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In [[philosophy]], '''essence''' is the attribute or set of attributes that make an object or substance what it fundamentally is, and which it has by necessity, and without which it loses its [[identity]]. Essence is contrasted with accident: a property that the object or substance has contingently, without which the substance can still retain its identity.  The concept originates with Aristotle, who used the Greek expression ''to ti ên einai'', literally 'the what it was to be', or sometimes the shorter phrase ''to ti esti'', literally 'the what it is,' for the same idea.  This phrase presented such difficulties for his Latin translators that they coined the word ''essentia'' to represent the whole expression.  For Aristotle and his scholastic followers the notion of essence is closely linked to that of definition (''horismos'')  [http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-metaphysics/ S. Marc Cohen, "Aristotle's Metaphysics"]

In [[philosophy]], '''essence''' is the attribute or set of attributes that make an object or substance what it fundamentally is, and which it has by necessity, and without which it loses its [[identity]]. Essence is contrasted with accident: a property that the object or substance has contingently, without which the substance can still retain its identity.  The concept originates with Aristotle, who used the Greek expression ''to ti ên einai'', literally 'the what it was to be', or sometimes the shorter phrase ''to ti esti'', literally 'the what it is,' for the same idea.  This phrase presented such difficulties for his Latin translators that they coined the word ''essentia'' to represent the whole expression.  For Aristotle and his scholastic followers the notion of essence is closely linked to that of definition (''horismos'')  [http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-metaphysics/ S. Marc Cohen, "Aristotle's Metaphysics"]