3 ms·

Do we know why such expertise was lost in the first place? The collapse of the Roman empire wasn't for another couple centuries.

tacos 10y ago
It was a Greek device. Theory is that it was pilfered with the other artifacts found in the shipwreck, en route to Julius Caesar. Rough couple years to be a Greek scientist.
tzs 10y ago
Was it lost? Or did those who could build such a thing simply did not think it was worth doing so? The astronomy knowledge and the mechanical theory needed to make the Antikythera mechanism were well known in ancient times, and I don't think those were ever lost. The mystery of the Antikythera mechanism is how it was actually built. But do we know how long it took to build? If it was built in a short time frame, then yeah, the maker probably used techniques that were lost not too long afterward, and not rediscovered until maybe the 14th century. But what if it were built over a much longer time frame? It could have been someone's lifetime project. Then simple techniques might work. For instance, if you need a piece of metal shaped to very tight tolerances, just get it close and then use a hand file to very slowly make it what you need. If this were the case, I can easily imagine that plenty of people between the time it was made and the 14th century knew how to build one, but simply were not interested enough to make building it their life's work.
- i_feel_great 10y ago
  Science is never lost, only suppressed.
  - sanoli 10y ago
    The history of scurvy is pretty interesting: http://mentalfloss.com/article/24149/how-scurvy-was-cured-then-cure-was-lost http://mentalfloss.com/article/24149/how-scurvy-was-cured-th...
  - leblancfg 10y ago
    The history of concrete is quite interesting. http://www.romanconcrete.com/docs/spillway/spillway.htm http://www.romanconcrete.com/docs/spillway/spillway.htm http://io9.gizmodo.com/how-the-ancient-romans-made-better-concrete-than-we-do-1672632593 http://io9.gizmodo.com/how-the-ancient-romans-made-better-co...
- pharke 10y ago
  Using a file to cut gears doesn't take a lifetime, they even did this in one of the documentaries about the subject. https://youtu.be/5mIGJzqrGnc?t=36m9s https://youtu.be/5mIGJzqrGnc?t=36m9s
abecedarius 10y ago
The Forgotten Revolution by Russo blames the establishment of the Roman empire instead -- or rather all the troubles in the couple centuries before. For example, he showed a timeline of astronomical observations used by Ptolemy: it had bars over the centuries from around 700 BC (iirc) down to Hipparchus in the 100s BC, then nothing until Ptolemy's era around 100 AD (which Russo thought a weak revival with people like Ptolemy more mining the libraries than really reestablishing scientific and technical progress). The author is more of a physicist than a historian, fwiw.
Shivetya 10y ago
My only question, was there only one ever? It seems implausible that it would be unique
- abecedarius 10y ago
  No. Archimedes for instance is known to have built orreries and written a lost book on "Sphere-making", apparently this topic. Cicero reported seeing one that the Roman general responsible for conquering Syracuse took back as loot. We don't know just how much these had in common with the Antikythera device. https://www.math.nyu.edu/~crorres/Archimedes/Sphere/SphereIntro.html https://www.math.nyu.edu/~crorres/Archimedes/Sphere/SphereIn...

tacos 10y ago

It was a Greek device. Theory is that it was pilfered with the other artifacts found in the shipwreck, en route to Julius Caesar. Rough couple years to be a Greek scientist.

tzs 10y ago

Was it lost? Or did those who could build such a thing simply did not think it was worth doing so? The astronomy knowledge and the mechanical theory needed to make the Antikythera mechanism were well known in ancient times, and I don't think those were ever lost. The mystery of the Antikythera mechanism is how it was actually built. But do we know how long it took to build? If it was built in a short time frame, then yeah, the maker probably used techniques that were lost not too long afterward, and not rediscovered until maybe the 14th century. But what if it were built over a much longer time frame? It could have been someone's lifetime project. Then simple techniques might work. For instance, if you need a piece of metal shaped to very tight tolerances, just get it close and then use a hand file to very slowly make it what you need. If this were the case, I can easily imagine that plenty of people between the time it was made and the 14th century knew how to build one, but simply were not interested enough to make building it their life's work.

i_feel_great 10y ago
Science is never lost, only suppressed.
- sanoli 10y ago
  The history of scurvy is pretty interesting: http://mentalfloss.com/article/24149/how-scurvy-was-cured-then-cure-was-lost http://mentalfloss.com/article/24149/how-scurvy-was-cured-th...
- leblancfg 10y ago
  The history of concrete is quite interesting. http://www.romanconcrete.com/docs/spillway/spillway.htm http://www.romanconcrete.com/docs/spillway/spillway.htm http://io9.gizmodo.com/how-the-ancient-romans-made-better-concrete-than-we-do-1672632593 http://io9.gizmodo.com/how-the-ancient-romans-made-better-co...
pharke 10y ago
Using a file to cut gears doesn't take a lifetime, they even did this in one of the documentaries about the subject. https://youtu.be/5mIGJzqrGnc?t=36m9s https://youtu.be/5mIGJzqrGnc?t=36m9s

abecedarius 10y ago

The Forgotten Revolution by Russo blames the establishment of the Roman empire instead -- or rather all the troubles in the couple centuries before. For example, he showed a timeline of astronomical observations used by Ptolemy: it had bars over the centuries from around 700 BC (iirc) down to Hipparchus in the 100s BC, then nothing until Ptolemy's era around 100 AD (which Russo thought a weak revival with people like Ptolemy more mining the libraries than really reestablishing scientific and technical progress). The author is more of a physicist than a historian, fwiw.

Shivetya 10y ago

My only question, was there only one ever? It seems implausible that it would be unique

abecedarius 10y ago
No. Archimedes for instance is known to have built orreries and written a lost book on "Sphere-making", apparently this topic. Cicero reported seeing one that the Roman general responsible for conquering Syracuse took back as loot. We don't know just how much these had in common with the Antikythera device. https://www.math.nyu.edu/~crorres/Archimedes/Sphere/SphereIntro.html https://www.math.nyu.edu/~crorres/Archimedes/Sphere/SphereIn...