Editing Humphry Davy (section)

== Early life: 1778–1798 ==
===Education, apprenticeship and poetry===
Davy was born in [[Penzance]], Cornwall, England on 17 December 1778, the eldest of the five children of Robert Davy, a woodcarver, and his wife Grace Millett.<ref name="ODNB" /> According to his brother and fellow chemist [[John Davy (chemist)|John Davy]], their hometown was characterised by "an almost unbounded credulity respecting the supernatural and monstrous ... Amongst the middle and higher classes, there was little taste for literature, and still less for science ... Hunting, shooting, wrestling, cockfighting, generally ending in drunkenness, were what they most delighted in."<ref name="Davy 1836">{{cite book |last = Davy |first= John |author-link = John Davy (chemist) |title = Memoirs of the Life of Sir Humphry Davy |volume = 1 |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=EOQ5AAAAcAAJ |location = London |publisher = Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, & Longman |year = 1836|isbn= 9780608378510 }}</ref>

==== Education ====
At the age of six, Davy was sent to the [[grammar school]] at Penzance. Three years later, his family moved to [[Varfell]], near [[Ludgvan]], and subsequently, in term-time, Davy boarded with John Tonkin, his godfather and later his guardian.<ref name="ODNB"/> Upon Davy's leaving grammar school in 1793, Tonkin paid for him to attend [[Truro Grammar School]] to finish his education under the Rev Dr Cardew, who, in a letter to the engineer and [[Fellow of the Royal Society]] [[Davies Giddy]] (from 1817 called [[Davies Gilbert]]), said dryly, "I could not discern the faculties by which he was afterwards so much distinguished." Davy entertained his school friends by writing poetry, composing Valentines, and telling stories from ''[[One Thousand and One Nights]]''. Reflecting on his school days in a letter to his mother, Davy wrote, "Learning naturally is a true pleasure; how unfortunate then it is that in most schools it is made a pain."<ref>{{cite book |last = Knight |first = David |author-link = David M. Knight |title = Humphry Davy: Science and Power |location = Cambridge |publisher = Cambridge University Press |year = 1992 |isbn = 978-0-631-16816-4 |url = https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780631168164 }}</ref> "I consider it fortunate", he continued, "I was left much to myself as a child, and put upon no particular plan of study ... What I am I made myself."<ref name=DNB>{{cite DNB |last=Hunt |first=Robert |author-link=Robert Hunt (scientist) |wstitle=Davy, Humphry |year=1888}}</ref> His brother said Davy possessed a "native vigour" and "the genuine quality of genius, or of that power of intellect which exalts its possessor above the crowd."<ref name="Davy 1836"/>

==== Apothecary's apprentice ====
After Davy's father died in 1794, Tonkin apprenticed him to John Bingham Borlase, a surgeon with a practice in Penzance. While becoming a chemist in the [[apothecary]]'s dispensary, he began conducting his earliest experiments at home, much to the annoyance of his friends and family. His older sister, for instance, complained his corrosive substances were destroying her dresses, and at least one friend thought it likely the "incorrigible" Davy would eventually "blow us all into the air."<ref name="DNB" />

In 1797, after he learnt French from a refugee priest, Davy read [[Lavoisier]]'s ''Traité élémentaire de chimie.'' This exposure influenced much of his future work, which can be seen as reaction against Lavoisier's work and the dominance of French chemists.

==== Poetry ====
As a poet, over one hundred and sixty manuscript poems were written by Davy, the majority of which are found in his personal notebooks. Most of his written poems were not published, and he chose instead to share a few of them with his friends. Eight of his known poems were published. His poems reflected his views on both his career and also his perception of certain aspects of human life. He wrote on human endeavours and aspects of life like death, metaphysics, geology, natural theology and chemistry.<ref name="auto">{{cite journal
 |last= Amin
 |first= Wahida
 |title= The Poetry and Science of Humphry Davy.
 |journal= Ultrasound in Medicine & Biology
 |url= http://usir.salford.ac.uk/30795/1/Wahida_Amin_-_The_Poetry_and_Science_of_Humphry_Davy_-_23.01.14.pdf
 |type= Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Salford, UK
 |year= 2013
 |volume= 48
 |issue= 1
 |pages= 35–46
 |doi= 10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2021.09.011
 |pmid= 34702642
 |access-date= 4 May 2017
|archive-date= 16 May 2017
|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20170516235835/http://usir.salford.ac.uk/30795/1/Wahida_Amin_-_The_Poetry_and_Science_of_Humphry_Davy_-_23.01.14.pdf
 |url-status= live
 }}</ref>

[[John Ayrton Paris]] remarked that poems written by the young Davy "bear the stamp of lofty genius". Davy's first preserved poem entitled "The Sons of Genius" is dated 1795 and marked by the usual immaturity{{According to whom|date=April 2021}} of youth. Other poems written in the following years, especially "On the Mount's Bay" and "St Michael's Mount", are descriptive verses.

Although he initially started writing his poems, albeit haphazardly, as a reflection of his views on his career and on life generally, most of his final poems concentrated on immortality and death. This was after he started experiencing failing health and a decline both in health and career.<ref name="auto" />

==== Painting ====
Three of Davy's paintings from around 1796 have been donated to the [[Penlee House]] museum at Penzance. One is of the view from above [[Gulval]] showing the church, [[Mount's Bay]] and [[St Michael's Mount|the Mount]], while the other two depict [[Loch Lomond]] in Scotland.<ref>{{cite news|last=Anon|title=Davy paintings donated to museum|newspaper=[[The Cornishman (newspaper)|The Cornishman]]|date=22 September 2011}}</ref><ref>Davy's picture of Mounts Bay was included in the Penlee House exhibition "Penzance 400: A Celebration of the History of Penzance", 29 March – 7 June 2014</ref>

==== Materiality of heat ====
[[File:Penzance - Lariggan River.jpg|thumb|Lariggan River]]
At 17, he discussed the question of the materiality of heat with his [[Quaker]] friend and mentor [[Robert Dunkin]]. Dunkin remarked: 'I tell thee what, Humphry, thou art the most quibbling hand at a dispute I ever met with in my life.' One winter day he took Davy to the Lariggan River to show him that rubbing two plates of ice together developed sufficient energy by motion to melt them,<ref>The Larigan, or Laregan, river is a stream in Penzance.</ref> and that after the motion was suspended, the pieces were united by regelation. It was a crude form of analogous experiment exhibited by Davy in the lecture-room of the [[Royal Institution]] that elicited considerable attention.<ref name="DNB" /> As professor at the Royal Institution, Davy repeated many of the ingenious experiments he learnt from Dunkin.