Nairne’s Barometer used by Captain Cook
In working on my book Evening Gray, Morning Red, I found myself using metaphors referencing barometers. “The glass was falling”, suggesting a storm, or a “rising glass” suggesting clear and dry weather, seemed perfectly apt language for a nautical novel. The problem was, the novel is set between 1768 and 1772. Were marine barometers common in the period? Did they even exist? I had some research to do.
The invention of the barometer is usually attributed to Torricelli in the mid-1600s, though the “weather glass” or “thunder glass”, a water barometer, is said to have been developed by Gheijsbrecht de Donckere in the 16th century. In England in 1695 Daniel Quare patented a marine barometer, which never seems to have caught on.
