1737 in science

Astronomy

• May 28 – The planet Venus passes in front of Mercury. The event is witnessed during the evening by amateur astronomer John Bevis at the Royal Greenwich Observatory in England.

  Botany

• Elizabeth Blackwell's A Curious Herbal, with her own colour illustrations, is published in London.

  Geology

• Francesco Serao is the first person to use the word lava in connection with extruded magma in a short account of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius which took place between May 14 and June 4.
• October 11 – An earthquake in Calcutta, India is said to have caused 300,000 deaths; this is now in question: it was probably a cyclone, with deaths estimated at 3,000.
• October 16 – An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 9.3 strikes offshore of the Kamchatka Peninsula.

  Mathematics

• Divergence of the sum of the reciprocals of the primes proved by Leonhard Euler.

  Technology

• John Harrison is given an award from the longitude prize to continue his work on development of a stable marine chronometer.

  Publications

• Venetian polymath Francesco Algarotti publishes Newtonianism for Ladies, or Dialogues on Light and Colours.

  Awards

• Copley Medal: John Belchier

  Births

• September 9 – Luigi Galvani, Italian physicist

  Deaths