This book offers a cultural history of the travels of energy in the English language, from its origins in Aristotle's ontology, where it referred to the activity-of-being, through its English usage as a way to speak about the inherent nature of things, to its adoption as a name for the mechanics of motion (capacity for work).

Peter Hjertholm holds PhD degrees in economics and history from the University of Copenhagen, where he has taught in both fields. In history, his research interests focus on slavery, black property rights, and the role of 'energy' in early American political discourse.

Part 1:THE CULTURAL ORIGINS AND TRAVELS OF ENERGY 1. Energeia, Activity-of-Being, and Inherent Nature 2. The Vernacular of Corporeal Energy 3. Energy's Cultural Travels in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries Part 2: THE MIGRATION OF ENERGY FROM CULTURE TO SCIENCE 4. Historical Accounts of the Birth of Energy in Science 5. To Understand the Motion of a Body: Thomas Young's Pedagogical Project Part 3: THE MIGRATION OF ENERGY FROM SCIENCE BACK TO CULTURE 6. The Cultural Absorption of the Science of Energy 7. The Popularisation of the Concept of Energy 8. Energy in Modernist Writings: The Adams Brothers Part 4: ENERGY IN LEXICOGRAPHY 9. Energy in Early English Lexicography 10. Energy in the oed