LOST & FOUND #4 …

Excellent Reading:
--- The Lost Discoveries from the beginning of Recorded History to the Renaissance --- Lost Discoveries - Dick Teresi.

LOST & FOUND
#4 The Start of Technology

  • Hanging Gardens of Babylon 616 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar takes Babylonia and builds Hanging Gardens of Babylon for one of his wives to keep her from being homesick
  • Remains of Gardens never found, but Greek historian (Diodorus Siculus) writes: 1/4 mile base of slabs of stone, terraces covered with plants, cantilevered to project over lower levels
  • Terraces suspended in air over galleries, terraces supported by 22' thick walls, even roof had trees, 10' passages, holes in terraces to light galleries, roof: had waterproof layer of lead, 2 layers of brick, reed matting set in asphalt, then soil for trees
  • Watered by screw pump from Euphrates (may be precursor to Archimedes screw by 700 years)
  • Babylon was huge and never completely excavated, population 1/2 million, center of human universe - grand scale - 8 level zigarat, 200' high, covered in gold, spiral staircase with seats for climbers to rest
  • Much technology was lost by conquest, but Persians, then later the Muslims tended to and enhanced much of Middle East technology
  • Hydrology: water tanks in Jericho 6000 B.C., canal from Tigris before 2500 B.C., Egyptian department of irrigation in 2800 B.C. & a dam 20 miles from Cairo in 2500 B.C. (remains are still there after over 5,000 years)
  • Water Milling: in Baghdad with population approaching 1 million even had floating mills to keep up with corn milling running 24x7 with millstones and wooden gears
  • Wind Mills: invented in Middle East ~950 A.D. (some still operating)

Questions

  1. How about that city Nebuchadnezzar is reputed to have built! What ancient historian writes about this?
    Diodorus Siculus
  2. Who invented a water pump like Archimedes’ screw? When?
    Babylonians in 616 B.C.
  3. How did ancient Baghdad keep up with providing grain for it’s 1 million people?
    Floating mills running 24x7
  4. If some dams’ remains can last 5,000 years and some wind mills can still operate after almost 3,000 years, what material must they be made of?In a word, why wouldn’t your wooden house last 1,000 years?
    Stone vs. wood