Antoine Lavoisier

About this book

This biography represents a comprehensive, accessible account of the great eighteenth-century French chemist and administrator, Antoine Lavoisier. Historians of science know of Lavoisier as a founder of modern chemistry. Students of the French Revolution know of him as an important financier and administrator in the final decades of the old regime and as the most famous scientist to be guillotined during the Terror. This volume devotes equal attention to Lavoisier's creation of his oxygen theory of combustion and to his efforts as a public administrator before and during the Revolution. Lavoisier was, by virtue of his achievements and the events in which he was involved, an historical figure of extraordinary importance. His biography illuminates the rise of modern science and the history of the French Revolution. Antoine Lavoisier provides the reader with a vivid, informed image of the man, his achievement and the tumultuous age in which he lived.