theories of Aether and Electricity).

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