the.com/leyden jar
the original battery that shocked monks, killed birds, and basically invented saving electricity for later
means An early device for storing static electricity, consisting of a glass jar lined inside and out with metal foil — essentially the first capacitor.
from Named for Leiden, the Dutch university city where physicist Pieter van Musschenbroek experimented with it in the 1740s (the German cleric Ewald von Kleist hit on a similar device around the same time). The English spelling 'Leyden' preserves an older rendering of the city's name. Musschenbroek famously got such a violent shock from his own invention that he reportedly said he wouldn't take another for the whole kingdom of France — which is roughly how the 'jar that bites' earned its fame.
- chain shock
- Nollet jolted 200 monks holding hands at once
- two inventors
- Discovered twice in 1745, named for neither
- hand discovery
- Inventor felt the jolt through his own body
- static storage
- First device to hold a charge before batteries existed
- franklin's tool
- Helped prove lightning was electricity, kite included