The Antikythera mechanism Links:


General plan of all gearing, composite diagram,
from De Solla Price, Transactions of the American Philosophical
Society Vol 64 No 7 (1974).

A reference to the Antikythera mechanism appears in

What Do You Care What Other People Think?: Further Adventures of a Curious Character
by Ralph Leighton (Contributor), Richard Phillips Feynman

This is a fun book to read if you don't know it I would recommend it.

See Extract from pages 94 - 96

Simulation of the Antikythera Mechanism
The Antikythera Mechanism was discovered in a wreck near the island of Antikythera (hence its name). A detailed
description of the device, which is considered the first computer ever made, is given in a historical article of Derek
da Solla Price, who devoted most of his life in deciphering its workings.

The .MOV animations of the device given here, come from a simulation of the mechanism. The colors of the gears
have no significance whatsoever. They are used for illustration purposes only.
http://etl.uom.gr/mr/Antikythera/index.html

An Ancient Greek Computer
June 1959 Scientific American article p60-7
http://www.giant.net.au/users/rupert/kythera/kythera3.htm

Gears, Galleys, and Geography:
The Antikythera Mechanism's Implications
Text of the 1993 APA Abstract
Rob S. Rice
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rrice/apagadgt.html

Rob S. Rice
USNA Eleventh Naval History Symposium
Paper for Collected Volume
The Antikythera Mechanism: Physical and Intellectual Salvage from the 1st Century B.C.
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rrice/usna_pap.html

ANTIKYTHERA MECHANISM
The Engines of Our Ingenuity
by John H. Lienhard
http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1031.htm

http://harpy.uccs.edu/greek/lateclasssculpt.html
http://harpy.uccs.edu/greek/sculpt/antikyth.jpg
http://harpy.uccs.edu/greek/sculpt/antik3.jpg
http://harpy.uccs.edu/greek/sculpt/antik2.jpg


The Antikythera wreck, 80 BC, Greece.
Roman ship on its way from Pergamon, found by sponge divers in
1900 on 40-55 m depth. Additional divings in the '70s by Cousteau. Finds are displayed in Athens, e.g. an
unidentified astronomical instrument. More info here and here.
http://atle.abc.se/~m10354/uwa/wreckint.htm


Used to mechanically calculate the position of Sun and Moon, used in ancient Greece.
http://horology.org/htu-anti.html


A HISTORY OF THE COMPUTER: PREHISTORY
http://www.pbs.org/nerds/timeline/pre.html

A Brief History of Clocks: From Thales to Ptolemy
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/GreekScience/Students/Jesse/CLOCK1A.html


The Collection of Bronzes
http://www.culture.gr/2/21/214/21405m/e21405m4.html


Gears from the Greeks : The Antikythera Mechanism, a Calendar Computer from Ca 80 B.C.
Derek De Solla Price
Availability: This title is out of print. Although it is no longer available from the publisher, we'll query our network of used bookstores for you and send an update within one to two weeks.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN%3D0871696479/002-9493240-9111817

RESUME Bernard Gardner
My honours project was Three dimensional analysis of x-ray images of the Antikythera Mechanism, an attempt to provide a
non-invasive method for deducing the internal structure of an ancient Greek geared mechanism. The project used Computer
analysis of scanned x-rays to try to produce a three-dimensional image of the internals of the mechanism. This information was
desired to aid in the understanding of the original function of the mechanism, the earliest known example of a geared
mechanism, which appears to date from the 1st century BC.
http://bernard.g7.org/resume

The Antikythera Mechanism
Bernard Gardner

In 1993, I was an Honours Student in Computer Science, studying at the Basser
Department of Computer Science at Sydney University. My thesis supervisor, Allan
Bromley had an interest in the Antikythera Mechanism, and so I embarked on a project
to analyse his X-Ray images of the mechanism, and attempt to produce a 3D model of
the gear trains inside the mechanism.

At the time, the mechanism was relatively unknown, but as interest seems to have
bloomed recently, I present here online my thesis.

BJG
http://www.geekHaus.net.au/antikythera/


Die Kalenderreform Caesars. Ein Beitrag zur
Geschichte seiner Spätzeit.
http://www.gnomon.ku-eichstaett.de/LAG/kalender.html


Spheres and Planetaria (Introduction)
http://www.mcs.drexel.edu/~crorres/Archimedes/Sphere/SphereIntro.html


The Antikythera Mechanism is the most sophisticated scientific instrument surviving from antiquity.
http://www.math.utsa.edu/ecz/ak000.html


THE EPHEBE OF ANTIKYTHERA (Ephebe: adolescent)

One more statue that has been an item of controversy among archaeologists Since it is evident
that he was holding some spherical object in his right hand, some say that it depicts Paris holding
the apple and others that it is a statue of Perseus holding Andromeda's head (340 B.C). It was
found in a ship wreckage near Antikythera in 1900.
http://focusmm.com.au/greece/gr_muse.htm


Many of the finest bronzesever discovered, such as the Youth of Antikythera, were salvaged bysponge divers.
http://www.dicksonc.act.edu.au/html/body_underwater.html


HISTORY AND ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE SHIP
084 ANTIKYTHERA SHIP
http://www.history.bangor.ac.uk/shipspecial/FLrf084.htm


Den märkliga manicken från Antikythera
[Contains one of the best photographs I have seen
of the A.M.]
http://www.nyteknik.se/efterjobbet/ej-97-20/ej-97-20.html



Publications of T.M.Th.
Gears from the Greeks:
The Mechanism of Antikythera
Description : The book presents the Mechanism of Antikythera (currently displayed in the National
Archaeological Museum of Athens)
http://uranus.ee.auth.gr/TMTh/public.htm


The Hab Theory : A Novel; Allan W. Eckert;
The device which has come to be known as the Antikythera Computer,
was discovered in the ancient wreckage of a ship
on the bottom of the Aegean Sea near the Greek island of Antikythera.
http://www.overbyte.com/habtheory/hab2.htm


A Very Brief History of Computer Science
The ancient Greeks developed some very sophisticated analog computers.
In 1901, an ancient Greek shipwreck was discovered off the island of Antikythera.
http://www.cslab01.math.uwaterloo.ca/courses/cs134/History/history.html


Antikythera
The tiny island of Antikythera (pop.150), 38 km. south-east of Kythera, is the most remote island in the Aegean Sea and
definitely one for the reclusive. It has one settlement (Potamos), one doctor, one police officer, one teacher (with a few pupils),
one phone and one monastery. There is no post office or bank. You can find a cafe and a restaurant.
http://www.odysseas.com/kythera3.html


Fractions, Cycles, and Time
The so-called Antikythera mechanism, apparently constructed in the first century B.C., recovered in 1900 from a
Mediterranean shipwreck, and analyzed just a few decades ago, is one of the most striking examples of such
engineering in the ancient world. It contained a system of gears whose gear ratios corresponded to well-known
astronomical cycles involving the moon, including the Metonic cycle. The mechanism was clearly a type of analog
computer, using fixed gear ratios to make calculations displayed as pointer readings on a dial.
http://www.sciencenews.org/sn_arc97/10_11_97/mathland.htm

Thank you to Rupert Russell, for permission to utilise the format of the set of links above.