Sur l'histoire de la notion du potentiel

Summary Huygens undoubtedly used the notion of the potential in his well-known work “Discours de la cause de la pesanteur” (Leyden, 1690), investigating the Earth's figure by means of Newton's famous canals. Maupertuis used this notion in a similar work published in London in 1733. The notion of potential was used by Clairaut in the “Théorie de la figure de la Terre” (Paris, 1743) and by D'Alembert in many articles (1752, 1761, 1768, 1773, 1780). Euler used it also in many of his works since 1736. These examples of application of the potential were not noticed because of peculiarities of terminology.