A Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue (up to 1700)
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First published 2001 (DOST Vol. X).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.
Torricellian, adj. [17th c. Eng. Torricellian (1660), f. the name of an Italian physicist (1608-47).] The Torricellian experiment, an experiment in which ‘Torricelli proved that the column of mercury in an inverted closed tube is supported by the pressure of the atmosphere on the mercury … and that the height of the column corresponds exactly to the atmospheric pressure' (OED). —1670 Edinb. B. Rec. X 92.
The Torricellian experiment of counterpoising the air with mercurie in glasspipe
