Discovery of Static Electricity

Benjamin Franklin and others eventually realized charge stored in Leyden jars resides not in water but in glass—the insulating dielectric material separating conductors.

Subsequent observers after Thales recognized that contact or friction with fur created an imbalance—something transferred from fur onto rubbed objects.

William Gilbert’s “De Magnete” (1600) made the revolutionary discovery that electrical and magnetic forces, though both acting at distance, represent fundamentally different phenomena.

Until the 17th century, electrical phenomena lacked coherent terminology, described variously as “invisible intangible imponderable agents” or even “threads of syrup.”

The Leyden jar, developed in the mid-18th century, represented the first device capable of storing substantial electrical charge for later discharge.

Throughout history, most cultures interpreted lightning as divine power—nature’s most dramatic display of force and aggression reserved for gods, beyond human comprehension.

By the mid-18th century, experimenters combined improved friction machines with capacitor banks to generate “deadly bolts of electricity”—man-made lightning demonstrations.

Early observers recognized that charged objects could produce shocks—sudden discharges that eliminated the attractive/repulsive forces, reversing friction-created imbalances.

Around 600 BC, Thales of Miletus—widely regarded as the first Greek philosopher—made the first recorded observations of static electricity through amber.

In 1600, William Gilbert—Queen Elizabeth I’s physician—published “De Magnete,” systematically investigating magnetism and coining the term “electricus” for amber-related phenomena.