Water-lifting devices, such as the water wheel, had come into use.Īnother water-lifting device was a bucket chain using a pulley, which is believed to have provided the means of watering the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. The operator pushed down on the pole to fill the bucket with water, then used the counterweight to assist in lifting the bucket. At one end of the lever was a counterweight, and at the other a pole with a bucket attached. The shaduf, first used in Mesopotamia in about 3000 b.c., consisted of a long wooden lever that pivoted on two upright posts. Similarly, he used the screw principle to improve on the shaduf and other rudimentary pumping devices. Archimedes's contribution lay in his explanation of the lever's properties, and in his broadened application of the device. in the form of a simple balance scale, and within a few thousand years workers in the Near East and India were using a crane-like lever called the shaduf to lift containers of water. The simplest example of this machine in operation would be the use of a crowbar (lever) balanced on a block of wood (fulcrum), which greatly increases the lifting ability of the operator. Actually, the more proper name for this simple machine is "lever and fulcrum," since the lever depends on the fulcrum as a pivot. Of these three, the lever is perhaps the oldest, having been used in some form for centuries prior to his writings on the subject. Though he contributed greatly to understanding of the lever, screw, and pulley, Archimedes did not invent any of these machines. He later returned to his hometown, where he lived the remainder of his life. to study under Conon and other mathematicians who had been disciples of Euclid (330?-260? b.c.). Son of an astronomer named Phidias, he went to Alexandria in around 250 b.c. His studies greatly enhanced knowledge concerning the way things work, and his practical applications remain vital today thus he is aptly named the "father of experimental science." Backgroundīorn in the Greek town of Syracuse in Sicily, Archimedes (287?-212 b.c.) was related to one of that city's kings, Hieron II (308?-216 b.c.). In addition to his mathematical studies and his work on buoyancy, Archimedes contributed to knowledge concerning at least three of the five simple machines-winch, pulley, lever, wedge, and screw-known to antiquity. "Give me a place to stand," Archimedes is said to have promised, "and I will move the world." In this perhaps apocryphal quote, the Greek mathematician, scientist, and inventor was discussing the principle of the lever and fulcrum, but he could very well have been describing his whole career. Archimedes and the Simple Machines That Moved the World Overview
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