Ewald Georg of Kleist

Description and drawing of the bottle of Leiden.

Ewald Jürgen Von Kleist (Vietzow, Pomerania, 10 June 1700 - Köslin, Pomerania, 11 December 1748) was a Lutheran cleric, jurist and German physicist.

He studied at Leyden, from 1722 to 1747, dean of the Cathedral of Cammin in Pomerania and member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences. He discovered fortuitously, in 1745, during experiments with electrostatic electricity, that this could be stored in a kind of vessel, later called the Leyden bottle (first practical condenser).

It is not clear who was the first to make the discovery, because on the same dates Pieter van Musschenbroek in Leyden or perhaps an assistant of this, Andreas Cunaeus (van der Kun).

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