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OTTO VON GUERICKE (1602-1686)

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Originally appearing in Volume V12, Page 670 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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OTTO VON See also:GUERICKE (1602-1686)  , See also:German experimental philosopher, was See also:born at See also:Magdeburg, in Prussian See also:Saxony, on the loth of See also:November 1602 . Having studied See also:law at See also:Leipzig, Helmstadt and See also:Jena, and See also:mathematics, especially See also:geometry and See also:mechanics, at See also:Leiden, he visited See also:France and See also:England, and in 1636 became engineer-in-See also:chief at See also:Erfurt . In 1627 he was elected See also:alderman of Magdeburg, and in 1646 See also:mayor of that See also:city and a See also:magistrate of See also:Brandenburg . His leisure was devoted to scientific pursuits, especially in See also:pneumatics . Incited by the discoveries of Galileo, See also:Pascal and See also:Torricelli, he attempted the creation of a vacuum . He began by experimenting with a See also:pump on See also:water placed in a See also:barrel, but found that when the water was See also:drawn off the See also:air permeated the See also:wood .. He then took a globe of See also:copper fitted with pump and stopcock, and discovered that he could pump out air as well as water . Thus he became` the inventor of the air-pump (165o) . He illustrated his See also:discovery 'before the See also:emperor See also:Ferdinand III. at the imperial See also:diet which assembled at See also:Regensburg in 1654, by the experiment of the " Magdeburg hemispheres." Taking two hollow hemispheres of copper, the edges of which fitted nicely together, he exhausted the air from between them by means of his pump, and it is recorded that See also:thirty horses, fifteen back to back, were unableto pull them asunder until the air was readmitted . Besides investigating other phenomena connected with a vacuum, he constructed an See also:electrical See also:machine which depended on the excitation of a rotating See also:ball of See also:sulphur; and he made successful researches in See also:astronomy, predicting the periodicity of the return of comets . In 1681 he gave up See also:office, and retired to See also:Hamburg, where he died on the 11th of May 1686 . His See also:principal observations are given in his See also:work, Experimenta nova, ut vacant, Magdeburgica de vacuo spatio (See also:Amsterdam, 1672) .

He is also the author of a Geschichte der Belagerung and Eroberung von Magdeburg . See F . W . See also:

Hoffmann, See also:Otto von See also:Guericke (Magdeburg, 1874) .

End of Article: OTTO VON GUERICKE (1602-1686)
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