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Study: Archimedes Set Roman Ships Afire with Cannons


Melvadius

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Live Science reports on an interesting take on how Archimedes may have defended Syracuse froma paper presented at the recent THE GENIUS OF ARCHIMEDES International conference held in Syracuse. Personally I am not totally convinced by this premise but it is one way of getting an academic paper widely read and discussed.

 

Greek inventor Archimedes is said to have used mirrors to burn ships of an attacking Roman fleet. But new research suggests he may have used steam cannons and fiery cannonballs instead.

 

A legend begun in the Medieval Ages tells of how Archimedes used mirrors to concentrate sunlight as a defensive weapon during the siege of Syracuse, then a Greek colony on the island of Sicily, from 214 to 212 B.C. No contemporary Roman or Greek accounts tell of such a mirror device, however.

 

Both engineering calculations and historical evidence support use of steam cannons as "much more reasonable than the use of burning mirrors," said Cesare Rossi, a mechanical engineer at the University of Naples "Federico II," in Naples, Italy, who along with colleagues analyzed evidence of both potential weapons.

 

The steam cannons could have fired hollow balls made of clay and filled with something similar to an incendiary chemical mixture known as Greek fire in order to set Roman ships ablaze. A heated cannon barrel would have converted barely more than a tenth of a cup of water (30 grams) into enough steam to hurl the projectiles.

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Wasn't Greek fire a considerably later invention (see this thread, even thou it seems as if it's refering to Wiki, which I unlike)?

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Wasn't Greek fire a considerably later invention (see this thread, even thou it seems as if it's refering to Wiki, which I unlike)?

 

 

A Byzantine invention, I believe.

 

I think the original article is bogus.

 

I'm not sure how bogus it is or if it was intended as a serious contribution to the event but there seems to be a website devoted to the conference which has on it's programme for 8th June 2010 listed the following item:

 

11.45-12.30 Prof. Cesare Rossi: Archimedes

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Unfortunately there is no abstract in the conference programme but Prof Rossi also seems to have brought out a book with his theories which is obviously one crying out for some interested party to hunt out and write a review on for UNVR - but you can probably count me out on that option

 

Hehe, that book The Genius of Archimedes... is 230 dollars, not sure those kind of books are dished out freely for reviews....

 

cheers

viggen

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Unfortunately there is no abstract in the conference programme but Prof Rossi also seems to have brought out a book with his theories which is obviously one crying out for some interested party to hunt out and write a review on for UNVR - but you can probably count me out on that option

 

Hehe, that book The Genius of Archimedes... is 230 dollars, not sure those kind of books are dished out freely for reviews....

 

cheers

viggen

 

 

Ouch! Although I have just realised that if you instead used the link I put in above to his theories and IF you really wanted to you could instead buy the 'pdf' version of the chapter containing his theory as an 'extract' from the full book for only $25..... I still think I'll pass. :D

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Haha, too bad, it sounds like a very interesting book and I would love to see this guys argument in full.

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I contacted the author of that study Cesare Rossi, and he was so kind to authorize me to publish here on his behalf some of his points he made in the papers.... (thanks Cesare!)

 

Dear Christian,

tanks for the interest in my work.

I am glad to tell you the main points of the contribution that I presented at the World Conference

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  • 3 years later...

Steam cannon = battery placement = archeology.

 

Where are the batteries? What fueled the steam? How long was the learning curve for the gunners, or was the gun fixed in terms of aim?

 

How often did they blow up instead of shooting? I find it hard to believe cannons didn't blow up, unless he used some new construction technique.

 

Did this author read Bellifortis?

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