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Person

John Newlands

A man with a neatly combed hairstyle and a full beard, dressed in formal attire including a black jacket, white shirt, and bow tie, sits against a warm-toned background.

English chemist (1837–1898) who proposed in 1865 that the elements, ranked by atomic weight, repeated their properties every eighth entry — a "law of octaves" named after the musical interval. The Chemical Society of London refused to publish his paper. After Mendeleev's table was vindicated, the Royal Society awarded Newlands the Davy Medal in 1887; the priority dispute was never quite settled.

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