Author: WORCESTER (Edward Somerset, Marquis of):
Title: A Century of the Names and Scantlings of such Inventions As at present I can call to mind to have tried and perfected, (which my former Notes being lost) I have, at the instance of a powerful Friend, endeavoured now in the Year 1655. to set these down in such a way as may sufficiently instruct me to put any of them in practice.
Description: Glasgow: Printed by R. and A. Foulis. 1767. 12mo, 126 x 67 mms., pp. xxvii [xxviii blank], 76 [77 - 86 Index, 2 blank leaves], contemporary; front joint crudely repaired. I hesitate to describe a book as "weird," but this one qualifies. As a courtier during the reign of Charles I, Worcester (c. 1661 - 1667) took up an interest in science, which eventually led to the present book, first published in 1663. Worcester has a long entry in ODNB, and I quote from the informative and judicious entry by Stephen K. Roberts, that "[he] wrote a catalogue of his inventions (eventually published in 1663), in the self-justifying mode that was typical of him, and probably designed to attract sponsorship. A century of the names and scantlings of … inventions is an eclectic mixture of detail and the sketchiest of outlines, and even Worcester's most determined apologist, Henry Dircks, writing in 1865, was unable to provide explanatory glosses for all the inventions listed. However, it is the 'water commanding engine' which has excited most interest among historians of science, because its inventor claimed to have found a way to 'drive up water by fire' (Dircks, 475). Although the word 'steam' was not used as a term in science or engineering until after Worcester's death, the water commanding engine appears to have been powered by that means, and thus the marquess has been promoted, most vigorously by Dircks, as an inventor of the steam engine. Victorian commentators, writing in the great age of steam power, were more ready to dismiss Worcester's claims than their successors of a century later. In the continuing absence of any archaeological or other physical evidence, a definitive verdict seems as elusive as ever, but it seems that Calthoff's contribution was probably greater than that of his employer, that steam power was indeed deployed at Vauxhall in a prototype of the water commanding engine, but that it was ultimately unsuccessful." He also claimed to have invented a machine to enable a person to fly, which he tried out on a young boy; a calculator, a floating garden int he Thames, a uversal language, etc. Gaskell 470.

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