The Antikythera Shipwreck and the Mechanism

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system1988
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Joined: Sun Feb 06, 2011 11:20 am
Location: Athens, Greece

The Antikythera Shipwreck and the Mechanism

Post by system1988 »

Hi all

Since I remember a conversation about astronomy and the question and how far this field had progressed during Alexander's time I created an album that contains objects from the Anthikythera Mechanism Exhibition in the National Museum of Athens.

In 1900 sponge fishremen found a shipwreck near the Antikythera island. The cargo of the sunk ship had statues, pieces of metal, jewlery, glassware, the famous Antikythera youth, (all destined to decorate Roman estates) the transport amphorae and the most important of all, the Antikythera Mechanism, the first computer ever found. The shipwreck was searched again in 1970 by J. Cousteau who found even more bronze stattuetes.

The mechanism was found in pieces but despite its fragmentary condition it bears 30 bronze gear- wheels which were manually operated by handle attached onto one of its short sides and enable the mechanims to make calculations based on 2 cylces of the solar system, the Metonic cycle and the Saros cycle. The mechanism's front and back metal plates were covered with densely incised inscriptions which contained astronomical information. Also it contains the Edgyptian calendar written in Greek characters and containing 12 months of 30 days each as well as the Zodiac cycle. It could also calculate when the Olympic games and all other Greek games were due. The Mechanism is dated back to the 2nd BC and was kept in a wooden box.

For more information take a look at the album i posted here:

http://s1246.photobucket.com/albums/gg6 ... xhibition/


Best regardss

Pauline
Πάντες άνθρωποι του ειδέναι ορέγονται φύσει
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