ANCIENT GREEK TECHNOLOGY The inventions of the ancient Greeks

by Kostas Kotsanas

This book revives approximately two hundred exceptional ancient Greek inventions (from the robot - servant of Philon to the cinema of Heron and from the automatic clock of Ktesibios to the analog computer of Antikythera) and aims to demonstrate that the technology of the ancient Greeks, just before the end of the ancient world, was shockingly similar to the beginning of our modern technology. The bolts and nuts, gears and rules, pulleys and belts, sprockets and chains, block and tackles and winches, pistons and cylinders, hydraulic controllers and valves, programmers and auto-pilots are just some of the inventions of the ancient Greeks which were the foundations of their complex technology. These legacies, identical and irreplaceable, continue today to constitute the building blocks of our modern technology, the development of which would be doubtful without its effortless and undemanding adoption. Only after a millennium of maturation was humanity able to "recover" this remarkable forgotten technology. The exploration of this age, when ownership for peak technology was not claimed, demonstrates, without a doubt, how much more (than we think) the modern Western Technological Civilisation owes to the Greeks.

Genres: Nonfiction, History

160 pages, Flexibound

First published January 1, 2013

Reviews

[Μανώλης Σιμιτσάκης · Rating 5 out of 5]

Εύστοχο, επεξηγηματικότατο, εκπληκτικό.

[Steve Wegman · Rating 4 out of 5]

A friend loaned me this little book that he got at a museum in Greece. Bi-lingual Greek/English, its a collection of descriptions and drawings of all kinds of ancient Greek technology from theater to warfare. Steam, hydraulic, air and manual power. Cranes, winches, levers, clocks, geometry. Fascinating.

[to'c · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating, simply fascinating. I need to build some of these!