AL-JAZARI AND THE HISTORY OF WATER CLOCK

Posted by Unknown , Wednesday, 16 January 2013 22:31

THE HISTORY OF WATER CLOCKS AND INGENIOUS DEVICES BEFORE AND AFTER AL-JAZARI

 
The first water clocks in their simplest form were used by the ancient civilizations of Babylonia and Egypt.
 
           About the developments that followed we have two historical reports. The known one in the histories of science is that of Vitruvious who said that Ctesibius, an Egyptian engineer and craftsman who worked in Alexandria about 250 BC, improved the design of the water clock.
 
           The second report came from Ridwan ibn al-Sa’ati in his book and is not known to historians of science. Ridwan mentioned in his book that a man called Hormuz invented the mechanisms of the water clock that were used by his father in the construction of the Damascus clock. He says further that “the design [of Hormuz] continued in the land of Fars for a long time, and was transmitted from there to the land of the Greeks, and its construction spread out in the land until it was transmitted to Damascus, where it was constructed up to the days of the Byzantines and after that in the days of Banu Umayya, according to what is mentioned in the histories. This clock attributed to Hormuz continued to be reproduced by one man after another on this pattern, and it was in the shape that we described above”
 
                 The report of Ridwan seems credible, since he links the development of the water clock with both Iran and the Hellenistic world. His story is of great historical importance and it deserves the attention of research workers. We should remark here that the practice of water clocks was limited to the cities of Syria and Mesopotamia in the early centuries of Islam which gives support to Ridwan’s account.
 
             The only public water clock known before Islam was erected in a public square in Gaza in the fifth century AD.
 
                Automata in general were known before Islam. The first musical automaton is attributed to Ctesibius of Egypt. In Asia Minor, Philon of Byzantium who was a contemporary of Ctesibius, wrote the first major treatise on ingenious devices. Philon’s work was continued and extended by Heron of Alexandria, who flourished in the middle of the first century AD.
 
             The tradition of water clocks and ingenious devices of pre-Islamic lands was further developed under Islam. Monumental water clocks in Islamic cities continued to be installed. The Abbasid Caliphs were interested in clocks and ingenious devices. The story of the clock that was presented by Harun al-Rashid (170-193/786-809) to Charlemagne in 807 AD is well known. It is reported also that the Abbasid Caliph Al-Mutawakkil (d. 247/861) was so obsessed with moving machines (Ālāt mutaḥarrika), that he favoured the Banu Musa who wrote their famous book al-Hiyal during this period.
 
             In Kiitab al-hayawan, al-Jahiẓ (160-253/776-867 AD) when discussing the measurement of time, says: “Our kings and scientists use the astrolabe by day and the binkamat (water clocks) by night” 
 
             Al-Khazini (flourished 515/1121) reported that Ibn al-Haytham (354/965 - 450/1038) who was a noted engineer as well as a great scientist, described a water clock. In the same period historians reported that Nasir al Dawla of Diyar Bakr (d. 453/1061 AD) constructed a public binkam (water clock) for the city of Mayyafariqin in the year 414/1012. This is 200 years before al-Jazari.
 
              The technology of clock- making was transferred to Muslim Spain and to Al-Maghrib. About the year 442/1050 AD, al-Zarqali constructed a large water clock on the banks of the Tagus River at Toledo in Spain. The clock was still in operation when the Christians occupied the city in 1085 AD. A treatise describing Andalusian monumental clocks was written in the eleventh century by Ibn Khalaf al-Mururadi. Water clocks were constructed for public places in al-Maghrib. The remains of two public water clocks in Fās from the fourteenth century AD can still be seen.
                   
             An Arabic treatise of unknown date and authorship describes a monumental water-clock. It is attributed to a Pseudo-Archimedes but it is not listed among Archimedes works in any history of science. Hill thinks that part of it may be of Greek origin, but most of it being written by Arabic writers.  Both Ridwan and al-Jazari mentioned it.
 
             In Damascus, Muhammad al-Khurasani al-Sa’ati (the clock-maker) built a monumental clock around 556/1160. Ridwan ibn al-Sa’ati re-built the clock of his father and gave a detailed description of its construction in 600/1203. Al-Jazari was writing his book in Āmid at the same time.
                   
            The skills in constructing clocks and ingenious devices were also established in the eastern lands of Islam.  We should remember that Muúammad al-Sa’ati who constructed the monumental clock in Damascus came from Khurasan in 549/1154 and started constructing the clock shortly after his arrival. He was considered unrivalled in his skills in clock making. It is reported that the noted astronomer ʿAlī Qūshjī (d. 1474) who was in Maragha, wrote a treatise (tadhkira) on spiritual (or ingenious) machines.
 
          The last important writer on the same subject was Taqi al-Din ibn Maʿrūf who wrote a book on water clocks and ingenious machines in 1552 and another on mechanical clocks in 1556. 
                  

4- Evaluation of al-Jazari’s work

Al-Jazari’s book deals with a whole range of devices and machines, with a multiplicity of purposes. What they have in common is the considerable degree of engineering skill required for their manufacture, and the use of delicate mechanisms and sensitive control systems. Many of the ideas employed in the construction of ingenious devices were useful in the later development of mechanical technology.
 
About al-Jazari’s book Sarton says that “this treatise is the most elaborate of its kind and may be considered the climax of this line of Moslem achievement.” Hill concludes also that “until modern times there is no other document, from any cultural area, that provides a comparable wealth of instructions for the design, manufacture and assembly of machines” .
 
Al-Jazari inherited the knowledge of his predecessors, but he improved on their designs and added devices of his own invention. The merit of his book is that it was the only book to discuss such a large variety of devices and to present them with text and illustrations and dimensions so that a skilled craftsman is able to construct any device on the basis of al-Jazari’s description. In the World of Islam Festival in 1976 it was possible to construct three of al-Jazari’s machines under Hill’s supervision. They worked perfectly well. One was a monumental water clock which is exhibited now in the Natuuurmuseum Asten in the Netherlands. [The toy machine shown below, incorporates several principles: the use of water power and a water raising saqiya at the same time. An actual machine like this from the thirteenth century, was supplying water from Nahr Yazid in Damascus to Ibn al-‘Arabi’s mosque until recently, and can be seen until now. ]
 
Figure. 1 

Many of al-Jazari’s components and techniques were useful in the development of modern mechanical engineering. These include the static balancing of large pulley wheels; calibration of orifices; use of wooden templates; use of paper models in design; lamination of timber to prevent warping; the grinding of the seats and plugs of valves together with emery powder to obtain a watertight fit; casting of brass and copper in closed mold boxes with greensand; use of tipping buckets that discharge their contents automatically; and the use of segmental gears.

Al-Jazari’s double acting piston pump is unique (Fig. 2). It is remarkable for three reasons:1) it incorporates an effective means of converting rotary into reciprocating motion through the crank-connecting-rod mechanism  2)  it makes use of the double-acting principle and 3) it is the first pump known to have had true suction pipes..
                                                                  Figure. 2
Al-Jazari occupies an important place in the history of automata, automatic control, robotics and automated musical theaters. His pioneering work is duly acknowledged in most histories.
 
The inventions of al-Jazari are a source of inspiration to modern designers such as the use of rolling balls to sound the hours on cymbals and operate automata. This concept is currently used in toys and other devices and their makers had registered patents in their names.
 
Al-Jazari described a combination lock. There are now in world museums three combination locks that were made in the same period of al-Jazari . Although they are simpler than the lock of  al-Jazari yet they follow the same principle. Two were made around 597/1200 AD by Muhammad b. Hamid al-Asturlabi al-Isfahani and are located in Copenhagen and Boston. The third is in Maastricht. The first combination lock in Europe was described by Buttersworth in 1846 and the wheels of this lock are strikingly similar to the discs of al-Jazari.
 
All illustrations in al-Jazari’s book are in colour, and among the fifty main drawings are miniatures that are of great artistic merit. This resulted in the disappearance of some of these paintings from the manuscripts and they found their way to the international museums of art or to private collections.
 
The illustrations of the book enable historians to study the clothing styles of men and women in Diyar Bakr in the thirteenth century, and some of their living habits. See the illustration below (Fig. 3) of the automated girl serving drinks.

 
  Figure 3


 Sumber: History of Science and Technology in Islam

Ulasan:
Teknologi jam air yang pertama digunakan oleh ketamadunan awal di Babylon dan Mesir.  Pembangunan teknologi ini diketahui menerusi dua laporan sejarah, daripada Vitruvius mengatakan bahawa pengasas pertama  kepada teknologi Jam Air ini ialah Ctesibius seorang Jurutera Mesir dan craftsman yang bekerja di Iskandariah pada tahun 250 sebelum masihi, beliaulah yang telah membangunkan reka cipta jam air.  Manakala laporan sejarah yang kedua datang daripada Ridwan ibn al-Salatin yang dikenali sebagai sejarawan ilmu Sains.  Ridhwan mengatakan bahawa, individu beranama Hormuz yang mencetuskan mekanisma Jam Air yang digunakan di Damascus.  Tambah beliau lagi, penciptaan Hormuz ini tersebar sehingga ke tanah Greek begitu juga dengan pembinaannya sehingga ke masa pemerintahan kerajaan Byzantine dan Bani Umayyah.  Namun begitu, penciptaan oleh Hormuz ini terhad sehingga ke bandar Syria dan Mesopotamia pada tahun awal Islam menurut laporan daripada Ridhwan.
            Ketika zaman Islam tokoh teknologi Jam Air yang dikenal pasti ialah Ibn Al-Haytham (354/965-450/1038) yang dikenali seorang yang hebat dalam dunia kejuruteraan dan ilmu Sains ketika zaman Khalifah Al-Mutawakkil.  Kemudian teknologi ini tersebar sehingga ke zaman Islam di Sepanyol dan Maghribi melalui individu yang bernama Al-Zarqali yang membina Jam Air yang besar di kawasan Sungai Tagus di Toledo, Sepanyol.  Operasi jam tersebut masih berjalan ketika zaman penjajahan Kristian di bandar tersebut pada tahun 1085 masihi.  Manakala di Damascus, Muhammad Al- Khurasani al-Saati membina jam monumen antara tahun 556/1160.  Anaknya Ridhwan Ibn al-Saati membina semula jam yang dibina bapanya dan memberikan perincian pembinaan tersebut dalam tahun 600/1203.
Evaluasi teknologi Al-Jazari.  Dalam bukunya menekankan tentang keseluruhan peralatan dan mesin dengan pelbagai kegunaan.  Menurut Sarton, buku Al-Jazari merupakan elaborasi teknologi Jam Air dan mampu dipetimbangkan sebagai klimaks kepada pencapaian orang muslim.  Manakala Hill pula merumuskan bahawa, sehingga ke zaman moden tiada dokumen lain dari mana-mana kawasan budaya yang membawakan kekayaan pembinaan dalam penciptaan dan rekaan, pembuatan dan pengumpulan mesin.  Al- Jazari menambah baik penciptaan sedia ada dengan menambahkan peralatan mesin dengan inisiatif sendiri.  Justeru, ianya memberikan panduan kepada ahli craftsman mendapat gambaran  jelas tentang ilustrasi dan dimensi penciptaan teknologi Jam Air berlandaskan buku Al-Jazari.
            Antara peralatan dan inovasi teknologi daripada Al-Jazari yang boleh dijadikan  contoh ialah, balancing static dengan roda Pulley yang besar; mempunyai double action piston, dan lamination timber untuk melicinkan dan mengemaskan penciptaan.















 

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