Home » The Project » Publications » Scientific American Dec. 2009: 50 years after Derek Price, "Decoding an Ancient Computer" by Tony Freeth

Scientific American Dec. 2009: 50 years after Derek Price, "Decoding an Ancient Computer" by Tony Freeth

"New explorations have revealed how the Antikythera mechanism modeled lunar motion and predicated eclipses, among other sophisticated tricks."

Scientific American’s eight-page feature article by Tony Freeth (Antikythera Mechanism Research Project) describes recent research from the point of view of one member of the scientific team. The article is published 50 years after Derek de Solla Price’s 1959 Scientific American article "An Ancient Greek Computer". It highlights the background to some of the key discoveries of the last few years and shows how far research has progressed from Price’s pioneering work. With nice graphics and a popular style, the article aims to bring the magic and mystery of the Mechanism to a wide readership.

"If it had not been for two storms 2,000 years apart in the same area of the Mediterranean, the most important technological artifact from the ancient world could have been lost forever."
From its chance discovery by sponge divers, the article covers more than a hundred years of research on this deeply mysterious and extraordinarily significant object. From the insights of Albert Rehm in the early 20th century to the seminal work of Derek de Solla Price in the mid 20th Century, research has been a zig-zag course of real progress and false trails. Price’s work in the 1970s with radiologist Charalambos Karakalos revealed just how complex the mechanism was. Research has been a fascinating detective story with a bewildering set of clues that have been understood and misinterpreted in equal measure. The narrative traces the important advances of Allan Bromley and Michael Wright with their new X-ray study in the late 1980s and early 1990s and the significant advances by Wright after Bromley’s death in 2002.

Much of the article concentrates on the new research on the Mechanism by the Anglo-Greek team of scientists, known as the Antikythera Mechanism Research Project. Significant progress began with the gathering of new data in 2005 by two teams from Hewlett-Packard (USA) and X-Tek Systems (UK). The resulting data led to a sequence of breakthroughs on the structure, functions and inscriptions of the Mechanism. In particular, it was shown that the Mechanism predicted eclipses and followed the variable motion of the Moon with a mechanical design of genius. This represents an altogether more advanced technological sophistication than had previously been thought possible in this era. These research results were published in the prestigious science journal, Nature, in 2006 and 2008. The article conveys the excitement of discovery and the remarkable implications for our understanding of the history of technology. Our modern technological world began, not with the scientific advances that originated in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, but 1,500 years earlier in 2nd Century BC Greece—and then technological progress appears to have come to a halt for a millennium afterwards. The Antikythera Mechanism has given up some of its secrets, but many still remain elusive and unexplained.

Error | Antikythera Mechanism Research Project

Error

The website encountered an unexpected error. Please try again later.