The year 1721 in science and technology involved some significant events.

Medicine

• The use of ether is developed as a pain-killer.
• Lady Mary Wortley Montagu introduces the Ottoman Turkish method of inoculation against smallpox – variolation – to London.^[1][2][3][4]
• Thomas Guy founds Guy's Hospital in London to treat "incurables" discharged from St Thomas'.^[5]

Psychology

• A suggestion box is developed under the eighth shogun of Japan, Yoshimune Tokugawa.

Technology

• Richard Newsham of London obtains his first patent for a manual fire pump.

Deaths

• September 11 - Rudolf Jakob Camerarius, German botanist (born 1665)

References

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