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The Greek computer of Antikythera, found in a Roman shipwreck and preserved in 82 fragments, returned to the center of scientific debate after a digital simulation indicated gear lockups, raising doubts about the impact of corrosion, deformation, and the precision of ancient craftsmen
Digital simulation shows that the Greek computer of Antikythera, created about 2,000 years ago to track celestial cycles and predict eclipses, may have been affected by the deformation of the preserved fragments, reigniting the debate about the precision achieved by ancient craftsmen.
The Greek computer of Antikythera, 2,000 years old, has once again challenged researchers after a digital simulation indicated that its gears jam almost immediately when modeled with the current measurements of the deformed fragments.
Greek computer united cosmos and eclipses
Found over a century ago in a Roman shipwreck, the mechanism was a bronze box, moved by gears.
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From the original object, 82 fragments survived, with about 30 to 40 gear wheels. Researchers associate the artifact with tracking the Sun, the Moon, and the planets, as well as predicting eclipses.
Jo Marchant, author of Decoding the Heavens, described to Smithsonian Magazine a set with a calendar, eclipse display, and inscriptions about stars, capable of indicating the cosmos.
Simulation showed gears locking
The study was conducted by Esteban Szigety and Gustavo Arenas, from the National University of Mar del Plata, in Argentina. The duo created a digital model with V-shaped teeth and documented deviations.
The result pointed to an obstacle: in part of the tests, the gears jammed or came loose. The model rarely allowed the solar pointer to complete four months of simulated movement.
The analysis revisits the work of Michael Edmunds, who in 2006 identified misalignments in the preserved gears. The hypothesis was that high errors would limit its use as a precise instrument.
Deformation may have altered the measurements
The researchers do not consider the Greek computer as a useless piece. Szigety suggests that the original craftsmen were more precise than the current dimensions indicate.
Aristeidis Voulgaris, from the Directorate of Culture and Tourism of Thessaloniki, recalls that two millennia in the sea transformed the bronze into atacamite. When dried, the material cracked, shrank, and went out of alignment.
Even with better tolerances, Edmunds notes that mechanical relationships would cause inaccuracies in the lunar pointer. Thus, the mechanism remains an anomaly of ancient engineering.
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