>>I never heard of it, but maybe he thought about some
>>machine in his time as Imperial Mathematician in Prag
>>(1601..1612 - nice history on
>>http://www.kepler.arc.nasa.gov/johannes.html
>>) - but afaik the idea of calculating machines
>>did recive more attention (althrough more seen
>>as scince fiction) after the invention of the
>>Taschenuhr by Peter Heinlein (15something).
> I've never heard of the Taschenuhr. Can anyone tell me more or direct me to
> a source of information?
Taschenuhr -> fob watch.
Peter Heinlein did the first clock small enough to
fit in a pocket. It had the size of a big egg. I don't
remember the exactr year, but I think it was in the
first half of the 16th century.
There are a lot of legendary stories around this device
- inclundig the one that his whife had destroyed the
first one, since she belived that this thing, going
tick-tack must be devils work (remember 16th and 17th
century was a or better _the_ high time of witch hunting
and dark religous belives - Kepler for example had to
defend is mother somewhen in the 1620s agains a triel
of witchhood). So she destroyed his masterpice, and he
let himself imprisson for the next few month in the city
prison, to build a new one without beeing disturbed :)
Building small time devices had an impact to trade
like calculating machines in the early days of this
century. Starting from coach clocks for merchants
who lead their 'empire' from their coaches, until
fob watches. in the 15th/16th century coach clock
was an enormous expensive device - even compared
th the expensiv travling coaces, a coach clock could
cost up to 5 times the coach ! (Like wehn I put a
new Server in my old car :)
Servus
Hans
--
Ich denke, also bin ich, also gut
HRK
Received on Fri Jun 19 1998 - 16:09:38 BST