Inscriptions decreed to him the biennial prize of 20,000 francs, and in
1878 he was elected a member of the Institute. He was also an honorary
member of most of the learned societies of Europe. In 1877 his health
broke down through overwork. He lingered for a few years, working to the
last, and died at Cairo on the 19th of January 1881.
His chief published works are: _Le Sérapéum de Memphis_ (1857 and
following years); _Dendérah_, five folios and one 4to (1873-1875);
_Abydos_, two folios and one 4to (1870-1880); _Karnak_, folio and 4to
(1875); _Deir el-Bahari_, folio and 4to (1877); _Listes géographiques
des pylônes de Karnak_, folio (1875); _Catalogue du Musée de Boulaq_
(six editions 1864-1876); _Aperçu de l'histoire d'Égypte_ (four
editions, 1864-1874, &c.); _Les Mastabas de l'ancien empire_ (edited
by Maspero) (1883). See "Notice biographique," by Maspero in _Auguste
Mariette. Oeuvres diverses_ (tome 1, Paris, 1904), and art. EGYPT:
_Exploration and Research_.
MARIGNAC, JEAN CHARLES GALISSARD DE (1817-1894), Swiss chemist, was born
at Geneva on the 24th of April 1817. When sixteen years old he began to
attend the École Polytechnique in Paris, and from 1837 to 1839 studied
at the École des Mines. Then, after a short time in Liebig's laboratory
at Giessen, and in the Sèvres porcelain factory, he became in 1841
professor of chemistry in the academy of Geneva. In 1845 he was
appointed professor of mineralogy also, and held both chairs till 1878,
when ill-health obliged him to resign. He died at Geneva on the 15th of
April 1894. Marignac's name is well known for the careful and exact
determinations of atomic weights which he carried out for twenty-eight
of the elements. In undertaking this work he had, like J. S. Stas, the
purpose of testing Prout's hypothesis, but he remained more disposed
than the Belgian chemist to consider the possibility that it may have
some degree of validity. Throughout his life he paid great attention to
the "rare earths" and the problem of separating and distinguishing them;
in 1878 he extracted ytterbia from what was supposed to be pure erbia,
and two years later found gadolinia and samaria in the samarskite
earths. In 1858 he pointed out the isomorphism of the fluostannates and
the fluosilicates, thus settling the then vexed question of the
composition of silicic acid; and subsequently he studied the fluosalts
of zirconium, boron, tungsten, &c., and prepared silicotungstic acid,
one of the first examples of the complex inorganic acids. In physical
chemistry he carried out many researches on the nature and process of
solution, investigating in particular the thermal effects produced by
the dilution of saline solutions, the variation of the specific heat of
saline solutions with temperature and concentration, and the phenomena
of liquid diffusion.
A memorial lecture by P. T. Cleve, printed in the _Journal of the
London Chemical Society_ for 1895, contains a list of Marignac's
papers.
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