An Ingenious Impudence

Abstract

An unidentified “northern colleague” of Werner’s once told him that his proposal of the coordination theory had been “an ingenious impudence” (eine geniale Frechheit) (L 37). This phrase is an apt one, for at the time of its inception (received by thejournal Dec., 1892; published 1893), the theory was largely without experimental verification. The data cited by Werner in support of his ideas had been obtained by the painstaking efforts of others, especially of the Danish chemist who was to become his chief scientific adversary, Sophus Mads Jørgensen (1837–1914) [36], (A 165), Professor of Chemistry at the Polytekniske Laereanstalt and Kebenhavns Universitet.