Ancient Secrets Of Antikythera Mechanism Finally Revealed: A 2,000-Year-Old Computer That ‘Saw Into Future’

MessageToEagle.com – Scientists have long tried the unravel the mystery of the Antikythera Mechanism, a 2,000-year-old amazing encrusted bronze object of undetermined use found on the small island of Antikythera, 25 miles northwest of Crete.

Some scholars described the Antikythera Mechanism as the world’s first analog computer. It seemed to be a sort of astronomical clock without pendulum but no Greek or Roman writer has ever described such an ancient computer, though many other wonders of antiquity are mentioned. Now, scientists have finally unraveled the mystery of the Antikythera Mechanism and its purpose.

It has long been suspected that the Antikythera Mechanism was used by ancient Greeks to track solar and lunar eclipses.

Now, according to a new study the minute inscriptions on the Antikythera’s outer surfaces clearly reveal this was a very important ancient astronomical object.

It confirms the mechanism displayed planets as well as showing the position of the sun and the moon,” said Mike Edmunds, an astrophysics professor of the University of Cardiff, who is part of the research project team.

n creating heaven’s mirror, its ancient engineers may have given in to a less scientific urge – man’s curiosity about what the future holds.

Edmunds said the decoding threw up an interesting nugget – the color of a forthcoming eclipse.

“We are not sure how to interpret this but it could hark back to suggestions the color of an eclipse was an omen or signal,” he said.

“If that is so, this is the first instance we have in the mechanism of any real mention of astrology rather than astronomy,” he said.

Nonetheless, the overriding objective of the mechanism was astronomical, not astrological, he said.

The team says the mechanism was a calendar of the sun and the moon that showed the phases of the moon, the position of the sun and the moon in the zodiac, the position of the planets, and predicted eclipses. Nothing of the sort was known to be made for well over 1,000 years.

“Now we have texts that you can actually read as ancient Greek, what we had before was like something on the radio with a lot of static,” said team member Alexander Jones, a professor of the history of ancient science at New York University.

“It’s a lot of detail for us because it comes from a period from which we know very little about Greek astronomy and essentially nothing about the technology, except what we gather from here,” he said. “So these very small texts are a very big thing for us.”

“It was not a research tool, something that an astronomer would use to do computations, or even an astrologer to do prognostications, but something that you would use to teach about the cosmos and our place in the cosmos,” Jones said. “It’s like a textbook of astronomy as it was understood then, which connected the movements of the sky and the planets with the lives of the ancient Greeks and their environment.”

“I would see it as more something that might be a philosopher’s instructional device.”

See also:

Enigmatic Antikythera Mechanism Still Full Of Secrets

Tacoma Researcher Attempts To Solve Mystery Of Ancient Astronomical Device

More Than 50 New Spectacular Artifacts Discovered From The Ancient Shipwreck of Antikythera

10 Remarkable Advanced Ancient Technologies Ahead Of Their Times

The team says they have read practically all the text on the surviving fragments. Their greatest hope is that archaeologists currently revisiting the shipwreck will uncover pieces overlooked by the sponge divers who found it a century ago — or even another similar mechanism.

The commercial vessel was a giant of the ancient world — at least 40 meters (130 feet) long — and broke into two as it sank, settling on a steep underwater slope about 50 meters (164 feet) deep.

Most of the inscriptions, and at least 20 gears that worked to display the planets, are still there.

The Antikythera Mechanism was in many ways a kind of philosopher’s guide to the galaxy, and perhaps the world’s oldest mechanical computer.

MessageToEagle.com