Permanent historical factsheet

Speed of Light

France · Science / Astronomy. Chronological records rendered directly from the World History Database.

2Records
1849–1862Date range
2Named people
0Places

Chronological records

1849

Hippolyte Fizeau1849

Science / Astronomy

The first successful entirely earthbound measurement of the speed of light is carried out by Hippolyte Fizeau, measuring the speed of light in air, which is slower than the speed of light in vacuum by a factor of the refractive index of air 1.0003

1862

Leon Foucault1862

Science / Astronomy

Foucaults estimate, published in 1862, is 298,000 kilometres per second

Names involved

Hippolyte FizeauLeon Foucault

Provenance

This factsheet is generated from stored World History Database records matching the country, broad category, detailed category and exact Event value shown above. Duplicate display records are collapsed; database wording is otherwise preserved. Source provenance varies by record, so formal academic citation should be checked against the relevant primary source, archive or specialist historical reference.