Johann von Lamont, FRSE (13 December 1805 – 6 August 1879), born John Lamont, was a Scottish-German

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either ...

and

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate cau ...

Biography

Lamont was born at Corriemulzie near

Inverey Inverey (; gd, Inbhir Eidh) is a hamlet on Mar Lodge Estate, in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Description The hamlet straddles the Ey Burn close to its confluence with the River Dee. Inverey comprises two 'communities' separated by the Ey Burn � ...

in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. The son of Robert Lamont (forester to

Earl Fife The title Earl Fife was a title in the Peerage of Ireland created by letters patent dated 26 April 1759 for William Duff (1696–1763) after asserting (but not proving) his descent from Macduff, the medieval Earl of Fife. Though in the Irish pe ...

) and Elizabeth Ewan, his education began at the local school in

, near Braemar. In 1817 his father died and John was sent to be educated at St James' monastery (Scots Benedictine College) at Ratisbon, Germany. He began to work in astronomy and joined the

Bogenhausen Bogenhausen ( Central Bavarian: ''Bognhausn'') is the 13th borough of Munich, Germany. It is the geographically largest borough of Munich and comprises the city's north-eastern quarter, reaching from the Isar on the eastern side of the Englischer ...

Observatory, became its director in 1835, took his doctorate of philosophy in 1830 and became professor of astronomy in 1852 at

Munich University The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich or LMU; german: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It is Germany's sixth-oldest university in continuous operatio ...

. At the observatory he undertook the task of creating a star catalog that had about 35,000 entries. In 1845 he was elected an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His most important work was on the magnetism of the Earth. He performed magnetic surveys in Bavaria and northern Germany, France, Spain, and Denmark. He discovered a magnetic decennial period (ten-year cycle) and the electric current in the Earth closing the electric "circuit" creating the magnetic field in 1850. This roughly matched the eleven-year sunspot cycle discovered by

Heinrich Schwabe Samuel Heinrich Schwabe (25 October 1789 – 11 April 1875) a German astronomer remembered for his work on sunspots. Schwabe was born at Dessau. At first an apothecary, he turned his attention to astronomy, and in 1826 commenced his observatio ...

. He calculated the

orbit In celestial mechanics, an orbit is the curved trajectory of an object such as the trajectory of a planet around a star, or of a natural satellite around a planet, or of an artificial satellite around an object or position in space such as ...

s of the moons of

Uranus Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. Its name is a reference to the Greek god of the sky, Uranus ( Caelus), who, according to Greek mythology, was the great-grandfather of Ares (Mars), grandfather of Zeus (Jupiter) and father of ...

and Saturn, obtaining the first value for Uranus' mass. By chance he observed Neptune in 1845 and twice in 1846, but did not recognize the object as being a new planet. He died, unmarried and without children, in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

, Germany, on 6 August 1879. His considerable wealth was used to found scholarships in sciences. He is buried in

Churchyard on the edge of Munich.

Publications

Lamont is the author of ''Handbuch des Erdmagnetismus'' (1849).

Honours

His many honours include

ForMemRS Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge, including mathematic ...

and FRSE. In 1867 he was awarded the

Merit Order of the Bavarian Crown The Order of Merit of the Bavarian Crown (german: Verdienstorden der Bayerischen Krone) was an order of merit of the Kingdom of Bavaria established by King Maximilian Joseph I on 19 March 1808. The motto of the order is Virtus et Honos ('Courage ...

by the King of Bavaria, through which Lamont was ennobled and permitted to use the predicate "von". The statue on his tomb in Munich has him with an open hand, into which the locals put small coins. In 1934 the Deeside Field Club erected a granite memorial cairn in his memory at Inverey, Scotland. It was unveiled by

Sir James Jeans Sir James Hopwood Jeans (11 September 187716 September 1946) was an English physicist, astronomer and mathematician. Early life Born in Ormskirk, Lancashire, the son of William Tulloch Jeans, a parliamentary correspondent and author. Jeans was ...

. The following astronomical features were named in his honor: *

Lamont (Martian crater) Lamont is a crater in the Thaumasia quadrangle of Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Ro ...

. *

Lamont (lunar crater) Lamont is a system of low ridges in the surface of Mare Tranquillitatis that is most likely a submerged impact crater. It was named after Scottish-born German astronomer Johann von Lamont. It is located to the southeast of the crater Arago. Lam ...

References

External links

Obituaries

MNRAS 40 (1880) 208

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lamont, Johann von 1805 births 1879 deaths 19th-century German physicists 19th-century Scottish scientists People from Marr Honorary Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Academic staff of the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich Foreign Members of the Royal Society 19th-century German astronomers Magneticians Scottish Roman Catholics Scottish emigrants to Germany