Did James Clerk Maxwell derive the permittivity of free space from his "Maxwell's" equations or was the parameter already known by him?

Question

My problem is my lack of knowledge on the historical development of the constant used for the permittivity of free space. I know instead of asking the question I should read Wiki on the history of "permittivity" and I did.

The article in some some sense seems to imply Maxwell's Equations were necessary in order to complete the value of the constant but I am not sure I understand why so this prompted me to ask the above question. I will keep reading the Wiki article again and again till I understand it but thought I would ask the question.

Answer 1

This answer is a repost of a comment of Conifold on the question, which the asker indicated gave a satisfactory answer to their question:

Wiki's History of Maxwell's equations implies that the value was measured by Weber and Kohlrausch in 1855, its relation to the speed of light noted by Kirchoff in 1857, and Maxwell was aware of it since 1861. You may want to check the original references linked in Geremia's answer to Electromagnetic constants and the speed of light.