BBC News : Ancient Moon 'computer' revisited
This shows just how advanced the Ancient Greeks and Romans were, and how long it took for Europeans to catch up after the fall of the Roman Empire, mainly because the Catholic Church hampered scientific development for over 1000 years.
BBC said:The delicate workings at the heart of a 2,000-year-old analogue computer have been revealed by scientists.
The Antikythera Mechanism, discovered more than 100 years ago in a Roman shipwreck, was used by ancient Greeks to display astronomical cycles.
Using advanced imaging techniques, an Anglo-Greek team probed the remaining fragments of the complex geared device.
The results, published in the journal Nature, show it could have been used to predict solar and lunar eclipses.
The elaborate arrangement of bronze gears may also have displayed planetary information.
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This shows just how advanced the Ancient Greeks and Romans were, and how long it took for Europeans to catch up after the fall of the Roman Empire, mainly because the Catholic Church hampered scientific development for over 1000 years.