Around 1901, sponge divers discovered a shipwreck off the rocky Greek island of Antikythera. Among its treasures of bronze statues, they also found a strange, corroded bronze artifact with wheels and gears of different sizes, which came to be known as the Antikythera mechanism. In the 1970s, a diving expedition led by Jacques Cousteau brought up coins and other objects that helped date the wreck to the first century before Christ—most likely a large, overloaded Roman trading vessel heading back to Rome from Asia Minor. Filmmaker Mike Beckham's PBS-aired NOVA documentary examines the history, structure, and significance of this mechanism, arguing that it could be the world's first computer. The ancient Greeks were renowned for their mastery of mathematics and astronomy; keen observers of the sky, they believed that the phases of the moon were important for planning crop planting and religious festivals. Modern scientists, mathematicians, and historians here x-ray and study the mechanism's remains, even working up a model of the original, which fit into a wooden box no bigger than a laptop computer. Using our knowledge of math while also decoding hard-to-decipher inscriptions, they conclude that the mechanism was an advanced, complex device meant to look into the future, predicting lunar and solar eclipses, with gear wheels tracing the repeating cycles of the moon. The documentary speculates that Archimedes may have developed a forerunner of the object, which now rests in a Greek museum. While the decline of the Greek and Roman empires stymied any further technological advancement, much ancient knowledge is believed to have passed to Arab scholars, and thereby later kept alive in Europe, where it helped spark the Renaissance. Serving up an interesting and intriguing math and history detective mystery tale, this is recommended. Aud: H, C, P. (S. Rees)
Ancient Computer
(2012) 60 min. DVD: $24.99 ($54.95 w/PPR). PBS Video. SDH captioned. ISBN: 978-1-60883-798-4. Volume 28, Issue 5
Ancient Computer
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