The Unbound Prometheus

The Unbound Prometheus: Technological Change and Industrial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to the Present is an influential economic history book by David S. Landes. Its focus is on the Industrial Revolution in England and its spread to the rest of Western Europe. Its principal contribution is the argument in favor of the Second Industrial Revolution.

The book was first published in 1969 by Cambridge University Press. It first appeared in the Cambridge Economic History of Europe, Volume VI in 1965, but it was expanded for the 1969 edition. The book deals with innovations and inventions that brought about modernization and technological developments in Western Europe beginning in the 18th century. It is considered to be one of the preeminent works on the economic history of industrialization in Western Europe. It has been reprinted numerous times and was published in a second edition with new commentary by Landes in 2003.