Hierapolis sawmill

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Depiction of a Roman water-powered sawmill in Hierapolis ( Asia Minor ). The mill, built in the 3rd century AD, is the first known machine to work with a crankshaft and connecting rod mechanism .

The Hierapolis sawmill was a Roman water-powered stone sawmill in Hierapolis, Asia Minor (present-day Turkey ). The water mill , dated to the second half of the 3rd century AD, is the first known machine in which a rotary motion was converted into a linear motion using a crankshaft and connecting rod .

The existence of the mill is evidenced by a relief on the sarcophagus of a local miller named Marcus Aurelius Ammianos. On the gable of the stone coffin is a water wheel that is fed by a mill channel. Two frame saws are driven by a gear drive, which cut through square blocks of stone via a connecting rod and a crankshaft, which is mechanically necessary (see graphic). The corresponding inscription is written in Greek .

More sawmills

Similar power transmission mechanisms consisting of a crank and connecting rod, admittedly without a gear drive, are known from archaeological excavations of two stone sawmills from the 6th century AD in Gerasa ( Jordan ) and Ephesus (Turkey). Another sawmill could have stood in Augusta Raurica , Switzerland , where a metal crankshaft from the 2nd century AD was discovered.

The operation of water-powered marble saws near Trier can be found in the poem Mosella by the Roman poet Ausonius from the late 4th century AD. A passage in the work of Saint Gregory of Nyssa (approx. 335–394) indicates the simultaneous existence of mechanical marble sawmills in Asia Minor , so that a widespread use of such industrial mills in the late Roman Empire can be assumed.

Based on the finds, the introduction of the crank mechanism with connecting rod can be brought forward a whole millennium; With his invention, all the main components of the steam engine, which was only developed to readiness for use much later, were available to a technical culture for the first time : the generation of steam power ( Heron's Aeolipile ), cylinders and pistons (in pressure pumps made of metal), check valves (in water pumps) and gears ( in water mills) were all known to Roman technicians.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Grewe (2009), p. 429; Ritti, Grewe, Kessener (2007), p. 161
  2. ↑ Ritti, Grewe, Kessener (2007), pp. 139–141
  3. ↑ Seigne 2002a; Seigne 2002b; Seigne 2002c
  4. ↑ Mangartz 2010; Ritti, Grewe, Kessener (2007), pp. 149–153
  5. ↑ Schiöler (2009), p. 66f.
  6. ^ Wilson (2002), p. 16
  7. ↑ Ritti, Grewe, Kessener (2007), p. 161
  8. ↑ Ritti, Grewe, Kessener (2007), p. 156, fn. 74

literature

Hierapolis sawmill
Gerasa sawmill
  • J. Seigne: Une scierie mécanique au VIe siècle , In: Archéologia 385 (2002a), pp. 36-37
  • J. Seigne: Sixth-Century Waterpowered Sawmill , In: Journal of the International Society of Molinology 64 (2002b), pp. 14-16
  • J. Seigne: A Sixth Century Water-powered Sawmill at Jerash , In: Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan 26 (2002c), pp. 205-213
Ephesus sawmill
  • Fritz Mangartz: The Byzantine stone saw from Ephesus. Building findings, reconstruction, architectural parts , monographs of the Roman-Germanic Central Museum, Vol. 86, Mainz 2010, ISBN 978-3-88467-149-8
Possible sawmill from Augusta Raurica
  • Thorkild Schiöler: The crankshaft from Augst and the Roman stone saw mill , In: Helvetia Archaeologica 40, No. 159/160 (2009), pp. 113-124
Industrial hydropower in antiquity
  • Wikander, Örjan: Sources of Energy and Exploitation of Power , in: John Peter Oleson (Ed.): The Oxford Handbook of Engineering and Technology in the Classical World , Oxford University Press, New York 2008, ISBN 978-0-19-518731 -1 , pp. 136-157
  • Wikander, Örjan: Industrial Applications of Water-Power , in: Örjan Wikander (Ed.): Handbook of Ancient Water Technology , Technology and Change in History, Vol. 2, Brill, Leiden 2000, ISBN 90-04-11123-9 , Pp. 401-412
  • Andre Wilson: Machines, Power and the Ancient Economy , in: Journal of Roman Studies , Vol. 92 (2002), pp. 1-32

See also

Web links