History of Technology Volume 26: Volume Twenty-six, 2005 9780826489708, 9781350019058, 9781441191069

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HISTORY OF TECHNOLOGY

HISTORY OF TECHNOLOGY Editor Ian Inkster INSTITUTE OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH Senate House, University of London, London WCIE 7HU EDITORIAL BOARD Professor Hans-Joachim Braun Universitat der Bundeswehr Hamburg Holstenhofweg 85 22039 Hamburg Germany Professor R.A. Buchanan School of Social Sciences University of Bath Claverton Down Bath BA2 7AY England Professor H. Floris Cohen Raiffeisenlaan 10 3571 TD Utrecht The Netherlands Professor Mark Elvin Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies Australian National University Canberra, ACT 0200 Australia Dr Anna Guagnini Dipartimento di Filosofia Universita di Bologna Via Zamboni 38 40126 Bologna Italy Professor A. Rupert Hall, FBA 14 Ball Lane Tackley Oxfordshire OX5 3AG England

Dr Richard Hills Stanford Cottage 47 Old Road Mottram-in-Longdendale Cheshire SKI4 6LW England Dr Graham Hollister-Short Imperial College Sherfield Building London SW7 2AZ England Dr A.G. Keller Department of History University of Leicester University Road Leicester LEI 7RH England Professor Carlo Poni Via Filopanti 4 40100 Bologna Italy Dr Saptal Sangwan, National Institute of Science and Technology and Development Studies Dr K.S. Krishmanana Road New Delhi 110012 India

History of Technology Volume 26, 2005

Edited by Ian Inkster

Bloomsbury Academic An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc LON DON • OX F O R D • N E W YO R K • N E W D E L H I • SY DN EY

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www.bloomsbury.com BLOOMSBURY, T&T CLARK and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published 2006 by Continuum International Publishing Group Copyright © Ian Inkster, 2006 The electronic edition published 2016 Ian Inkster has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be accepted by Bloomsbury or the author. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: HB: 978-0-8264-8970-8 ePDF: 978-1-4411-9106-9 ePub: 978-1-3500-1904-1 Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. Series: History of Technology, volume 26 Typeset by Fakenham Prepress Solutions, Fakenham, Norfolk NR21 8NN

Contents

The Contributors Notes for Contributors HOWARD DAWES AND CHRISTOPHER DAWES, IN COLLABORATION WITH GERRY MARTIN AND ALAN MACFARLANE Making Things from New Ideas

vii ix

1

NICOLAS GARCIA TAPIA The Twenty-One Books of Engines and Machines Attributed to Pedro Juan de Lastanosa

23

R.L. HILLS Richard Roberts' Contributions to Production Engineering

41

MICHAEL PARIS Promoting British Aviation in 1950s Cinema

63

Special Issue: Engineering Disasters Edited by R. Angus Buchanan and Ian Inkster

79

R. ANGUS BUCHANAN Introduction

81

DAVID K. BROWN 2 Maritime Disasters and the Law

89

DEREK PORTMAN 3 Suspension Bridges

99

R. ANGUS BUCHANAN 4 The Causes of the Great Sheffield Flood of 1864

113

P.R. MORRIS 5 Semiconductor Manufacture and Chemical Contamination within Silicon Valley

131

VI

Contents

BRENDA J. BUCHANAN 6 Gunpowder: A Capricious and Unmerciful Thing

141

JOHN H. BOYES 7 Engineering Disasters: Thoughts of a Factory Inspector

161

PETER STOKES 8 Fatigue as a Factor in Aeronautical Disasters

165

DAVID ASHFORD 9 Design Compromises in the Space Shuttle

177

HENRY PETROSKI 10 Past and Future Bridge Failures

185

Contents of Former Volumes

201

The

David M. Ashford 3 Forest Hills Almondsbury Bristol BS32 4DN John H. Boyes 129 Endlebury Road Chingford London E4 6PX David K. Brown 9 Park Lane Bath BA1 2XG Brenda Buchanan 13 Hensley Road Bath BA2 2DR Professor R. Angus Buchanan University of Bath Centre for the History of Technology Claverton Down Bath BA2 7AY Christopher Dawes The Dawes Trust PO Box 15 Pershore Worcestershire WR10 2RD

Contributors

Howard Dawes The Dawes Trust PO Box 15 Pershore Worcestershire WR10 2RD Richard L. Hills Stanford Cottage 47 Old Road Mortram-in Langdendale via Hyde, Cheshire SK14 6LW Alan McFarlane King's College Cambridge CB2 1ST P. Robin Morris Hilltop 16 Ebrington Road West Malvern Worcs WR14 4NL Michael Paris Department of Humanities University of Central Lancashire Preston Lancashire PR1 2HE Professor Henry Petroski Duke University North Carolina 27708-0287 USA

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The Contributors

Derek Portman 28 Fedden Village Nore Road Portishead Bristol BS20 8DN

Peter R. Stokes 46 Carrington Avenue Boreham Wood Herts WD6 2HA

History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

N o t e s for

Contributors

Contributions are welcome and should be sent to the editor. They are considered on the understanding that they are previously unpublished in English and are not on offer to another journal. Papers in French and German will be considered for publication, but an English summary will be required. The editor will also consider publishing English translations of papers already published in languages other than English. Include an abstract of 150-200 words. Authors who have passages originally in Cyrillic or oriental scripts should indicate the system of transliteration they have used. Be clear and consistent. All papers should be rigorously documented, with references to primary and secondary sources typed separately from the text, double-line spaced and numbered consecutively. Cite as follows for: BOOKS 1. David Gooding, Experiment and the Making of Meaning: Human Agency in Scientific Observation and Experiment (Dordrecht, 1990), 54-5. Only name the publisher for good reason. Reference to a previous note: 3. Gooding, op. cit. (1), 43. Titles of standard works may be cited by abbreviation: DJVB, DBB, etc. THESES Cite University Microfilm order number or at least Dissertation Abstract number. ARTICLES 13. Andrew Nahum, The Rotary Aero Engine', Hist. Tech., 1986, 11: 125-66, esp. 139. Please note the following guidelines for the submission and presentation of all contributions:

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Notes for Contributors

1. Type your manuscript on good quality paper, on one side only and double-line spaced throughout. The text, including all endnotes, references and indented block quotes, should be in one typesize (if possible 12 pt). 2. In the first instance submit two copies only. Once the text has been agreed, then you need to submit three copies of the final version, one for the editor and two for the publishers. You should, of course, retain a copy for yourself. 3. Number the pages consecutively throughout (including endnotes and any figures/tables). 4. Spelling should conform to the latest edition of the Concise Oxford English Dictionary. 5. Quoted material of more than three lines should be indented, without quotation marks, and double-line spaced. 6. Use single quotes for shorter, non-indented, quotations. For quotes within quotes use double quotation marks. 7. The source of all extracts, illustrations, etc., should be cited and/or acknowledged. 8. Italic type should be indicated by underlining. Italics (i.e. underlining) should be used for foreign words and titles of books and journals. Articles in journals are not italicized but placed within single quotation marks. 9. Figures. Line drawings should be drawn boldly in black ink on stout white paper, feint-ruled paper or tracing paper. Photographs should be glossy prints of good contrast and well matched for tonal range. Each illustration must be numbered and have a caption. Xerox copies may be sent when the article is first submitted for consideration. Please do not send originals of photographs or transparencies but if possible have a good-quality copy made. While every care will be taken, the publishers cannot be held responsible for any loss or damage. Photographs or other illustrative material should be kept separate from the text. They should be keyed to your typescript with a note in the margin to indicate where they should appear. Provide a separate list of captions for the figures. 10. Notes should come at the end of the text as endnotes, double-line spaced. 11. It is the responsibility of the author to obtain copyright clearance for the use of previously published material and for photographs.

History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

M a k i n g

T h i n g s

N e w

f r o m

I d e a s

H O W A R D DAWES AND C H R I S T O P H E R DAWES IN C O L L A B O R A T I O N W I T H G E R R Y M A R T I N AND ALAN M A C F A R L A N E

INTRODUCTION Most of us would agree that humans have taken increasing control over their environment when compared with other living species. The developed nations enjoy a surplus of food, people can travel fast and freely, can communicate with others anywhere and have developed substantial control over disease. Why has mankind been so successful? The answers range from religious explanations to humans' use of language and tools. But this is not a uniform accomplishment around the globe; some countries are more developed than others. This may be a consequence of geography, natural resources, social structures and political systems. Even within countries, organizations operate with differing success, perhaps due to their products, management strategies and marketing policies. These varying reasons for success, depending on whether one is considering the macro or the micro, are all important factors at their respective levels. However, in this paper, we explore another, quite different model for success, which applies universally, whether considering humans as a race or individual enterprises. But there are those who question whether man has been, or continues to be, successful. It has been said that if we measure our progress in terms of our happiness or evaluation of our own well-being, we have not advanced for half a century, and that economic growth and scientific endeavour have been losing their way for some decades. We must try to define what we mean by success. In essence, success can be defined as achieving desired aims or goals. By definition, therefore, it needs to be possible to measure achievement, and there must be a defined objective. Without objectivity, one can only draw subjective conclusions of the type that one feels better or that the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. However, goals are ultimately subjective, because one individual or group might be seeking objectives that differ massively from another. For example, there have been awesome advances in weaponry and military

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technology, with the ability to deliver increasing amounts of energy with increasing accuracy. This is objective and measurable and stands true universally, but the consequences, while meeting the goals of some groups, may be contrary to those of others. Now we have a paradox when trying to develop a universal model. You cannot have subjective issues which apply universally. For this reason, we must focus on measurable criteria only, which are universal. Delivering increasing amounts of energy with increasing accuracy is objective and measurable so fits within our criteria. The consequences of this military technology in human terms are manifestly subjective and cannot be applied universally. In using the term 'economic growth' we refer to universally objective and measurable achievements. We look at the circumstances in which economic growth may occur and consider the behavioural patterns that encourage creative and innovative minds to flourish and draw attention to the many and sometimes obscure reasons that may inhibit or even discourage the process of innovation. We endeavour to make the link between knowledge, and by this we mean scientific knowledge, and the innovation that can be developed from it. To clarify what we mean by economic growth, we have chosen an improbable story, an Archaeological Fantasy to illustrate it. This is used as a metaphor to show how one might define growth by developing an example to which anybody can readily subscribe. We would like to look in particular at the background and history of the extraordinary burst of creative activity that took place in Western Europe over the last 400 years. ARCHAEOLOGICAL FANTASY Imagine that there was a global museum where all the archaeologists of the past have collected all their finds over the centuries and placed them in one central place for study, just as many archaeologists do today. They lay the artefacts out on long rows of wooden tables so that all the objects from any one site are laid out in a row, but in strict chronological order. Imagine that we spend a few days walking up and down the tables, trying to understand what we see. We put marks on the tables at 1,000-year intervals and then we look at the changes in the artefacts between the beginning and the end of these 1,000-year periods. Ten thousand years BC, it would be very difficult to see any difference at all between artefacts 1,000-years apart, although we would start to see faint evidence of the change from hunter-gatherer to farmer. Once clusters of farming communities had become established the pace of change accelerated. By the first century BC we would see a large range of artefacts in use and mastery of a wide range of materials. Copper and bronze (alloy of copper and tin), gold, silver and iron, glass and resins and a variety of natural fibres and of ceramics. Ploughs, and boats that could sail far from land, wheels for carriages and pipes for water. We would see quite

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clearly that some sites had a wide range of artefacts in use and a rapid rate of innovation of artefacts, while other sites - the majority - had hardly any innovation. In the 1,000-year period before AD 1200, other important changes would become apparent. China would show itself to be the most advanced civilization, with extensive manufacture of high-quality products, efficient agriculture founded on large-scale hydraulic engineering, effective and reliable sea travel. The Arab civilization would be at its peak, with mastery of agriculture, many fine buildings, great control over the supply of water, precision working of metals and of glass, and above all a reverence for knowledge - knowledge systematically brought in from the Greeks, from Byzantium and from the East, as far away as India and China. By AD 1200, another important aspect of change would be clear from the archaeological record - that stasis, by which we mean a static level without change, or even decline, was just as much part of human experience as was 'progress'. A few centuries of development, represented on the wooden tables by rapid change in functional artefacts, is always followed by either a dropping back to some simpler state with the loss of many skills, or by a plateau in which most of the old skills were preserved, but with the rate of innovation falling to a very low level. There would be no exceptions to this. By AD 1500, China and the Middle East had substantially stopped innovating; the Roman, Hellenic, Egyptian and Mesopotamian innovative periods had left a great legacy to be picked up and built upon in future clusters of innovation, but none of our archaeological sites would show continuous innovation. All would show, ultimately, decline or at best a high equilibrium - and this means that these sites would quite soon become left behind, when compared with innovating parts of the world. The sites from Europe would show an interesting departure. Around AD 1000, Europe would be seen as a backward, peripheral area of the world. Chinese and Islamic technology and civilization were far ahead. By AD 1900, the situation had changed completely. A very substantial range of quite new artefacts had come into existence, showing a rate of innovation on many European sites far exceeding that seen before on any of the nonEuropean sites. Yet it seems that the innovations in any one part of Europe drifted quite rapidly around Europe as a whole, until they were taken up wherever the local cultural and economic climate was congenial. In this movement of the centres of innovation we see the old phenomenon of rise and decline, but we see it in an interesting setting, in which the rise in one area, as a consequence of innovation, spills over into another area and is continued and taken forward so that when the first area declines, as it always does, it has a neighbour who is moving ahead in innovation and whose products spill out, not merely into the declining region, but becoming available to all the regions around. This is a very important aspect of this study. The cross-fertilization of artefacts from one area to another is vital for the wider

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Making Things from New Ideas

spread of knowledge and the movement of ideas that are necessary to encourage innovation. So there seem to be two principles we should note. First, that innovation appears to show up in small geographic clusters. But it also seems necessary that knowledge and innovation from one area can leak out into surrounding regions. We need a cluster that is bounded but is also leaky, so that ideas can be picked up elsewhere. Indeed, as we walk up and down our wooden tables, we soon observe another interesting phenomenon - that the lines of artefacts from Europe are starting to incorporate new knowledge, knowledge that has simply not been available in previous periods. Nowadays we call this experimental or scientific knowledge, but these can be rather misleading terms and it is more helpful to call this 'reliable knowledge', that is knowledge that has been tested, usually by experiment, in a variety of circumstances and shown to have high reliability and universal applicability, so that the knowledge will be reliable and testable anywhere in the world. Knowledge is of limited use to humanity until it is embodied in some way in an artefact or product; then it can have an enormous impact on the community. Some reliable knowledge has in fact been around for millennia - for instance, the drug discovered many centuries ago by South American Indians, which we now call quinine - is still the ultimate drug of choice against malaria. We tend not to call this science, but it is clearly reliable knowledge. It was in Europe that this process of generation of new reliable knowledge first became established on a steadily growing basis. There had been plenty of instances of new reliable knowledge before, sometimes of a remarkably sophisticated nature, as in China. But these clusters of intellectual activity were sporadic and the innovation process eventually died away, even though the intellectual and material processes they gave rise to may have continued for a very long period. This analysis of the archaeological record gives us a view of Europe's development over the last 1,000 years. Of course, a large though diminishing measure of wealth was acquired by invasion and colonization by some powerful states around the world. However, this acquisition is in the nature of zero-sum activity: one nation's gain was another nation's loss. It is clear though that new knowledge and the new functional products that resulted were responsible for massive economic growth in Europe, and it is this process of the generation of new reliable knowledge and its embodiment in new functional artefacts which represents, after the huntergatherer/farmer transition, the second great advance in human development. ECONOMIC GROWTH We now have an objective and measurable record from the objects in the archaeological information. We can use this and place it in context to examine how some of the ideas and artefacts interrelate.

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We believe that the massive economic growth in Europe, referred to in the Archaeological Fantasy, can be evidenced and clarified by the two pictorial graphs which follow. These show different functions against time, covering the last 400 years. The exponential nature of these functions clearly demonstrates that there have been some dramatic developments within each of these activities and it is this that we have defined as 'Economic Growth'. So what are we looking at? By examining the artefacts laid out on the wooden tables of our Archaeological Fantasy, our archaeologists can see the dramatic changes that have taken place. The process through which innovation leads us always involves change. Most essentially it involves change resulting from increase in knowledge, and nearly always changes in materials. Let us look at two examples: the increase in speed of travel and the resolution of the microscope since 1600. Speed of Travel If we consider man's ability to move about quickly, a graph of the increase in the speed of travel is dramatic indeed, rising from travel on horseback at a maximum of some 15 miles per hour to many thousands of miles per hour in a space rocket. But this is not a smooth development from the horse to the rocket. At each stage the earlier method of transport has been superseded by the next. Trains and cars take over from horses, and aeroplanes supersede ships and so on. The previous mode of transport is made increasingly obsolete by the innovation and is substituted because the market thinks that the new way does the job better. It is important to note that rise in speed reflected major advances in knowledge and technology. Before there was any possibility of developing even Newcomen's Atmospheric engine in 1710, the new knowledge of the gas laws, defining the relationship between the pressure and temperature of a given volume of gas, discovered in the 1660s by Robert Boyle, was essential. From Watt's design to Trevithick's high-pressure engine, it was necessary to understand that the power of Watt's low-pressure engine would simply not be capable of driving an engine that was light enough to be moved on rails. Resolution of the Microscope Consider the resolution of the microscope. Man's unaided eye has serious limitations when trying to look at the very small. Below about 0.1 mm we can see and understand very little, but a huge new world opens up when we are assisted by the microscope. From its invention in the early seventeenth century as a simple instrument of two lenses, there was little improvement until Leeuenhoek produced tiny glass spheres which gave good-quality images and quite high magnification, but they were very difficult to use, as the focal length was so short. By the end of the century good compound instruments were in wide use, but while there were improvements to the focusing and mounting of the instruments, the resolution did not exceed about 0.015 mm.

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Q

^ y

Robert Boyle's Gas laws c.1665

Newcomen Atmospheric engine c. 172S

Watt Low pressure * ci770

£nain

§

Water Airpump Manometer c.1660

1 :•>'

10

Trevithick High pressure Engine 1804

s%

1400

1500

Figure 1 Speed of travel in mph.

1600

1700

1800

Achromatic objective James Smith Microscope No. 31 c. 1840

Resolution of Microscope Log Scale —i

Q ^ •s ^

van Leeuwenhoek simple microscope

Marshall Compound] microscope c. 1690

The Flea f Micrograp

1mm (maximum unaided eye resolution)

1400

1500

1600

Figure 2 Resolution of the microscope.

1700

1800

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Making Things from Mew Ideas

The situation remained unchanged until the discovery by J J . Lister and others of the achromatic objective in the late 1830s, which increased the resolution to 0.009 mm. It was now possible to see living bacteria, and the whole opportunity for the observation and control of disease became a reality. Further development and changes to the objective gradually improved the microscope until by 1890 a resolution of 0.002 mm was achieved, where the wavelength of light was now the limiting factor. J J . Thomson, in the early twentieth century, revealed new knowledge and understanding of the electron. The Transmitting Electron Microscope could be developed, which improved resolution down to 0.0001 by 1938 and 0.00001 mm by 1945. As we saw in the graph of the speed of travel, and again now with the increase in the resolution of the microscope, the picture that is emerging is thought-provoking. Without clear glass we can have no gas laws, no steam engine, no internal combustion engine. We can have no recognition of nitrogen and so no artificial nitrogenous fertilizers. Similarly, without clear glass we can have no lenses and therefore no visualization of bacteria and no understanding of infectious disease. We would have no understanding of cell division (or of cells) and thus no microbiology and no detailed understanding of genetics. Also of course without spectacles, a majority of the population would experience difficulty reading past the age of around 55 (see The Glass Bathyscaphe by Alan Macfarlane and Gerry Martin, 2002). Thus it can be seen that the use of glass, a comparatively small innovation initially, enabled the discovery of new knowledge and the innovation of artefacts. It allowed a change of perception with far-reaching and dramatic effect. CLUSTERS AROUND A NEW MATERIAL: SHIFTING OF ATOMS In a similar way to the use of glass, man has taken many other forms of matter - atoms - or frequently complex patterns of atoms that have already been brought together through natural non-human processes such as stone, wood fibres and clay - and reformed them into patterns which are more useful resources such as houses. Increasingly, over the centuries it has proved to be beneficial to sort, concentrate and recombine atoms for use in new artefacts. We can regard manufacture as the repositioning of materials and the manipulation of atoms, to create useful functional resources and artefacts. Having sorted the raw materials, atoms or assemblies of atoms to an appropriate state, it is part of the task of the innovator to place them in proximity to each other appropriate to the artefact to be made, be it beer, margarine or butter, electricity-generating turbines or spectacle lenses. A huge variety of atom-shifting processes have been developed over the centuries to this end. Casting, cutting, spinning and weaving, fermentation and distillation, electroplating and polishing, chemical reaction, vapour deposition, brick firing and glass melting, heat-treating, the list is endless.

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Time

>

Figure 3 Typical growth curves. Where does it all end as these graphs go on rising dramatically at this exponential rate? It is important to understand that all these growth curves are in fact made up of a number of smaller curves that have tailed off only to be supplanted or replaced by something that kept the growth going. Each part follows a graph something like Figure 3 and usually has three distinct phases. The first is the slow rise as the acceptance of a new innovation pushes up the function curve, then the steep growth followed by a flattening off, as the old innovation is replaced by a new one. The two curves of exponential growth showing the speed of travel on horseback from a few miles per hour to the modern space rocket at speeds of thousands of miles per hour, and the increases in the resolution of the microscope, are demonstrating dynamic economic growth. Something extraordinary was going on, and if we superimpose these two graphs on one time scale, along with others such as wheat yields and the speed of weaving, it reveals that they were all experiencing their exponential character at very much the same time (see Figure 4). We believe this growth was clearly the result of the scientific enlightenment that was taking place particularly in England from the 1650s. New knowledge was having a dramatic effect. As new reliable knowledge became available, the innovators were picking it up and interpreting it in the innovation and manufacture of new artefacts. History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

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1400

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(700

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Figure 4 Exponential economic growth curves. MECHANISM OF INNOVATION As has just been illustrated, economic growth requires innovation. The process of innovation seems to need to be a threefold activity if it is to be successful. First, it requires knowledge, and sometimes new knowledge has to be created. Second, knowledge is barren unless it is used and embodied in a prototype to create an artefact or resource. Third and most importantly, the artefact must be tested in a marketplace. In the longer run only the public can decide on the future success or failure of an artefact. There is, in fact, a fourth aspect to the process of innovation, and that is the releasing of new knowledge that is created within the artefact. This can then be used for the further development or creation of new knowledge or artefacts, and thus the cycle, here referred to as the triangle (or loop), is completed and the whole process may start again. It is a main tenet of this work that for successful economic development to occur, the cyclical process just referred to should take place at an increasing rate, or more precisely, there should be many triangles being created, each providing growth through new knowledge, innovation and the quantity production of artefacts and which may have spin-offs for the further development of another cycle. These cycles are essential for economic progress and the more widespread these cycles that are created, the more certain the overall economic benefit.

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However, there are many pitfalls. Human nature is adept at devising processes that slow down or even prevent the economic development of these triangles. Political, social, moral and religious traps or constraints abound, and these will be examined more fully later. If the constraints to innovation are successful, the creation of cycles will slow down or even stop, with dire consequences for the economic health of the area and probably the innovators will move away to healthier pastures where their ideas and aspirations are easier to fulfil. The risk of technical migration is an ever-present threat to innovation. It is important to remember that the circumstances for innovation represent a very delicate balance between those involved, and chance, or serendipity, will play its part. It may be likened to the wind blowing the leaves about in autumn. They swirl around at random, but occasionally some will gather in some corner and build up into a pile. This represents the clustering of knowledge and artefact-generation, which happens from time to time and occurred in England in the seventeenth century and led to the industrial revolution. Nearer our own time, Alexander Fleming, watching bacteria cultures growing in Petri dishes, led by chance to the discovery of penicillin, and the first pill of this antibiotic was innovated. However, one pill can have little effect on the health of the individual or the community. It is only the quantity production of the artefact that could lead to growth and the huge benefits that followed the availability of antibiotics. All this may seem like little more than common sense, but our history is littered with examples of laws and attitudes devised to slow down the process of innovation. So how do we encourage it and avoid the traps? To do this we must first learn what is going on. We must increase our understanding of the basis of this economic growth. THE MODEL Our analysis reveals the three-part nature of economic growth, and the next section shows the build-up of a triangle starting with a Knowledge corner, followed in turn by Innovation and then the Artefact-production and marketing. An example will show that activity mainly proceeds in a clockwise direction around the triangle and that the type of innovation represented by the superimposed cluster of curves is far from being merely a response to market forces. The study of the growth in crop yields demonstrates the highly selective nature of innovation. It shows that knowledge fortuitously or randomly available to the innovator is being specifically selected during the process of innovation and that without it, the innovation could not take place. Economic growth occurs when the triangle is traversed in the clockwise direction. However, the process (items, ideas and money) can also have an anticlockwise rotation. For example, experimental equipment, such as scientific instruments, consists of artefacts, and substantial generation of new knowledge can arise from the use of very small numbers of such

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KNOWLEDGE

A Commercial and technical knowledge used in the production of artefacts,

K

Artefacts (instruments & prototypes) innovated to perform experiments to generate new knowledge

T

INNOVATION

ARTFFACTS Commercially produced artefacts used in the Innovation process

Figure 5

The structure of economic growth.

artefacts; not many barometers or air pumps are required to tease out the existence of a vacuum or the gas laws. Commercially produced artefacts are often used in the innovation process. Commercial and technical knowledge is used in the production of artefacts. These are shown in the important reverse local loops. Having defined the basic model in its dynamic terms, it is very clear that the model would not rotate unless there was human motivation to cause things to happen. In the triangle, we have restricted the knowledge corner to reliable knowledge, capable of withstanding scientific testing. This is important as any innovation based on unreliable concepts will ultimately fail. However, reliable knowledge alone will not suffice and cause the triangle to rotate. It needs an extra dimension to include motivation, economics and a whole range of other social factors. Social Structure Fundamental to motivation is ownership. As nomadic, hunter-gatherer tribes, there was minimal concept of personal ownership. A great advance in human development came when someone put stakes in the ground and marked out his own territory. There would be little motivation to produce things if no personal benefit could be had from them. Innovation is a process which enables people to claim ownership of knowledge when that knowledge is embodied in artefacts. It is the desire for ownership of these artefacts which completes the triangle and enables its rotation.

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Various essential constructs are necessary for ownership to occur within a society. For example, there must be laws to enable and regulate mechanisms of exchange including money. There must be binding contracts and systems to protect tangible and intellectual property. The triangle will only rotate within an appropriately functioning social structure. A conducive culture requires a reliable system for the movement of goods and services, including communication mechanisms, transportation, information-recording and accounting. This triangle is essentially scientifically based. By this, we mean that existing knowledge and the new knowledge created in the top corner are derived from scientific principles. Only from this basis can the innovator know he is on firm ground and that his innovation and the artefacts that result will be reliable. Of course business studies and economics are not always testable or scientific. They involve social, economic and motivational issues. Ideally, we prefer to keep the base triangle strictly scientific, but as we cannot ignore the other influences, we have illustrated these aspects in the model by using the triangle with a pyramid superimposed on top. This shows the social, economic and motivational aspects of the model, which influence the triangle but do not alter the basic concept. We believe that the base triangle is of the nature of a fundamental law and that the superimposed pyramid represents human influences that create motivation, economic considerations, or indeed may create traps that interfere with the natural rotation of the triangle.

ARTEFACTS KNOWLEDGE

INNOVATION Figure 6

The effect of social factors (pyramid). History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

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Making Things from New Ideas

TRAPS Innovation is a very delicate process and will be limited in communities, or under regimes, which impose constraint traps by laws or directives, which restrict freedom to explore new reliable knowledge, to innovate or to produce artefacts. Restriction may be in the form of religious, political or ethical considerations which, however socially desirable, are nonetheless constraints on the innovation process. An important consequence of the imposition of constraint traps is that imaginative and motivated people will tend to move away from areas where they are constrained from using their knowledge or creative abilities. This frequently occurs with innovation, where a bright idea fails to find backing or support in its native surroundings, only to be driven away to a more receptive environment. This technical migration can result in serious economic loss for the native community. It has been observed that the trap of affluence can lead to people leaving manufacturing for the socially more acceptable professions. For the triangle to rotate successfully, a stable legal system is necessary, where the ownership of goods is respected and where there are established and enforceable legal structures for the buying and selling of goods. Thus lawyers, accountants and other professionals are vitally necessary if the innovator is going to have his goods traded successfully in the marketplace. But this requires an extremely delicate balance. Too many bright people becoming lawyers and the manufacturing process suffers. Not enough law enforcement and the manufacturers cannot trade in safety. Indeed, strategic balance is a key condition: the optimum mix of skilled people at each of the corners of the triangle and in the pyramid is fundamental to the rate of economic growth. Politicians and economists may regard this balance, or imbalance, as a measure of the stage in the business cycle. We believe that economic growth comes directly from the rotation of the triangle, which is itself determined by the activities and influences of the pyramid. However, the activities of the pyramid do not in themselves create growth, they are services of a zero-sum nature allowing the triangle to rotate, which through the generation of new knowledge incorporated in new artefacts leads to growth. KNOWLEDGE Knowledge may be defined as 'the facts, skills and understanding that you have gained through learning or experience' [Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, 2001). In addition to learning and experience, our model includes knowledge gained from reasoning; the process of thinking logically to deduce new understandings. Learning comes from others' knowledge, as at school, where we are taught, read and study. Experience comes from observation, watching to see what happens. Knowledge generated from observation tends to come from one of two main sources. Long before humankind emerged, living species had been History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

Howard Dawes, Christopher Dawes, Gerry Martin, Alan Macfarlane

gaining knowledge of the world and of how to manipulate nature to their benefit. The greatest part of this growing knowledge base has been by direct interaction and observation of life events as we try to manipulate the world with farming, and making tools, machines, buildings, clothing, etc. This type of knowledge, while of crucial importance in the fight for survival, tends to be knowledge of particular materials used in particular circumstances. It is 'craft' or 'tacit' knowledge, essential to improving the tasks of ordinary living. The second and more recent source is the scientific method. During the last few hundred years, methods of generating more universal and reliable knowledge have been developed. Experimental methods using accurate measurement and scientific instruments have been devised to test relationships of matter and energy, and mathematical tools devised to define these relationships in more precise and reliable ways. It is this institutionalization of the production of increasingly reliable knowledge which is at the root of the changes we have shown in the exponential growth curves. The increased reliability of the knowledge generated through experiment is a consequence of increased accuracy of observation, both in terms of the clarity of seeing what we are looking at, and in understanding what we think we are looking at. Early observations and understandings of the movements of stars depended both on the observation methods, clarity of vision, and on the assumptions being made; early astronomers thought they were looking at the movement of stars around the earth which they believed sat at the centre of the universe! Scientific instruments and other artefacts have assisted massively in the accuracy of observation, and the scientific method has helped to replace inaccurate assumptions. Whether considering tacit knowledge or scientific knowledge, the use of artefacts is of fundamental importance in both. Scientific instruments in particular play an important role in 'the torture of nature' as the seventeenth-century scientist Robert Hooke put it, to reveal new and increasingly reliable knowledge. THE INNOVATION PROCESS Innovators apply knowledge by making things from new ideas. Making new products or prototypes is essentially a knowledge-based activity, and without new ideas or knowledge being introduced the process inevitably tends to stagnate. Innovation is about choices, making the best selection from an array of available knowledge, even when that knowledge may be embodied in a technique or component, a new material, or in other prototypes or artefacts. Until the knowledge source is available and selected, no artefact which needs to incorporate it is possible. The process of innovation involves making choices. It always does involve making a selection from a wide range of options. These choices are not usually random, but are intentional to achieve an objective. It may

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Making Things from New Ideas

often be necessary to broaden the options for choice by looking in areas not obviously connected with the objective. Sometimes opportunities do occur by chance, or a random opportunity may present itself. Such situations may be called luck or serendipity. However, it should always be remembered that serendipity favours the prepared mind, and thus it is those who are looking carefully and with concentration on the objective that serendipity will usually benefit. Alexander Fleming (1881-1955) was studying the growth of bacteria when he observed areas of the Petri dish where no bacteria were growing: a chance observation which he chose to investigate ultimately led to the discovery and use of penicillin as an antibiotic. We move on and our innovator has produced his working prototype. The result of the innovation process must be a prototype or trial which has to function within the innovatory expectations. If it doesn't work, then it is back to the drawing board. Once produced, the working prototype must be tested in the marketplace. If feedback from market research is negative, the reasons are analysed and corrective actions or adustments made to improve the product. This process continues until favourable feedback is received from the market. At this point the new product can be commercially exploited for profit. Many innovations fail simply because this rigorous and necessary routine is not followed with efficient discipline. When it works, however, the results can be spectacular. MECHANISM OF INNOVATION Innovation is thought sometimes to be purely a response to a market need, but this can hardly be so, because it relies on selective mechanisms which occur long before the prototype reaches the market, and it is only at this stage that the market can accept or reject the new product. However, the market does act as an attractor or stimulation, and innovators tend to focus their activities in areas where an improvement to existing resources can be anticipated to succeed in the market. Innovation processes are ruthless in that there is an ongoing endeavour to make the existing product obsolete and extinct, so in comparing the existing with the new, the customer will eventually choose the fittest and most functional. It has been said that innovation comes essentially from three distinct sources: from institutions like universities and government agencies, from firms that undertake research and development, and from the vast body of individual inventors. As knowledge, until it is applied, has very little use, so prototypes, until they are produced and sold in quantity, often have little or no effect on economic growth. There are exceptions, such as in the innovation of specialized scientific instruments designed for particular purposes. But in the main, it is the quantity production of the new artefacts which can cause changes in standards of living and further economic growth. For example, Fleming's penicillin, mentioned earlier, has little value as a single pill; it will not even help an individual, let alone a

History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

Howard Dawes, Christopher Dawes, Gerry Martin, Alan Macfarlane

Components & Materials

Serendipity

Prototypes

Variations from which selections are made

Design

~k-

Analysis

New prototype

No Functionality - Does it work?

Yes -ve Feedback Market research +ve Feedback

Figure 7 Mechanism of innovation. population. However, the quantity production of pills, enabling patients to take courses of antibiotics, can change the health and well-being of the community. ARTEFACTS By artefacts, we are referring to commercially exploitable innovations, man-made objects designed to perform tasks, such as telescopes, sewing machines, aircraft and antibiotics. For newly innovated artefacts to influence economic growth they normally need to be produced and sold in large quantities. In reality, it is rarely the same people or organizations who innovate new products that successfully manufacture and sell them in quantity for profit. The quantity production and sale of artefacts normally requires different skills and abilities from those required for the innovation of new products. Commercial production and sales require investment in manufacturing facilities and marketing. Products will be sold and some, or all, of the revenue generated from these sales may be reinvested in the business. Surplus revenue is profit, which provides the return on the owners' investments. Most knowledge-generating institutions, such as universities, have been funded from the profits of manufacturing businesses, either directly or indirectly through taxation and wealth redistribution. Furthermore, commercially produced artefacts are used in the production of reliable knowledge, as was shown earlier. So, the quantity production of artefacts has a direct effect on the generation of new reliable knowledge, in terms both of funding it and of providing the tools for its discovery.

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Making Things from New Ideas

TRIANGLE ROTATION The innovation process requires the input of new reliable knowledge in order to produce a prototype. Having received a favourable response from market research, the new artefact can be commercially mass-produced. Profits from sales of these artefacts and the artefacts themselves may be used in the process of generating new reliable knowledge and the cycle, or triangle of knowledge, innovation and artefacts, can rotate. A triangle can be represented on a function curve, for example the speed of travel or the ability to see smaller and smaller. Movement up this function curve is brought about by continual developments in new and different technologies. The faster the triangle rotates, the more new reliable knowledge is generated enabling the innovation and commercial production of more new artefacts; steam engines, motor cars, high-speed electric trains, aeroplanes and space shuttles, for example. One function curve represents many different types of artefacts and technologies used to achieve the same function. TRIANGLE TREES Normally, there will be many triangles rotating, each representing their respective functions. In addition to their speed of rotation, the more triangles there are rotating in a community, the greater the overall economic growth. As new knowledge and new artefacts are produced, there will be spin-offs from one technology to another and from one function to another. Triangles will interact with each other, enabling 'triangle trees', where ideas from one factor contribute to other factors enabling them to grow down different branches. For example, being able to see smaller and smaller is one factor, which led to the control of bacteria, which is another factor, which had major implications on medical science, which is another factor, which has a big effect on health and drug development, other factors. Likewise, the steam engine was not originally invented for travel, but was used to raise water to dry out mine shafts, but the technology spun off into a transportation function. PREDICTIONS This model, like other models, is a description of the process and structure of economic growth. It is not designed to be prescriptive and specify how innovation should be undertaken, nor is it intended to predict how, where and when specific innovations will occur. However, by an understanding of the processes set out in the model and by making assumptions, it is possible to make some general predictions with varying degrees of certainty or reliability. The greatest advances in human development, at least in terms of economic growth, have been made when new reliable knowledge has been embodied in new functional artefacts through the innovation process. We see that it is important that the knowledge must be reliable and so we can History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

Howard Dawes, Christopher Dawes, Gerry Martin, Alan Macfarlane

Figure 8

Triangle tree.

predict with quite high certainty that an innovation based on unreliable knowledge will ultimately fail. Furthermore, as innovations depend on existing and new reliable knowledge, they are likely to stem from areas where new reliable knowledge is being generated. That is not to say that the innovation will necessarily relate directly to that new knowledge, it sometimes takes a very long time, but that ideas and concepts will develop from fields where new knowledge is being discovered. We can also predict environments where innovation is unlikely to occur. Adam Smith identified that, given peace, justice and reasonable taxation, then people will innovate and economies will grow. The converse of this can be seen in many areas of the world where some, or all, of these three ingredients are lacking; development tends to be slow or minimal. A conducive culture is essential for innovation to occur. Innovation will also be constrained in communities which restrict freedom to explore new reliable knowledge or innovate to produce artefacts. Religious, political or ethical constraints, even though deemed socially desirable, are nonetheless constraints on the innovation process. We can predict that innovation is likely to arise from areas where new reliable knowledge is being generated, where there is a conducive culture and freedom from constraint traps, but can we gain insight into when innovation is likely to occur?

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Making Things from New Ideas

Innovation is most likely to happen when there is a need for it, and the converse is also true. History shows that economic success can remove, or lessen, the demand for innovation. After a period of affluence, societies tend to move their focus away from manufacture and the production of artefacts, which tends to carry the stigma of a low-status activity, towards service professions, such as law, accountancy and teaching, or the arts. This trap of affluence inhibits industrial productivity and the consequent generation of new reliable knowledge, so fundamental to the innovation process. We have tried to show that the process of economic growth, such as has been defined here, is the consequence of many triangles rotating and proliferating in a wide range of artefact-production. But one might well ask, Tn what form does this economic growth manifest itself?' Initially, of course, there is nothing tangible in the creation of reliable knowledge or indeed very little in the innovation process. It is only when the prototype is put into commercial production of the artefacts, that we can see and measure in monetary terms what has been achieved. We may call this tangible wealth. WEALTH There is an even more fundamental aspect to economic growth than the generation of new knowledge, innovation and the production of artefacts. This idea seems to indicate that the other necessary processes of marketing and distribution are of the nature of a zero-sum activity. By this we mean that there is no new growth created by marketing and distribution, merely the transfer from one party to another of the value or tangible wealth, bound up in the artefact. Of course, without marketing and distribution the manufacturer would not be able to sell his products in the quantity or at the price that he would wish, but this is a matter of price or cost between the parties, a subjective issue, not a function of the creation of growth. It is quite astonishing how much tangible wealth can be bound up in a successful artefact: allowing for substantial mark-up on the cost of the product, the selling processes, financial and legal costs and taxation, there is still a margin left over for profit. From the conclusion of the last paragraph, it is the making of things that creates the tangible wealth. If this is true, as we believe it is, we would suggest that the converse may also be true, such that if any of the corners are not included or are left out of the process, then increasing economic growth will not be created and there will be no increase in tangible wealth. One can think of many societies that have developed sophisticated marketing, transport and extensive trading and commercial practices, but have not made things incorporating new ideas. The result is that they stagnate and remain without economic growth but can exist in quite a high level of stasis for many hundreds of years.

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CONCLUSIONS The tripartite nature of the links between knowledge, innovation and artefacts is at the root of economic growth. This process is an extremely powerful positive feedback mechanism. The faster the triangle rotates, the stronger the economic growth that will result. But the rate at which the triangular loops are repeatedly traversed is strongly influenced by the existence or otherwise of traps. Traps inhibit, or in extreme cases can stop, the action at one or more of the corners. History shows that the largest group of traps is that imposed by conscious human agency. Constraints imposed on the generation of knowledge, on the diffusion of knowledge, or when innovation is perceived to be disruptive to the existing social order. Examples abound from the religious persecution of Galileo, the index of prohibited books, the banning of the earliest power looms in Danzig, Frankfurt and Leyden, to the banning of copying machines in communist Russia. Remarkably, the location of the industrial revolution in England can be ascribed to the country's relative ineptitude in producing traps, compared with continental countries. Numerous authors have noted that over the last couple of centuries there has been a shift in organizational behaviour towards the merit of cultural conditions we call Liberty, Equality, Democracy and Freedom. The words are of course themselves social constructions - freedom for some can only exist by restricting the freedom of others. But the most general and serious trap must be the lack of freedom to perform actions required to traverse the loop. The opposite is freedom that allows such actions, and a case can be made that 'freedom to perform such actions' will tend to be self-fulfilling. If such a conclusion is valid then it follows that Democracy, Liberty and Freedom are the outcome of their ability to foster material success, though not because of any sociological or idealistic values that may be ascribed to them, but because they deliver the goods. The years to come will reveal new and undreamed-of innovation based on new reliable knowledge, but it will be for society to decide which directions will be acceptable and which should be rejected. References Robert Boyle, New Experiments Physico-mechanical, touching the Spring of the Air, and its 2nd edn, 1662. Brian Bracegirdle, 'Seventeenth Century Microscopy', Quekett Journal of Microscopy 39 (2002): 332-46. Richard L. Hills, Power from Steam, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. A. Macfarlane and G. Martin, The Glass Bathyscaphe, London: Profile Books, 2002. Eric Robinson and A.E. Musson, James Watt and the Steam revolution, London: Adams & Dart, 1969.

History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

T h e

T w e n t y - O n e

E n g i n e s

a n d

A t t r i b u t e d d e

t o

B o o k s

o f

M a c h i n e s P e d r o

J u a n

L a s t a n o s a

NICOLAS GARCIA

TAPIA

INTRODUCTION This article is a resume of the book of the same title written in Spanish by the author and published by the Regional Government of Aragon in 1997.1 I should thank professors Graham Hollister-Short and Alex Keller for their suggestions. In addition the latter has kindly taken on the task of translation. The manuscript known as 'Los veintiun libros de los ingenios y de las maquinas de Juanelo', which is in the Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid, has excited numerous investigations and some discussion by various scholars.2 The passage of years has allowed us to complete a deeper and clearer study, correcting the mistakes which hasty discussion often brings in its train. Our intention is to make known the result of our latest research on the manuscript, both in what relates to the content of the same and to the transformation and vicissitudes which it has undergone, and to explain the reasons and documentary proofs which permit us to continue maintaining, with the greatest possible certainty, the attribution to the Aragonese Pedro Juan de Lastanosa. A Puzzling Manuscript The manuscript known by the title 'Los veintiun libros de los ingenios y de las maquinas de Juanelo' presents a series of puzzles which have justified the interest shown by all those to whose attention it has been brought. In the first place we are dealing with a huge sixteenth-century treatise on machines and engineering construction, generally related to water, of great importance to the history of technology. The title by which it is known bears the name of 'Juanelo', by which Gianello Turriano was commonly called in Spain. He was one of the most famous of the clockmakers and engineers of Charles V and Philip II, the two great monarchs of sixteenth-century Spain. Turriano was the creator History of Technology, Volume Twenty-six, 2005

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The Twenty-One Books of Pedro Juan de Lastanosa

of among other things, a machine to raise water from the river Tagus up to the royal palace, the Alcazar Real, of Toledo, one of the most wonderful 'engines' of its time, known as Juanelo's device'. The manuscript in the Biblioteca Nacional was considered until recently the work of Juanelo Turriano, on account of the attribution which appears on the first title page of the manuscript. However, the studies of Reti and Garcia-Diego have demonstrated definitively that the work cannot be by Juanelo, on account of its content, which does not match well with the work of the clockmaker, and also on account of the language which better suits a man born in Aragon, than Italy.3 GarciaDiego wisely ascribed the authorship to some 'pseudo-Turriano'; but the problem remained, of discovering who the true author was. To that task we have dedicated a great effort, which for our part led us onto the track of an Aragonese, an engineer of King Philip II, named Pedro Juan de Lastanosa. Jose-Antonio Garcia-Diego did not think that the author could be Lastanosa, who was, in his opinion, too well educated to busy himself with machines, and who died in 1576, at a time when, according to GarciaDiego's dating, the book in question had not even been written. However, linguistic study of the text by Frago, an outstanding Aragonese scholar, finally demonstrated that the author very probably hailed from a region located in northern Aragon, in the valley of the river Cinca, which happens to be the area where Pedro Juan de Lastanosa originated.4 The second puzzle of the manuscript's title is the number of 'libros' books or chapters - into which it is divided. While the title page states that there are 21, there are actually more that are not numbered and besides, it is clear to see that the numbering has been corrected in some later revision. Consequently, 'the twenty-one books of engines and machines of Juanelo' are not 21, nor by Juanelo - which adds even more confusion to any study of them. The third puzzle is that the manuscript breaks off so abruptly, without explaining some of the themes which had previously been announced. It seems that the author did not have time to finish it, leaving it unsigned. Nor do we know what happened to the manuscript, who handled it, and how it reached the Biblioteca Nacional, where it is currently preserved. So it is no cause for surprise that the study of the work has been, in these circumstances, the object of considerable debate.5 We now propose to deal with these issues, providing answers to the puzzles which the manuscript raises. THE TITLE PAGES ADDED IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY One of the things which will be noticed first, when studying the manuscript, is that the title pages of each volume were added in the seventeenth century. However, not everything indicated by the new title added to the sixteenth-century text is false. In the first place, the 'twentyone books' derive from a reorganization of the chapters, corresponding to the new technical ideas of the seventeenth century. In the second place, the

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Nicolas Garcia Tapia

25

additional 'and machines of Juanelo' does not necessarily mean that Juanelo Turriano has written it, but that the machines described in the text are so ingenious that they would have been worthy of the fabled clockmaker of the sixteenth century, who had already been transformed into a legend in the following century. The reorganization of the text and redaction of the new title was carried out by Juan Gomez de Mora, then architect to the Spanish king Philip IV and admirer of the latter's illegitimate brother, Juan Jose de Austria, to whom the new, reorganized and beautiful manuscript is dedicated. There is another point indicated on the new title pages which does correspond to reality; the manuscript was 'ordered to be made and illustrated by the Catholic King Philip II, King of the two Spains and of the New World'. In effect, in the epoch of Philip II (1527-98), the Spanish sovereign commanded his scientists and engineers to write at least one book on their specialism, with the aim that their knowledge should not be lost, and could thus be transmitted to the next possessor of the post. In the text, references are made to King Philip II, written in a tone which indicates that the author was indeed in the royal service as an engineer, and wrote at his behest. From the events mentioned there, from the date of publication of the last book cited (1564), and because mention is made of a personage, the Archbishop Don Hernando de Aragon who lived until 1575, we know the period in which the book was written must lie between 1564 and 1575, which was precisely the period when Spanish technology was at its most vigorous. As this is the subject with which the manuscript deals, it is indispensable to establish first some clear explanation. AN OVERVIEW OF TECHNOLOGY IN SPAIN IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY During the period in which the original of the 'Twenty-One Books' was written, numerous public works were being constructed, many among them related to the material of the manuscript: architectural fountains like that of Ocana (Madrid), dams like that of Ontigola at Aranjuez, which possessed an extensive network of channels for watering gardens and supplying fountains. Navigable canals, harbours, bridges, aqueducts and so on were then constructed. All the Spanish territories, including those of America, participated in this expansion of engineering.6 This effort of Philip II to endow his vast empire with an infrastructure appropriate to its great extent coincided with the Spanish monarch's interest in all the subjects which at that time corresponded to the knowledge of a Renaissance prince, in accordance with the Italian model, and far from the image of'the dark and cruel king' by which he has been portrayed. Philip II's interest in all aspects of culture and art has already been demonstrated.7 However, it is less well known that the Spanish monarch was a lover of the sciences and technology.8 Philip knew how to surround himself, not only with artists, but with men of science hailing from all over the world, so creating a Court in which the study of mathematics and science applied to technology was a priority.

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The Twenty-One Books of Pedro Juan de Lastanosa

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