My main argument, however, is that the word "velocipede" was used generically to include all types of machine including even hobby-horses for which it was originally coined.
It is the first reliable claim for a practically used bicycle, basically the first commercially successful two-wheeled, steerable, human-propelled machine commonly called a velocipede, nicknamed hobby-horse or dandy horse.
Largely self-taught, he studied botany, learned several foreign languages, constructed a velocipede or early bicycle, and experimented with the production of coal gas.
