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The Diagrams and Replicas of Richard of Wallingford’s Clock

  • Seb Falk
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Tools, Techniques, and Technologies
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Abstract

This article studies the scaled-down model of Richard of Wallingford’s astronomical clock at the Whipple Museum of the History of Science in Cambridge, made by Don Unwin in 1990. Wallingford’s clock, installed at St Albans Abbey c. 1330, was destroyed in the sixteenth century, so its reconstruction was no simple matter. The first part of the article discusses the fourteenth-century diagrams of parts of the clock. These diagrams are slippery depictions of the object: partly artistic representations; partly engineer’s plans; partly geometrical idealisations; partly tables of data. The second part focuses on the making of Unwin’s replica: alongside other replicas of the same clock, I consider the role of its constructor, the decisions involved in its reconstruction, and its status as a replica with different, sometimes contradictory, value for historians and museum-goers. The article concludes with some reflections on the value and fluctuating fortunes of replica historic objects.

Abstract

This article studies the scaled-down model of Richard of Wallingford’s astronomical clock at the Whipple Museum of the History of Science in Cambridge, made by Don Unwin in 1990. Wallingford’s clock, installed at St Albans Abbey c. 1330, was destroyed in the sixteenth century, so its reconstruction was no simple matter. The first part of the article discusses the fourteenth-century diagrams of parts of the clock. These diagrams are slippery depictions of the object: partly artistic representations; partly engineer’s plans; partly geometrical idealisations; partly tables of data. The second part focuses on the making of Unwin’s replica: alongside other replicas of the same clock, I consider the role of its constructor, the decisions involved in its reconstruction, and its status as a replica with different, sometimes contradictory, value for historians and museum-goers. The article concludes with some reflections on the value and fluctuating fortunes of replica historic objects.

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter 1
  2. Acknowledgements
  3. Contents VII
  4. List of Figures and Tables IX
  5. Prologue: of Friendship and Fishponds 1
  6. Introduction 5
  7. Part I: Historiography, Disciplinary Categories, and Anachronism
  8. Greco-Roman Histories of Astronomy, Their Genres, and Their Afterlives 15
  9. When was Cosmology? The Curious History of a Disciplinary Category 33
  10. Surmise or Certainty: Women in Science in Antiquity 51
  11. Deep Reading of Kepler’s New Astronomy: An Exercise in Computational History of Science 65
  12. Part II: Scientific Writing: Genres, Authority, Authorship, and Audiences
  13. Narrative Elements in Aristotle’s Generation of Animals 83
  14. Style and Intended Readership of Theophrastus’ On Fire (De igne) 95
  15. Strategies of Moralising in the Pseudo-Vergilian Aetna 115
  16. Leonides of Alexandria’s Isopsephic Epigrams: An Astronomical Art? 131
  17. Faithful Marriages and Wild Unions: Palladius’ On Grafting 153
  18. Ancient Authority in Arabic-Islamic Scientific Writing and Practice 169
  19. “A Cabinet of Many Rare Secrets”: The Uses and Abuses of Aristotle’s Masterpiece 191
  20. Part III: Counting and Measuring: Tools, Diagrams, and Replicas
  21. The Various Uses of Numbers and Mathematics in Ancient Egypt 219
  22. Greek Sexagesimals and Zeros 231
  23. The Diagrams and Replicas of Richard of Wallingford’s Clock 253
  24. Measuring Magnetism: Retrospective on Theories and Instruments from Lucretius to Blackett and Bullard 279
  25. Ancients and Moderns in Tycho Brahe’s Astronomy 295
  26. List of Contributors 317
  27. Bibliography
  28. Index
  29. Index Locorum
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111010632-016

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter 1
  2. Acknowledgements
  3. Contents VII
  4. List of Figures and Tables IX
  5. Prologue: of Friendship and Fishponds 1
  6. Introduction 5
  7. Part I: Historiography, Disciplinary Categories, and Anachronism
  8. Greco-Roman Histories of Astronomy, Their Genres, and Their Afterlives 15
  9. When was Cosmology? The Curious History of a Disciplinary Category 33
  10. Surmise or Certainty: Women in Science in Antiquity 51
  11. Deep Reading of Kepler’s New Astronomy: An Exercise in Computational History of Science 65
  12. Part II: Scientific Writing: Genres, Authority, Authorship, and Audiences
  13. Narrative Elements in Aristotle’s Generation of Animals 83
  14. Style and Intended Readership of Theophrastus’ On Fire (De igne) 95
  15. Strategies of Moralising in the Pseudo-Vergilian Aetna 115
  16. Leonides of Alexandria’s Isopsephic Epigrams: An Astronomical Art? 131
  17. Faithful Marriages and Wild Unions: Palladius’ On Grafting 153
  18. Ancient Authority in Arabic-Islamic Scientific Writing and Practice 169
  19. “A Cabinet of Many Rare Secrets”: The Uses and Abuses of Aristotle’s Masterpiece 191
  20. Part III: Counting and Measuring: Tools, Diagrams, and Replicas
  21. The Various Uses of Numbers and Mathematics in Ancient Egypt 219
  22. Greek Sexagesimals and Zeros 231
  23. The Diagrams and Replicas of Richard of Wallingford’s Clock 253
  24. Measuring Magnetism: Retrospective on Theories and Instruments from Lucretius to Blackett and Bullard 279
  25. Ancients and Moderns in Tycho Brahe’s Astronomy 295
  26. List of Contributors 317
  27. Bibliography
  28. Index
  29. Index Locorum
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