Intricate object proves history wrong

KLOOFENDAL – UNISA’s Department of Mathematical Sciences held a fascinating talk on 1 November at Eagle’s Fair Restaurant at the Walter Sisulu Botanical Gardens, regarding an object – the Antikythera Mechanism – that has drastically changed our knowledge of ancient history.

Guests were treated to a three course-buffet meal while Professor Derek P. Smits from the department gave an insightful lecture on the Antikythera Mechanism, which is kept at the National Archaeological Museum in Athens, Greece.

The mechanism was found by sponge divers off the Greek island of Symi in 1900, along with a host of treasures salvaged from an ancient Roman shipwreck – which sank in approximately 80BCE – in what was deemed the first archaeological expedition of modern times. The mechanism spent the next nine decades in the museum archive with no one knowing what to make of the bizarre artifact.

It was only in the new millennium that archaeologists and scientists began to take serious interest in it, after noticing the intricate cogs and machinery the object was made up of. An X-ray taken in 2005 revealed the artifact comprised of cogs and dials which predicted lunar and solar cycles and eclipses over a 19-year period.

There is no record of such technology existing in 80BCE. It was previously thought the tools necessary to create such an elaborate machine were not available at that time. In 2008 this was proved false when a graphic 3D representation of the artifact illustrated clearly just how advanced ancient Greek civilisation was.