Astronomical clock (Astrarium)
Reloj astronómico (Astrarium)
- Date
- 1364 · confidence high
- Place
- Padua, Italy (Giovanni de Dondi); St Albans (Richard of Wallingford)
- Credited to
- Giovanni de Dondi; Richard of Wallingford
- People
- 👤 Giovanni Dondi dell'Orologio1330–1388👤 Richard of Wallingford1292–1336
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
What it is
A seven-dial clock with elliptical gearing that reproduced the motion of the Sun, Moon and planets according to Ptolemy. The pinnacle of medieval precision mechanics.
Dondi's treatise (Tractatus astrarii) preserves complete plans; the original clock was lost.
What it led to
- the astronomical clocks of Prague, Strasbourg and Lund as sources of civic pride
- a tradition of designing non-circular gears and complex gear trains
- a mechanistic culture that inspired Leonardo and 17th-century science
Built on
- Antikythera mechanismc. 100 BCE
- Early planispheric astrolabec. 150 CE
- Islamic planispheric astrolabec. 900
- Equatoriumc. 1015
- Al-Jazari's castle clock1206
- Mechanical weight-driven clockc. 1283
- Verge and foliot escapementc. 1300
- Public striking tower clock1335
- Mechanical weight-driven clock
- Verge and foliot escapement
Made possible
- Prague Orloj (astronomical clock)1410
- Taqi al-Din's Istanbul observatory1577
- mechanical planetarium
- Renaissance automata