The Story of Chemistry

The Story of...

by Anne Rooney

The Story of Chemistry shows how the study of chemistry came into being following early exploitation of chemistry that were purely practical, e.g. smelting, alloys, dyeing, cooking, glazing pottery and paints. Hammurabi produced his catalog of metals as early as 1700 BC, and just as the exploration of metals was driven by a desire for better weapons, so chemistry advanced in the early historical period for use in distillation, materials, fermentation and medicine. Chemistry became a science after it was divorced from alchemy, when the scientific method was applied by such luminaries as Bacon and Lavoissier. Incorporating the search for elementals and the composition of matter, along with the study of energy and the transformation of matter, this is the story of how human beings took control of the world and used chemistry to modify it. Produced in an attractive and popular format with lots of full-color illustrations. Accessible and easily understood, with box-outs on all the leading personalities in this discipline.

Genres: Nonfiction, Science, History

208 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 2018

About the author

Anne Rooney gained a degree and then a PhD in medieval literature from Trinity College, Cambridge. After a period of teaching medieval English and French literature at the universities of Cambridge and York, she left to pursue a career as a freelance writer. She has written many books for adults and children on a variety of subjects, including literature and history. She lives in Cambridge and is Royal Literary Fund Fellow at the University of Essex.