Ancient machine tools

Distinctive spiral patterns carved into a small jade ring show that China was using complex machines more than 2500 years ago, says a Harvard graduate student in physics.

The ring was among the goods found in high-status graves from China's "Spring and Autumn Period" from 771 to 475 BC. Most archaeological attention has focused on larger and more spectacular jade and bronze artifacts. But Peter Lu identified the patterns on the small rings as Archimedes' spirals, which he believes are the oldest evidence of compound machines. . .

Specialists believe most ancient Chinese jades were hand-carved, but Lu thought the spirals on the jade rings were machine-made as soon as Jenny So, an art historian at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, showed him one at the Smithsonian Institution.

"I said I bet you could do it with a modified bow drill, and she looked at me as if I had two heads," Lu told New Scientist.

Challenged to prove he was right, Lu built a spiral-carving machine around an old record player. . .

Read the full story here. The technological sophistication of the ancients still tends to be underappreciated; who needs the wacky inventions of modern-day pseudohistorians when we have the very real Antikythera mechanism?

MORE Antikythera references here, here, here, and here.

Posted by David on June 12, 2004 12:01 PM