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Cavendish's Discovery of Hydrogen

When
1766
Where
Royal Society of London, inferred institutional context for the paper's appearance; no passage states where the paper appeared
Episodes
1

In 1766 Henry Cavendish published his first paper, On Factitious Airs, describing a definite, peculiar, and highly inflammable gas he called "inflammable air," produced when certain acids acted on certain metals. He reported the gas's density and that it formed water on combustion, and the Royal Society awarded him the Copley Medal for the paper.

Episodes

  1. 1766 · Royal Society of London, inferred institutional context for the paper's appearance; no passage states where the paper appearedCavendish's 1766 paper On Factitious Airs

    Cavendish's first paper described "inflammable air"—hydrogen—produced by acids acting on metals, reported its density, and noted it formed water on combustion.

Background and detail

Background. Henry Cavendish (10 October 1731 – 24 February 1810) was an English experimental and theoretical chemist and physicist. He had been elected to the Royal Society of London in 1765, and his father had taken him to Royal Society meetings and Royal Society Club dinners in 1758, situating him within the London scientific community before his first paper appeared.

The 1766 Paper. Cavendish's first paper, Factitious Airs, appeared in 1766. In it he described the density of inflammable air, a definite, peculiar, and highly inflammable gas produced by the action of certain acids on certain metals, which formed water on combustion. He correctly guessed that this gas—hydrogen—was proportioned two to one in water.

Recognition. The Royal Society recognized the paper's importance, awarding Cavendish its Copley Medal for this work. The discovery of hydrogen, which he termed "inflammable air," became one of the achievements for which he is noted.

People involved

  • Henry Cavendish · Author of the 1766 paper On Factitious Airs describing "inflammable air" (hydrogen)

Sources

  1. Henry Cavendish Wikipedia, revision of 2026-08-31

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.