William Merle

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William Merle

fl. 1300s

English scholar, also known as Morley or Merlee, who kept the first regular, systematic records of weather and was one of the first to attempt a scientific forecast. The Babylonians had recorded wind directions in c. 900 b.c., and in the sixth century b.c. the Greeks kept records on rainfall. Merle, however, was the first individual figure notably associated with meteorology. He maintained his weather records at Oxford, England, from 1337-44.

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