Ancient clock displays Olympic calendar and astronomical cycles

The Antikythera Mechanism is a two-thousand year-old clock made in Greece that was discovered a century ago in a shipwreck. Two years ago, scientists studying the bits and pieces that survived under the sea were able to figure out that the device was used to calculate astronomical cycles. Now though, British mathematician Tony Freeth, part of the original research group, has determined that the Antikythera Mechanism also shows the timetables of the Olympic Games. Freeth and his colleagues published their findings in this week's issue of the science journal Nature. The magazine also posted a fascinating video telling the clock's story. It's a marvelous tale of technology, history, and curiosity. From Nature News:

The device had intermeshed toothed wheels that represent calendar cycles. By turning the wheels, a user could figure out the relationships between astronomical cycles to deduce the relative positions of the Sun and Moon and forecast eclipses.

But after two millennia under the sea off the island of Antikythera, near Crete, all that remains of the device are 82 fragments of flaking bronze, including parts of 30 gear-wheels2. The numbers of gear teeth are crucial, but must be inferred from the partial wheels that remain. And most of the inscriptions are hidden under corrosion and surface accretions. To read them, the researchers used a method called microfocus X-ray computed tomography, which provides X-ray images of slices through the sample, revealing inscriptions buried beneath the mechanism's surface.

Antikythera Mechanism video
"Complex clock combines calendars" Nature News article
"Calendars with Olympiad display and eclipse prediction on the Antikythera Mechanism" paper

• [padster123]

  @#3 gigarizel

  That java relighting thing is amazing! I’ve seen that kind of effect running on high-end workstations at major visual effect facilities, but not running via java/Firefox on my little laptop! Awesome! Thanks.

• [Ugly Canuck]

  #7 Oh yeah it’s pretty bad…zealous religious fanatics attacked anything connected with the Pagan world, for that fact alone, as being evil…and the Pagans did good architecture (it was torn down), sculpture (they were broken up ), had great libraries (burned without compunction), even famous women scholars (literally butchered to death by Christian mobs), etc., etc….the destruction only took about three centuries to destroy what had been the labors of a thousand years to build.
  Curiously it was the Civilization, now derided by some as wishing a return to the Dark Ages, which in truth labored to preserve what little we have today of the science and other learning of the Ancients. Even stranger, some of those, making that claim today about that Civilization, proudly consider themselves to be the current members of that group most truly responsible through their actions and beliefs for the occurrence of the actual Dark Ages.

• [Takuan]

  ummm, where’s that BB item about that woman who makes the most exquiste geared mechanisms? It links to an Antikythera working duplicate she also built.

• [Takuan]

  http://www.boingboing.net/2008/06/09/gorgeous-mechanical.html

• [Takuan]

  to
  http://www.tatjavanvark.nl/antikythera/

• [mdhatter]

  #2 – The ancients must have been wise indeed, if they could figure out NBC Sports’ broadcast schedule.

  bahahahahahaha

• [eti]

  Whoa! The Greeks invented Steampunk!

• [El Mariachi]

  And it’s still easier to read than the TokyoFlash watches Cory likes to post.

• [Stefan Jones]

  “also shows the timetables of the Olympic Games”

  The ancients must have been wise indeed, if they could figure out NBC Sports’ broadcast schedule.

• [gigarizel]

  Here is a really cool little web ap that lets you interactively relight the Antikythera using a photographic technology called polynomial texture mapping. http://www.hpl.hp.com/research/ptm/antikythera_mechanism/index.html It really lets you examine the fine detail.

• [MarlboroTestMonkey7]

  So kind of an Olympics souvenir?

• [Springtime for Spacers]

  What awes me about this is that based on precise observation it models the workings of the solar system insofar as they pertain to a human made calendar system yet the people who built it didn’t have to know how the solar system actually works.

• [Ugly Canuck]

  #5 Emulation of precisely-recorded long-term astronomical observations was the key.
  This device serves to remind us that our usual contempt towards the tech abilities of Antiquity is misplaced, and that the records of the History of those times have been filtered ( where not erased entirely) by centuries of custody, editorialization and alteration by those in whom the belief in miracle, together with an attitude of contempt for the observable world, were inculcated from birth.
  In many ways we only re-attained the quality of the engineering and tech sophistication of Roman Times as recently as the 19th century.
  This device serves as physical proof of the Ancients technical ability, the extent of their technical sophistication…too bad about the centuries of backsliding…but we are making up for lost time.

• [padster123]

  Precise metal gearing, 2,000 years ago?

  Wow – we fell back further than I thought during the subsequent “Dark Ages”.

• [kaiza]

  Greecepunk?