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The timeline of chemistry lists important works, discoveries, ideas, inventions, and experiments that significantly changed humanity's understanding of the modern science known as chemistry, defined as the scientific study of the composition of matter and of its interactions. The history of chemistry in its modern form arguably began with the Irish scientist Robert Boyle, though its roots can be traced back to the earliest recorded history. Early ideas that later became incorporated into the modern science of chemistry come from two main sources. Natural philosophers (such as Aristotle and Democritus) used deductive reasoning in an attempt to explain the behavior of the world around them. Alchemists (such as Geber and Rhazes) were people who used experimental techniques in an attempt to extend the life or perform material conversions, such as turning base metals into gold. In the 17th century, a synthesis of the ideas of these two disciplines, that is the ''deductive'' and the ''experimental'', leads to the development of a process of thinking known as the scientific method. With the introduction of the scientific method, the modern science of chemistry was born. Known as "the central science", the study of chemistry is strongly influenced by, and exerts a strong influence on, many other scientific and technological fields. Many events considered central to our modern understanding of chemistry are also considered key discoveries in such fields as physics, biology, astronomy, geology, and materials science to name a few. ==Pre-17th century== Prior to the acceptance of the scientific method and its application to the field of chemistry, it is somewhat controversial to consider many of the people listed below as "chemists" in the modern sense of the word. However, the ideas of certain great thinkers, either for their prescience, or for their wide and long-term acceptance, bear listing here. ;c. 3000 BC: Egyptians formulate the theory of the Ogdoad, or the "primordial forces", from which all was formed. These were the elements of chaos, numbered in eight, that existed before the creation of the sun. ;c. 1200 BC: Tapputi-Belatikallim, a perfume-maker and early chemist, was mentioned in a cuneiform tablet in Mesopotamia. ;c. 450 BC: Empedocles asserts that all things are composed of four primal elements: earth, air, fire, and water, whereby two active and opposing forces, love and hate, or affinity and antipathy, act upon these elements, combining and separating them into infinitely varied forms. ;c. 440 BC: Leucippus and Democritus propose the idea of the atom, an indivisible particle that all matter is made of. This idea is largely rejected by natural philosophers in favor of the Aristotlean view (see below). ;c. 360 BC: Plato coins term ‘elements’ (''stoicheia'') and in his dialogue Timaeus, which includes a discussion of the composition of inorganic and organic bodies and is a rudimentary treatise on chemistry, assumes that the minute particle of each element had a special geometric shape: tetrahedron (fire), octahedron (air), icosahedron (water), and cube (earth). ;c. 350 BC: Aristotle, expanding on Empedocles, proposes idea of a substance as a combination of ''matter'' and ''form''. Describes theory of the Five Elements, fire, water, earth, air, and aether. This theory is largely accepted throughout the western world for over 1000 years.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 url = http://hilltop.bradley.edu/~rbg/el.html )〕 ; c. 50 BC: Lucretius publishes ''De Rerum Natura'', a poetic description of the ideas of atomism. ;c. 300: Zosimos of Panopolis writes some of the oldest known books on alchemy, which he defines as the study of the composition of waters, movement, growth, embodying and disembodying, drawing the spirits from bodies and bonding the spirits within bodies. ;c. 770: Abu Musa Jabir ibn Hayyan (aka Geber), an Arab/Persian alchemist who is "considered by many to be the father of chemistry",〔John Warren (2005). "War and the Cultural Heritage of Iraq: a sadly mismanaged affair", ''Third World Quarterly'', Volume 26, Issue 4 & 5, p. 815-830.〕 develops an early experimental method for chemistry, and isolates numerous acids, including hydrochloric acid, nitric acid, citric acid, acetic acid, tartaric acid, and aqua regia. ;c. 1000: Abū al-Rayhān al-Bīrūnī and Avicenna,〔Robert Briffault (1938). ''The Making of Humanity'', p. 196-197.〕 both Persian chemists, refute the practice of alchemy and the theory of the transmutation of metals. ;c. 1167: Magister Salernus of the School of Salerno makes the first references to the distillation of wine. ;c. 1220: Robert Grosseteste publishes several Aristotelian commentaries where he lays out an early framework for the scientific method. ;c 1250:Tadeo Alderotti develops fractional distillation, which is much more effective than its predecessors. ;c 1260: St Albertus Magnus discovers arsenic and silver nitrate. He also made one of the first references to sulfuric acid.〔Vladimir Karpenko, John A. Norris(2001), (Vitriol in the history of Chemistry ), Charles University〕 ;c. 1267: Roger Bacon publishes ''Opus Maius'', which among other things, proposes an early form of the scientific method, and contains results of his experiments with gunpowder. ;c. 1310: Pseudo-Geber, an anonymous Spanish alchemist who wrote under the name of Geber, publishes several books that establish the long-held theory that all metals were composed of various proportions of sulfur and mercury. He is one of the first to describe nitric acid, aqua regia, and aqua fortis.〔(Encyclopædia Britannica 1911, ''Alchemy'' )〕 ;c. 1530: Paracelsus develops the study of iatrochemistry, a subdiscipline of alchemy dedicated to extending life, thus being the roots of the modern pharmaceutical industry. It is also claimed that he is the first to use the word "chemistry".〔 ;1597: Andreas Libavius publishes ''Alchemia'', a prototype chemistry textbook. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Timeline of chemistry」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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