Is the Minoan Disc Discovered at Paleokastro in 1898 the World’s First Analog Computer?

 
Is the Minoan Disc Discovered  at Paleokastro in 1898 the World's First Analog Computer?

Researcher and university professor, Minas Tsikritsis from Crete, where Minoan civilization flourished from approximately 2700 BC to 1450 century BC, claims that a Minoan disc  discovered at Paleokastro, Western Crete, in 1898, is the world's earliest analog computer, predating the amazingly intricate “Antikythera Mechanism” by some 1,400 years. Analysis of a relief image on the right side of the matrix of the 25 gear spoked disc reveals that it served as a cast to build a mechanism serving as an analog computer used as a sundial and also to calculate solar and lunar eclipses.  This is what the 25 gear mechanism looks like (CLICK to ENLARGE):



I myself immediately noticed that it also bears a striking resemblance to the astrolabe, and appears to have been used to calculate geographical latitude.  If so, and if it served all of these functions, it was indeed an extremely complex mechanism and precise measuring apparatus, not to be rivalled until the discovery of the even more “Antikythera Mechanism” of the Hellenic Era (ca. 400-300 BCE). 
To the right of the Minoan Disc discovered in 1898, we see an analytical geometric diagram of the Labrys, one of the hallmark concrete symbols of both the Minoan & Mycenaean Civilizations.  Here again, we can clearly see that the Minoans & Mycenaeans had encoded into the Labrys precise calculations of not only the lunar year (13 cycles) but of the solar year as well... an atypical and astonishing achievement for any ancient civilization.  There appears to be a remarkable correlation of the functions of these two Minoan/Mycenaean instruments of calculation and measurement.   

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However, a word of warning about the so-called Minoan computer!

In rogueclassicism – quidquid bene dictum est ab ullo, meum est.  “Whatever anyone else has said well, I also have put into words.” (Translation mine)  

Minoan Antikythera Mechanism?

we find the following observation, “... Tsikritsis ... passim ... sees this — apparently — as a 25 tooth gear of some sort. One of the gears in the Antikythera Mechanism’s ‘sun-moon assembly’ has 24 teeth, so potentially this is a somewhat less ‘sophisticated’ ... method of calculation ...  it would be interesting to know the diameter of this ‘gear’ ... in order to try and figure out how large the ‘minoan mechanism’ [is] ... perhaps we should suspicious because Tsikritsis apparently also claims to have translated/decoded Linear A ... I think we’ll defer judgement on this one … 

Perhaps we should.   This still leaves us with the question, What is “Antikythera Mechanism”?  For without knowing that, it is well-nigh impossible to conjure any meaningful conception of this enigmatic Minoan Disc. We will discuss the  Antikythera Mechanism in the next post, which you will be reading first at any rate.

Richard

 

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