Sir Humphry Davy, 1st Baronet FRS MRIA FGS (17 December 1778 – 29 May 1829) is a British chemist and inventor.

He is probably best remembered today for his discoveries of several alkali and alkaline earth metals, as well as contributions to the discoveries of the elemental nature of chlorine and iodine.

Berzelius called Davy's 1806 Bakerian Lecture On Some Chemical Agencies of Electricity "one of the best memoirs which has ever enriched the theory of chemistry."

(Berzelius, J. J.; trans.

A. Jourdan and M. Esslinger (1829–1833) (in French).

Traité de chimie.

1 (trans., 8 vol.

ed.).

Paris.

pp.

164., (in Swedish) Larbok i kemien (Original ed.).

Stockholm.

1818.)

This paper is central to any chemical affinity theory in the first half of the nineteenth century.

In 1815, he invents the Davy lamp, which allows miners to work safely in the presence of flammable gases.