Credit: ©The Royal Society
    Image number: RS.15353

    Glass balls

    Date
    26 November 1662
    Creator
    Unknown, Artist
    After
    Robert Hooke (1635 - 1703, British) , Natural philosopher
    Object type
    Archive reference number
    Manuscript page number
    p3
    Material
    Dimensions
    height (page): 293mm
    width (page): 184mm
    Subject
    Content object
    Description
    Drawing of a double glass ball used by Robert Hooke to prove the compression of air in the internal glass ball. This was reported among other experiments using glass balls to the meeting of the Royal Society on 26 November 1662.

    ABC shows a glass ball made of white glass melted in the flame of a lamp and sealed up while the ball was very hot. DFEIK indicates a bolt head cut off at IK to fit in the ball and sealed up with cement afterwards. Water is then poured in between the bolt head and the glass ball until it reaches H. When the top of the glass ball A is broken, the height of the water rises to G (1/8 of an inch), which indicates the measure of the air that was compressed in the glass ball ABC.

    The original drawing by Hooke is at Cl.P/20/3/003. Other copies of this image are found in RBO/2i/040, RBO/2ii/044 and MS/776/239.
    Transcription
    A Brief Account
    The Expts tryed with Glasse-Balls
    Transcribed by the Making Visible project
    Object history
    26 November 1662, ‘Mr. Hooke brought in his account of the experiments tried with glass-balls’ (Birch 1:127).
    Related fellows
    Robert Hooke (1635 - 1703, British) , Natural philosopher
    Associated place
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