antikythera mechanism
The Antikythera mechanism must therefore be an arithmetical counterpart of the much more familiar geometrical models of the solar system which were known to Plato and Archimedes and evolved into the orrery and the planetarium. [1]
The Antikythera Mechanism is the earliest bronze geared device ever found. [2]
Besides such tantalizing synchronicities, the existence of the Antikythera mechanism also should prompt fundamental change in the way the ancient sources are read. [3]
At the time the Antikythera mechanism was built, the Greeks still believed the entire universe revolved around the Earth. [4]
It reveals surprising results on the back dials of the Antikythera Mechanism - including a dial dedicated to the four-year Olympiad Cycle of athletic games in ancient Greece. [5]
The “Antikythera Mechanism” was discovered damaged and fragmented on the wreck of a cargo ship off the tiny Greek island of Antikythera in 1900. [6]
The Antikythera Mechanism is the name given to an astronomical calculating device, measuring about 32 by 16 by 10 cm, which was discovered in 1900 in a sunken ship just off the coast of Antikythera, an island between Crete and the Greek mainland. [...] The device, made of bronze gears fitted in a wooden case, was crushed in the wreck, and parts of the faces were lost, “the rest then being coated with a hard calcareous deposit at the same time as the metal corroded away to a thin core coated with hard metallic salts preserving much of the former shape of the bronze” during the almost 2000 years it lay submerged. [7]
One hypothesis is that the device was constructed at an academy founded by the ancient Stoic philosopher Posidonius on the Greek island of Rhodes, which at the time was known as a centre of astronomy and mechanical engineering, and that perhaps the astronomer Hipparchus was the engineer who designed it since it contains a lunar mechanism which uses Hipparchus’ theory for the motion of the Moon. [8]
Other gears governed the sun, moon, planets, and the pointers on two calendrical spirals. [2]
Subsequent investigation, particularly in 2006, dated it to about 150′100 BC; and hypothesised that it was on board a ship that sank en route from the Greek island of Rhodes to Rome. [8]
It is neither facile nor uninstructive to remark that the Antikythera mechanism dropped and sank–twice. [3]
Returning later with a navy ship, the divers recovered many artifacts from the sunken vessel, including marble and bronze statues. [4]
The team believes the Antikythera Mechanism may be the world’s oldest computer, used by the Greeks to predict the motion of the planets. [6]
Explore the remains of a 2,000 years old clocklike mechanism considered to be an astronomical computer capable of predicting the positions of the sun and moon in the zodiac on any given date. [1]
Sources:
[1] Antikythera Mechanism: An Ancient Greek Computer?
[2] The Antikythera Mechanism
[3] The Antikythera Mechanism
[4] The Antikythera Mechanism: Interesting Thing of the Day
[5] The Antikythera Mechanism Research Project
[6] CDNN :: Antikythera Mechanism - World’s Oldest Computer?
[7] Antikythera Mechanism I
[8] Antikythera mechanism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia