CURIOSITY AND RUBBER IN THE FRENCH ATLANTIC

Abstract

This article argues that the networks and culture of French Atlantic science played a decisive role in introducing rubber from the Americas to the scholars and engineers of Europe. Though known to the earliest European travellers in Central and South America, rubber aroused no interest among scholars until Charles-Marie de la Condamine encountered it in 1736. Nevertheless, French scientific connections to South America were characterized by their fragility and their limited reach. French scientists were dependent on Hispanic, Creole and indigenous informants for scientific information and for practical assistance to conduct their research. The greatest strength of French science in South America was the prestige it enjoyed in Europe, as local experts saw opportunities to advance their reputations through assisting French investigators. Equally importantly, the high reputation of French science ensured that implausible or unconventional discoveries, such as the unusually elastic properties of rubber, would be greeted with enthusiasm rather than scepticism. French Atlantic science also brought with it a distinctively French version of the prevailing culture of curiosity. Though widely regarded as a vice in the sixteenth century, by 1700 curiosity was widely seen in a more favourable light. Scientific institutions such as the Académie Royale des Sciences created a structure of academic exchange, which protected and encouraged the pursuit of curiosity. Meanwhile the development of an increasingly standardized language of science provided a linguistic framework through which to communicate and contextualize the diverse fruits of curious inquiry. This culture and language of curiosity ensured that bizarre but apparently purposeless foreign discoveries, such as rubber, could be excised from their non-European context and domesticated into European daily life.