Meteorological Archives
Dates: 1706-1915
The ‘Meteorological Archives’ contain raw meteorological, tidal and magnetic data sent from across the world.
Image caption: MA/54/3, Meteorological table observations by Nicolaus Cruquius, 1725.
by Louisiane Ferlier
Digital Resources Manager
The collection known as 'Meteorological Archives' (MA) is composed of manuscript and printed observations of the weather, tides and magnetic phenomena sent to the Royal Society from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries.
The material contains a variety of formats with a total of 1,661 individual observations, ranging from a single loose table to multiple bound volumes to metre-long sheets of automated data.
The series was created in 1839 following a decision by the Royal Society Meteorological Committee to form a dedicated ‘department’ where meteorological manuscripts would be kept separate from the rest of the Society’s archives. The creation of the series was also accompanied by active record-hunting across colonial networks to obtain information on weather from across the globe, with calls for meteorological observations to be sent to the Royal Society relayed through the Secretary of State for Colonies, the East India Company and the Corporation of Trinity House (a seafaring regulator).
MM/14/38, Minutes of the Meteorological Committee of the Royal Society, 21 November 1839
As a result, over half of the records in MA date from 1838 to 1846 and cover all six continents and all oceans.
Map of the Meteorological Archives of the Royal Society
Many of the observations were printed in the Philosophical Transactions, usually in condensed or summarised form. This is particularly the case for the earliest records which followed a call put out in 1723 in the Philosophical Transactions by the Secretary of the Royal Society, James Jurin FRS, who recommended a standardised form to enable comparisons across countries. Much of the data sent in the 1720s adopted Jurin’s tabular format and would later be published in extracted form by William Derham FRS.
-
Paper, 'Abstract of meteorological observations made at Naples, Bengal and Christiana' by William Derham
Creator: William Derham Reference number: L&P/13/3 -
Meteorological observations at Bengal, India, by Gervase Bellamy
Creator: Gervase Bellamy Reference number: MA/52/2 -
Meteorological observations at Naples [Italy], by Nicolaus Cyrillus
Creator: Niccolo Cirillo Reference number: MA/10/2 -
Meteorological observations at Christiana [Oslo], Norway, by P. Kink
Reference number: MA/12
The Royal Society kept its own observations for the period 1774-1843, from which date the duties were transferred to the Royal Greenwich Observatory. Sixteen bound volumes in the MA series include the original meteorological data taken in the Royal Society apartments at Somerset House.
-
Meteorological observations at the Royal Society's apartments at Somerset House, London, by [Stephen Lee?]
Creator: Stephen Lee Reference number: MA/220/1 -
Meteorological observations at the Royal Society, London, by James Hudson
Creator: James Hudson Reference number: MA/230/1 -
Meteorological observations at the Royal Society's apartments at Somerset House, London, by [Stephen Lee?]
Creator: Stephen Lee Reference number: MA/322/1 -
Meteorological observations at the Royal Society, London, by John David Roberton
Creator: John David Roberton Reference number: MA/326/1
The series is not arranged chronologically, or by format, or by geographic region, making it difficult to navigate physically. A card catalogue attempted to arrange them ‘by continent, island or vessel’ and a geographical list of the series was created. The current cataloguing includes the name of the observer, the geographic location (including geodata) and the date range, as well as the type of observation to facilitate searching. Where the observations have been turned into a dataset for climate analysis, the information has been added.
Some of the key names of nineteenth-century meteorology are present in the collection, including Luke Howard FRS, who created the cloud nomenclature still in use today, aeronautical meteorologist James Glaisher FRS, and proponent of international meteorological cooperation Georg von Neumayer.
The meteorological and magnetic raw data for the First British Antarctic expedition, which was the subject of intense scrutiny and debate, is also included in the series. To discover more on the expedition itself, read our dedicated InFocus piece.
The Meteorological Archives contain manuscripts of historical importance to understand the development of meteorology but also as raw material for scientists working on reanalysis scenarios. Get in touch if you are interested in using these as primary sources for scientific or historical research.
