Invention Timeline - Rene Antoine Ferchault de Reaumur, French Physicist; Discoverer of the Composition of China Porcelain and Inventor of the Process of Turning Iron Into Steel and of Extracting Tin
b. ? 1683 and d. October 17, 1756
French physicist; discoverer of the composition of China porcelain and inventor of the process of turning iron into steel and of extracting tin. He constructed a thermometer which maintains equal degrees of heat and cold, using what is called the Reaumur Scale. From 1708 till his death he was engaged in geometrical speculations; the strength of cordage; the development of the shells of testaceous animals; the coloring-matter of turquoise-gems; the manufacture of iron, steel, porcelain; artificial incubation; the imitating of the famous purple dye of the ancients; the graduation of thermometers; the reproduction of the claws of lobsters and crabs; the instincts and habits of insects.
Turn, turn, my wheel! What is begun
At daybreak must at dark be done,
To-morrow will be another day;
To-morrow the hot furnace flame
Will search the heart and try the frame,
And stamp with honor or with shame
These vessels made of clay.
—Kéramos: Longfellow
1490 B. C.—Crockery was made by the Egyptians and Greeks.
650 B. C.—Potters flourished in Corinth.
185 B. C.—Hard porcelain was invented by Sin-Ping of China.
