ABSTRACT
The first recorded use of the term ‘acoustics’ in the English language occurs in Francis Bacon's Of the Advancement of Learning, published in 1605. 1 In tracing the application of the word over the succeeding centuries, it was used up until the mid-1800s, mainly in reference to magical and mechanical contraptions and instruments, rather than in allusion to an environment or to a mediating context. In fact, the term, since its inception – in a journey from adjective to noun – has retained connotations of mechanical contraption, magical phenomenon, biological function and finally, since the mid-nineteenth century, of the qualitative. 2
