Jean Beguin was an iatrochemist noted for his 1610 Tyrocinium Chymicum

Tyrocinium Chymicum

Tyrocinium Chymicum was a published set of chemistry lecture notes started by Jean Beguin in 1610 in Paris, France. It has been suggested that it was the first chemistry text book...

(Beginner's Chemistry), which many consider to be one of the first chemistry textbooks. In the 1615 edition of his textbook, Beguin made the first-ever chemical equation

Chemical equation

A chemical equation is the symbolic representation of a chemical reaction where the reactant entities are given on the left hand side and the product entities on the right hand side. The coefficients next to the symbols and formulae of entities are the absolute values of the stoichiometric numbers...

or rudimentary reaction diagrams, showing the results of reactions in which there are two or more reagents. Modern rendering of this famous diagram, detailing the reaction of corrosive sublimate (HgCl₂) with sulfide of antimony (Sb₂S₃), is shown below:

External links

• Jean Beguin - Eric Weisstein's World of Scientific Biography