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Post by swamprat on Mar 31, 2015 14:09:49 GMT -6
Scientists Unravel Mystery of Ancient Greek Machineby Ker Than November 29, 2006 A computer generated reconstruction of the front and back of the Antikythera Mechanism. Credit: Antikythera Mechanism Research Project
Scientists have finally demystified the incredible workings of a 2,000-year-old astronomical calculator built by ancient Greeks.
A new analysis of the Antikythera Mechanism, a clock-like machine consisting of more than 30 precise, hand-cut bronze gears, show it to be more advanced than previously thought—so much so that nothing comparable was built for another thousand years.
"This device is just extraordinary, the only thing of its kind," said study leader Mike Edmunds of Cardiff University in the UK. "The design is beautiful, the astronomy is exactly right…In terms of historical and scarcity value, I have to regard this mechanism as being more valuable than the Mona Lisa."
The researchers used three-dimensional X-ray scanners to reconstruct the workings of the device's gears and high-resolution surface imaging to enhance faded inscriptions on its surface.
Precise astronomy The new analysis reveals that the device's front dials had pointers for the sun and moon — called the "golden little sphere" and "little sphere," respectively—and markings, which coincided with the zodiac and solar calendars. The back dials, meanwhile, appear to have been used for predicting solar and lunar eclipses.
The researchers also show that the device could mechanically replicate the irregular motions of the Moon, caused by its elliptical orbit around the Earth, using a clever design involving two superimposed gear-wheels, one slightly off-center, that are connected by a pin-and-slot device.
The team was also able to pin down the device's construction date more precisely. Radiocarbon dating suggested it was built around 65 B.C., but newly revealed lettering on the machine indicate a slightly older construction date of 150 to 100 B.C. The team's reconstruction also involves 37 gear wheels, seven of which are hypothetical.
"In the face of fragmentary material evidence, such guesswork is inevitable. But the new model is highly seductive, and convincing in all of its detail," wrote Francois Charette, a researcher at the Ludwig-Maximilians University in Germany who was not involved in the study, in a related article in the journal Nature.
Discovered in 1900 Pieces of the ancient calculating machine were discovered by sponge divers exploring the remains of an ancient shipwreck off the tiny island of Antikythera in 1900. For decades, scientists have been trying to figure out how the device's 80 fragmented pieces fit together and unlock its workings.
Previous reconstructions suggested the Antikythera Mechanism was about the size of a shoebox, with dials on the outside and a complex assembly of bronze gear wheels within. By winding a knob on its side, the positions of the sun, moon, Mercury and Venus could be determined for any chosen date. Newly revealed inscriptions also appear to confirm previous speculations that the device could also calculate the positions of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn — the other planets known at the time.
The international team, led by Edmunds and Tony Freeth, also of Cardiff University, included astronomers, mathematicians, computer experts, script analysts and conservation experts from the U.K., Greece and the United States.
The researchers plan to create a computer model of how the Antikythera Mechanism worked and eventually a working replica.
The team's findings will be presented in a two-day international conference in Athens and published in the Nov. 30 issue of the journal Nature.
www.livescience.com/1166-scientists-unravel-mystery-ancient-greek-machine.html
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Post by skywalker on Apr 2, 2015 21:09:17 GMT -6
I wonder what else was on that boat? If this technological marvel went down with it maybe some other interesting things are there too. The person who owned it must have had some connections to some pretty interesting people. It might be worth diving down there and doing a thorough search...if they haven't done so already.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 16, 2016 10:46:31 GMT -6
Scientists Unravel Mystery of Ancient Greek Machineby Ker Than November 29, 2006 A computer generated reconstruction of the front and back of the Antikythera Mechanism. Credit: Antikythera Mechanism Research Project
Scientists have finally demystified the incredible workings of a 2,000-year-old astronomical calculator built by ancient Greeks.
A new analysis of the Antikythera Mechanism, a clock-like machine consisting of more than 30 precise, hand-cut bronze gears, show it to be more advanced than previously thought—so much so that nothing comparable was built for another thousand years.
"This device is just extraordinary, the only thing of its kind," said study leader Mike Edmunds of Cardiff University in the UK. "The design is beautiful, the astronomy is exactly right…In terms of historical and scarcity value, I have to regard this mechanism as being more valuable than the Mona Lisa."
The researchers used three-dimensional X-ray scanners to reconstruct the workings of the device's gears and high-resolution surface imaging to enhance faded inscriptions on its surface.
Precise astronomy The new analysis reveals that the device's front dials had pointers for the sun and moon — called the "golden little sphere" and "little sphere," respectively—and markings, which coincided with the zodiac and solar calendars. The back dials, meanwhile, appear to have been used for predicting solar and lunar eclipses.
The researchers also show that the device could mechanically replicate the irregular motions of the Moon, caused by its elliptical orbit around the Earth, using a clever design involving two superimposed gear-wheels, one slightly off-center, that are connected by a pin-and-slot device.
The team was also able to pin down the device's construction date more precisely. Radiocarbon dating suggested it was built around 65 B.C., but newly revealed lettering on the machine indicate a slightly older construction date of 150 to 100 B.C. The team's reconstruction also involves 37 gear wheels, seven of which are hypothetical.
"In the face of fragmentary material evidence, such guesswork is inevitable. But the new model is highly seductive, and convincing in all of its detail," wrote Francois Charette, a researcher at the Ludwig-Maximilians University in Germany who was not involved in the study, in a related article in the journal Nature.
Discovered in 1900 Pieces of the ancient calculating machine were discovered by sponge divers exploring the remains of an ancient shipwreck off the tiny island of Antikythera in 1900. For decades, scientists have been trying to figure out how the device's 80 fragmented pieces fit together and unlock its workings.
Previous reconstructions suggested the Antikythera Mechanism was about the size of a shoebox, with dials on the outside and a complex assembly of bronze gear wheels within. By winding a knob on its side, the positions of the sun, moon, Mercury and Venus could be determined for any chosen date. Newly revealed inscriptions also appear to confirm previous speculations that the device could also calculate the positions of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn — the other planets known at the time.
The international team, led by Edmunds and Tony Freeth, also of Cardiff University, included astronomers, mathematicians, computer experts, script analysts and conservation experts from the U.K., Greece and the United States.
The researchers plan to create a computer model of how the Antikythera Mechanism worked and eventually a working replica.
The team's findings will be presented in a two-day international conference in Athens and published in the Nov. 30 issue of the journal Nature.
www.livescience.com/1166-scientists-unravel-mystery-ancient-greek-machine.html www.universetoday.com/129389/mysterious-greek-device-found-astronomical-computer/Mysterious Greek Device Found to be Astronomical Computer www.universetoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/675px-Antikythera_model_front_panel_Mogi_Vicentini_2007-435x580.jpg
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Post by swamprat on Sept 19, 2016 10:39:00 GMT -6
Human skeleton found on famed Antikythera shipwreck
Two-thousand-year-old bones could yield first DNA from an ancient shipwreck victim.Jo Marchant 19 September 2016
Divers examine human bones excavated from the Antikythera shipwreck. Brett Seymour, EUA/WHOI/ARGO
Hannes Schroeder snaps on two pairs of blue latex gloves, then wipes his hands with a solution of bleach. In front of him is a large Tupperware box full of plastic bags that each contain sea water and a piece of red-stained bone. He lifts one out and inspects its contents as several archaeologists hover behind, waiting for his verdict. They’re hoping he can pull off a feat never attempted before — DNA analysis on someone who has been under the sea for 2,000 years.
Through the window, sunlight sparkles on cobalt water. The researchers are on the tiny Greek island of Antikythera, a 10-minute boat ride from the wreckage of a 2,000-year-old merchant ship. Discovered by sponge divers in 1900, the wreck was the first ever investigated by archaeologists. Its most famous bounty to date has been a surprisingly sophisticated clockwork device that modelled the motions of the Sun, Moon and planets in the sky — dubbed the ‘Antikythera mechanism’.
But on 31 August this year, investigators made another groundbreaking discovery: a human skeleton, buried under around half a metre of pottery sherds and sand. “We’re thrilled,” says Brendan Foley, an underwater archaeologist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, and co-director of the excavations team. “We don’t know of anything else like it.”
A partial skull, with three teeth, is among the human remains found at the Antikythera wreck. Brett Seymour, EUA/WHOI/ARGO
Within days of the find, Foley invited Schroeder, an expert in ancient-DNA analysis from the Natural History Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen, to assess whether genetic material might be extracted from the bones. On his way to Antikythera, Schroeder was doubtful. But as he removes the bones from their bags he is pleasantly surprised. The material is a little chalky, but overall looks well preserved. “It doesn’t look like bone that’s 2,000 years old,” he says. Then, sifting through several large pieces of skull, he finds both petrous bones — dense nuggets behind the ear that preserve DNA better than other parts of the skeleton or the teeth. “It’s amazing you guys found that,” Schroeder says. “If there’s any DNA, then from what we know, it’ll be there.”
Schroeder agrees to go ahead with DNA extraction when permission is granted by the Greek authorities. It would take about a week to find out whether the sample contains any DNA, he says: then perhaps a couple of months to sequence it and analyse the results.
For Schroeder, the discovery gives him the chance to push the boundaries of ancient-DNA studies. So far, most have been conducted on samples from cold climates such as northern Europe. “I’ve been trying to push the application of ancient DNA into environments where people don’t usually look for DNA,” he says. (He was part of a team that last year published the first Mediterranean ancient genome, of a Neolithic individual from Spain.)
Foley and the archaeologists, meanwhile, are elated by the chance to learn more about the people on board the first-century bc ship, which carried luxury items from the eastern Mediterranean, probably intended for wealthy buyers in Rome.
Rare discovery The skeleton discovery is a rare find, agrees Mark Dunkley, an underwater archaeologist from the London-based heritage organization Historic England. Unless covered by sediment or otherwise protected, the bodies of shipwreck victims are usually swept away and decay, or are eaten by fish. Complete skeletons have been recovered from younger ships, such as the sixteenth-century English warship the Mary Rose and the seventeenth-century Vasa in Sweden. Both sank in mud, close to port. But “the farther you go back, the rarer it is”, says Dunkley.
Only a handful of examples of human remains have been found on ancient wrecks, says archaeologist Dimitris Kourkoumelis of the Greek Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities, who collaborates with Foley. They include a skull found inside a Roman soldier’s helmet near Sardinia, and a skeleton reportedly discovered inside a sunken sarcophagus near the Greek island of Syrna (although the bones disappeared before the find could be confirmed).
In fact, the best-documented example is the Antikythera wreck itself: scattered bones were found by the French marine explorer Jacques Cousteau, who excavated here in 1976. Argyro Nafplioti, an osteoarchaeologist at the University of Cambridge, UK, concluded that the remains came from at least four individuals, including a young man, a woman and a teenager of unknown sex.
At the wreck site, only broken pots now remain on the sea floor — the sponge divers recovered all artefacts visible on the seabed in 1900–01. But Foley thinks that much of the ship’s cargo may be buried under the sediment. His team, including expert technical divers and members of the Greek archaeological service, relocated and mapped the 50-metre-deep site before beginning their own excavations in 2014. They have found items such as wine jars, glassware, two bronze spears from statues, gold jewellery and table jugs used by the crew (see ‘Ancient bounty’). The divers have also recovered ship components including enormous anchors and a teardrop-shaped lead weight, found in June, that may be the first known example of what ancient texts describe as a ‘war dolphin’ — a defensive weapon carried by merchant vessels to smash hostile ships.
The skeleton uncovered in August consists of a partial skull with three teeth, two arm bones, several rib pieces and two femurs, all apparently from the same person. Foley’s team plans further excavations to see whether more bones are still under the sand.
That so many individuals have been found at Antikythera — when most wrecks yield none — may be partly because few other wrecks have been as exhaustively investigated. But the researchers think it also reveals something about how the ship sank. This was a huge vessel for its time, perhaps more than 40 metres long, says Foley, with multiple decks and many people on board. The wreck is close to shore, at the foot of the island’s steep cliffs. He concludes that a storm smashed the ship against the rocks so that it broke up and sank before people had a chance to react. “We think it was such a violent wrecking event, people got trapped below decks.”
The individuals found at Antikythera could be from the crew, which would probably have consisted of 15–20 people on a ship this size. Greek and Roman merchant ships also commonly carried passengers, and sometimes slaves. One reason people get trapped inside shipwrecks is if they are chained, points out Dunkley. “The crew would be able to get off relatively fast. Those shackled would have no opportunity to escape.” Intriguingly, the recently discovered bones were surrounded by corroded iron objects, so far unidentified; the iron oxide has stained the bones amber red.
Schroeder says that because ancient underwater remains are so rare, DNA analysis on such samples using state-of-the-art techniques has barely been tried. (Analyses were conducted on skeletons from the Mary Rose and the Vasa, but specialists no longer see those methods — based on amplifying DNA using a method called PCR — as reliable, because it is too difficult to distinguish ancient DNA from modern contamination.) Exceptions include analyses on 8,000-year-old wheat from a submerged site off the English coast (although these results have been questioned because the DNA did not show the expected age-related damage), and mitochondrial DNA from a 12,000-year-old skeleton found in a freshwater sinkhole in Mexico.
Finding undisturbed remains such as those at Antikythera is crucial because it offers the opportunity to extract any DNA in the best possible condition. Previously salvaged bones are not ideal for analysis because they have often been washed, treated with conservation mater¬ials or kept in warm conditions (all of which can destroy fragile DNA), or handled in a way that contaminates them.
Schroeder guesses from the skeleton’s fairly robust femur and unworn teeth that the individual was a young man. As well as confirming the person’s gender, DNA from the Antikythera bones could provide information about characteristics from hair and eye colour to ancestry and geographic origin. In the past few years, modern genome sequences have revealed that genetic variation in populations mirrors geography, says Schroeder. He and others are now starting to look at how ancient individuals fit on that map, to reconstruct past population movements. Would the shipwreck victim look more Greek-Italian or Near Eastern, he wonders?
Over dinner, the researchers decide to nickname the bones’ owner Pamphilos, after a name found neatly scratched on a wine cup from the wreck. “Your mind starts spinning,” says Schroeder. “Who were those people who crossed the Mediterranean 2,000 years ago? Maybe one of them was the astronomer who owned the mechanism.”
www.nature.com/news/human-skeleton-found-on-famed-antikythera-shipwreck-1.20632?WT.ec_id=NEWSDAILY-20160919
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Post by swamprat on Jul 7, 2017 14:53:39 GMT -6
Wow! I WANT one! Cliff, when you order yours, buy me one!
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Post by swamprat on Oct 5, 2017 18:37:21 GMT -6
Antikythera shipwreck yields statue pieces and mystery bronze disc Archaeologists think that at least seven life-sized sculptures are hidden nearby.
Jo Marchant 04 October 2017
Marine archaeologists investigating the ancient shipwreck that yielded the Antikythera mechanism — a complex, bronze, geared device that predicted eclipses and showed the movements of the Sun, Moon and planets in the sky — have recovered a wealth of treasures, including bronze and marble statue pieces, a sarcophagus lid and a mysterious bronze disc decorated with a bull. The artefacts were trapped under boulders in a previously unexplored part of the site near the island of Antikythera, Greece, and the researchers think that large parts of at least seven statues are still buried nearby.
The discoveries are “extremely exciting”, says Kenneth Lapatin, curator of antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, California. Only a handful of bronze statues survive from the ancient world, and they have almost invariably been treated and altered by previous conservators, undergoing processes that destroyed much of the information scientists might have gleaned from them. “Technology has improved so much,” says Lapatin. “We can learn from these untreated finds.”
The first-century-BC cargo ship, discovered in 1900 by sponge divers, is famous for yielding a heavily encrusted and corroded geared device that used to predict eclipses and chart the skies. The sponge divers also retrieved many other priceless items, including luxury glassware, jewellery and a two-metre-tall bronze statue, dating from the fourth century BC, nicknamed the ‘Antikythera youth’.
Statue search The recovery of multiple ‘orphan’ statue pieces — limbs without matching heads or bodies, for example — suggested that several statues still lie buried here. So an international team of archaeologists and divers, co-led by Brendan Foley of the University of Lund in Sweden and Theotokis Theodoulou of the Greek Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities in Athens, is now re-excavating the 50-metre-deep wreck site to look for them.
The team has made a stream of discoveries since work began in 2014, including wine jars, giant anchors, gold jewellery and a human skeleton, which is now being analysed for DNA. But the statues have remained hidden until now.
On 4 October, the team announced that during a 16-day dive season the previous month, they found several major statue pieces, including two marble feet attached to a plinth, part of a bronze robe or toga, and a bronze male arm, with two fingers missing but otherwise beautifully preserved. A slim build and “turning hand” gesture suggest that the arm may belong to a philosopher, says Theodoulou.
In 1900–01, the sponge divers salvaged orphan limbs from a minimum of six bronze statues. The newly discovered arm pushes that total to at least seven, says Theodoulou. The team is particularly excited because the statue pieces were found in an area undisturbed by any previous excavations, buried beneath large boulders dislodged from Antikythera’s steep cliffs over the course of 2,000 years by periodic earthquakes. “We think this means that everything is down there still,” says Foley. The discovery of seven bronze statues, if they could be recovered, would significantly boost the world’s total from this time period, which stands not much greater than 50, Lapatin estimates. Few of those are complete. And although these ancient figures might look beautiful, they are hard to study because the aggressive treatments by generations of conservators have altered and damaged the bronze.
Technological advances Fresh, untreated finds such as those from Antikythera will give researchers the opportunity to use modern techniques to study a significant aspect of ancient Greek life — for example, by looking at casting methods, which precise alloys were used and whether the statues were made for export or had been previously displayed. Meanwhile, any heads found might enable researchers to identify the people depicted, and to compare their likeness with any existing portraits, for example, marble statues or images etched on coins.
Foley and Theodoulou’s team also recovered an intriguing bronze disc or wheel, about eight centimetres across, attached to four metal arms with holes for pins. A layer of hardened sediment hides its internal structure, but it superficially resembles the Antikythera mechanism, and researchers had initially hoped that it might be part of that ancient device: perhaps the gearing that calculated the positions of the planets, which is missing from the find.
But preliminary X-ray imaging conducted in an Athens hospital on 25 September revealed a surprise: instead of gear wheels, the image of a bull appeared. The object might have been a decorative element, says Lapatin, perhaps attached to a box or a statue’s shield, or even — because of its sturdy construction — to the doomed ship. More-detailed radiography is planned for the next few weeks. Other discoveries this season include a sarcophagus lid made from fine, red marble, more human remains and wooden ship planks and frames that the researchers hope will reveal information about the vessel’s size and shape.
The team plans to return to Antikythera in May 2018, to break up the boulders and excavate beneath. “It’s going to be a major operation,” says Foley. “But we think it will be spectacular.”
Look at pictures: www.nature.com/news/antikythera-shipwreck-yields-statue-pieces-and-mystery-bronze-disc-1.22735?WT.ec_id=NEWSDAILY-20171005
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