• DOI:10.1038/nature05357
Corpus ID: 4424998

Decoding the ancient Greek astronomical calculator known as the Antikythera Mechanism

@article{Freeth2006DecodingTA,
  title={Decoding the ancient Greek astronomical calculator known as the Antikythera Mechanism},
  author={T. Freeth and Y. Bitsakis and X. Moussas and J. Seiradakis and A. Tselikas and H. Mangou and M. Zafeiropoulou and R. Hadland and D. Bate and A. Ramsey and M. Allen and A. Crawley and P. Hockley and T. Malzbender and D. Gelb and W. Ambrisco and M. Edmunds},
  journal={Nature},
  year={2006},
  volume={444},
  pages={587-591}
}

• T. Freeth, Y. Bitsakis, +14 authors M. Edmunds
• Published 2006
• Physics, Medicine
• Nature

The Antikythera Mechanism is a unique Greek geared device, constructed around the end of the second century bc. It is known that it calculated and displayed celestial information, particularly cycles such as the phases of the moon and a luni-solar calendar. Calendars were important to ancient societies for timing agricultural activity and fixing religious festivals. Eclipses and planetary motions were often interpreted as omens, while the calm regularity of the astronomical cycles must have… Expand