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Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent

Antoine Laurent Lavoisier

Born

26 August 1743

Died

8 May 1794

Elected to the Academy of Sciences in 1768, Lavoisier established the role of oxygen in combustion, formulated the conservation of mass and helped create the modern chemical nomenclature. In the same year as his election he bought a share in the Ferme générale, the consortium that collected the indirect taxes, and he later promoted the customs wall built around Paris, which made him widely resented. He sat on the commission on weights and measures from 1790 until its members were purged in December 1793. The Convention having ordered the arrest of the former farmers-general, he was tried with twenty-seven others on a charge of conspiracy and guillotined on 8 May 1794. The words attributed to the presiding judge, that the Republic had no need of scientists, are not recorded at the trial and are regarded as apocryphal.

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