By Tony Freeth
Key Concepts:
■ The Antikythera mechanism is a unique mechanical calculator from second-century B.C. Greece. Its sophistication surprised archaeologists when it was discovered in 1901. But no one had anticipated its true power.
■ Advanced imaging tools have finally enabled researchers to reconstruct how the device predicted lunar and solar eclipses and the motion of the moon in the sky.
■ Inscriptions on the mechanism suggest that it might have been built in the Greek city of Syracuse (now in modern Sicily), perhaps in a tradition that originated with Archimedes.
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(H/T History of the Ancient World)
