Principles of Chemistry

MENDELEEV, Dmitri Ivanovich (1834-1907). Osnovy khimii. [Principles of Chemistry]. St Petersburg: 1869-71. First edition of Mendeleev's principal work. His preface, dated March 1869, contains the first appearance of his periodic table; it was only shortly before publication that Mendeleev first realised how to group the elements according to the principle of atomicity. Principles of Chemistry was first conceived two years earlier, after Mendeleev had been appointed to the chair of chemistry in the University of St. Petersburg. Finding there was no book he could recommend to his students as a text for his lectures, he set out to write his own, deriving his basic plan from Gerhardt's theory of types, whereby elements were grouped by valence in relation to oxygen. However, in his early chapters on alkali metals and specific heat, Mendeleev organised the halogens and alkali metals according to their atomic weight in order to show that, in spite of their common valency, they had a contrary chemical relationship. In seeing there was a regular progression between the atomic weights of all the elements, he was led on remarkably quickly to the formulation of the periodic law. DSB IX, p. 288; Bolton p. 664; cf. Grolier Science 74. Two volumes, octavo (179 x 105mm). Half titles, engraved illustrations in text, folding letterpress table (faint dampstaining, some spotting, small repair in upper margin of second title, table mounted.) Contemporary Russian roan-backed boards (hinges cracked, backstrip of vol. 2 detached along front joint, rubbed and worn, front flyleaves renewed). Custom clamshell box.

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