Thèse présentée à la faculté des sciences de Paris... Sur les vitesses rélatives de la lumière dans l’air et dans l’eau

by Jean Bernard Léon Foucault

$20,000 · Offered by Sophia Rare Books

First edition

Paris: Bachelier, 1853. First edition, rare, and an exceptionally fine copy, of Foucault’s doctoral thesis on the speed of light, in which he provides a convincing proof for the wave theory of light. In the 1840s Foucault undertook a series of optical experiments using an apparatus of rotating mirrors to determine the velocity of light. Originally developed by Charles Wheatstone to measure the velocity of electricity,

Found via Rare Books Intel, a search across rare-book dealers, auction houses and marketplaces worldwide.