A two-thousand-year-old bronze box can predict eclipses, track the moon, and compile the calendars of four civilizations simultaneously. It's been dubbed an ancient computer, but the name of its maker has never been recorded. Who is really behind it?
This video explores the Antikythera Mechanism, an object discovered in a shipwreck near the island of Antikythera in 1900. We examine its workings using X-ray scans, decipher the tiny Greek inscriptions on its plates, and connect Babylonian eclipse calculations with Hipparchus' geometry. From the Corinthian calendar to the small feast at Dodona, this object bears the fingerprints of its owner, as well as the big question: why hasn't it been likened for a thousand years? We also compare it to the Belitung shipwreck and how we interpret our underwater heritage. Watch until the end to see why the mystery isn't as it's always been.
— Chapter —
0:00 Opening
1:13 A Name, Many Legends
2:59 The Antikythera Shipwreck
6:10 Reading the Machine
9:18 The Dispute Between the Moon and the Sun
18:50 For Whom It Was Built
21:02 Whose Hands Were Behind It
31:35 The Lost and the Survived
35:13 Footage Sources
— Sources:
• Tony Freeth et al. (Nature journal, 2006) — X-ray scans and reconstruction of the mechanism's function, including Hipparchus' moon theory.
• Derek de Solla Price — Yale physicist-historian, article 'An Ancient Greek Computer' (Scientific American, 1959) and book 'Gears from the Greeks'.
• Alexander Jones — book 'A Portable Cosmos', study of the shipwreck's date and astronomical context of the mechanism.
• Cicero — a classical work mentioning the moving celestial spheres of Archimedes and Poseidonius, an ancient source for astronomical instrumentation traditions.
• Christian Carman & James Evans (2014) — dating the origin of the eclipse dial to 205 BC.
• Natali Pearson — a book about the Belitung shipwreck and the ethical debate surrounding the salvage of underwater heritage.
• National Archaeological Museum of Athens — a repository for the mechanism and finds of the Antikythera ship, a source for descriptions of the dial and the games.
• Science Museum London / Michael Wright — a working reconstruction of the mechanism and the historical context of astronomical gears.
A two-thousand-year-old bronze box can predict eclipses, track the moon, and compile the calendars of four civilizations simultaneously. It's been dubbed an ancient computer, but the name of its maker has never been recorded. Who is really behind it?
This video explores the Antikythera Mechanism, an object discovered in a shipwreck near the island of Antikythera in 1900. We examine its workings using X-ray scans, decipher the tiny Greek inscriptions on its plates, and connect Babylonian eclipse calculations with Hipparchus' geometry. From the Corinthian calendar to the small feast at Dodona, this object bears the fingerprints of its owner, as well as the big question: why hasn't it been likened for a thousand years? We also compare it to the Belitung shipwreck and how we interpret our underwater heritage. Watch until the end to see why the mystery isn't as it's always been.
— Chapter —
0:00 Opening
1:13 A Name, Many Legends
2:59 The Antikythera Shipwreck
6:10 Reading the Machine
9:18 The Dispute Between the Moon and the Sun
18:50 For Whom It Was Built
21:02 Whose Hands Were Behind It
31:35 The Lost and the Survived
35:13 Footage Sources
— Sources:
• Tony Freeth et al. (Nature journal, 2006) — X-ray scans and reconstruction of the mechanism's function, including Hipparchus' moon theory.
• Derek de Solla Price — Yale physicist-historian, article 'An Ancient Greek Computer' (Scientific American, 1959) and book 'Gears from the Greeks'.
• Alexander Jones — book 'A Portable Cosmos', study of the shipwreck's date and astronomical context of the mechanism.
• Cicero — a classical work mentioning the moving celestial spheres of Archimedes and Poseidonius, an ancient source for astronomical instrumentation traditions.
• Christian Carman & James Evans (2014) — dating the origin of the eclipse dial to 205 BC.
• Natali Pearson — a book about the Belitung shipwreck and the ethical debate surrounding the salvage of underwater heritage.
• National Archaeological Museum of Athens — a repository for the mechanism and finds of the Antikythera ship, a source for descriptions of the dial and the games.
• Science Museum London / Michael Wright — a working reconstruction of the mechanism and the historical context of astronomical gears.