GIBBS, Josiah Willard (1839-1903). "On the Equilibrium of Heterogeneous Substances," in Transactions of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, New Haven: Tuttle, Morehouse & Taylor, 1876-78, volume III (part I pp.108-248 and part II pp.343-524), 8°, 60 photo-lithographed plates (some plates in part I slightly damaged at fore-edge, three plates in the second part badly-discoloured, one or two plates soiled, all stamped on verso, title to part I cleanly-torn and with crude repair to inner margin, pp.108-109 chipped and with neat paper repairs affecting text, library markings though not to the two Gibbs papers), modern boards backed in library cloth, preserving original wrappers to part II, and original back wrapper to part I [Dibner 49; Honeyman 1495; Horblit 40: "a foundation treatise on physical chemistry, the interpretation of chemical processes by application of thermodynamics and mathematics"; Sparrow 84]

Details

GIBBS, Josiah Willard (1839-1903). "On the Equilibrium of Heterogeneous Substances," in Transactions of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, New Haven: Tuttle, Morehouse & Taylor, 1876-78, volume III (part I pp.108-248 and part II pp.343-524), 8°, 60 photo-lithographed plates (some plates in part I slightly damaged at fore-edge, three plates in the second part badly-discoloured, one or two plates soiled, all stamped on verso, title to part I cleanly-torn and with crude repair to inner margin, pp.108-109 chipped and with neat paper repairs affecting text, library markings though not to the two Gibbs papers), modern boards backed in library cloth, preserving original wrappers to part II, and original back wrapper to part I [Dibner 49; Honeyman 1495; Horblit 40: "a foundation treatise on physical chemistry, the interpretation of chemical processes by application of thermodynamics and mathematics"; Sparrow 84]

Lot Essay

Gibbs' memoir of some 300 pages "vastly extended the domain covered by thermodynamics, including chemical, elastic, surface, electromagnetic and electrochemical phenomena in a single system" (DSB), and led directly to the modern manufacture of plastics, drugs, dyes and organic solvents.

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