![Le diverse et artificiose machine del Capitano Agostino Ramelli Figure CLXXXVIII](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/06/Le_diverse_et_artificiose_machine_del_Capitano_Agostino_Ramelli_Figure_CLXXXVIII.jpg)
The bookwheel (also written book wheel and sometimes called a reading wheel) is a type of rotating
bookcase
A bookcase, or bookshelf, is a piece of furniture with horizontal shelves, often in a cabinet, used to store books or other printed materials. Bookcases are used in private homes, public and university libraries, offices, schools, and bookst ...
that allows one person to read multiple books in one location with ease. The books are rotated vertically similar to the motion of a
water wheel
A water wheel is a machine for converting the energy of flowing or falling water into useful forms of power, often in a watermill. A water wheel consists of a wheel (usually constructed from wood or metal), with a number of blades or buckets ...
, as opposed to rotating on a flat table surface. The design for the bookwheel originally appeared in a 16th-century illustration by
Agostino Ramelli
Agostino Ramelli (1531–ca. 1610) was an Italian engineer best known for writing and illustrating the book of engineering designs ''Le diverse et artificiose machine del Capitano Agostino Ramelli'', which contains, among others, his desig ...
at a time when large books posed practical problems for readers. Ramelli's design influenced other engineers and, though now
obsolete, inspires modern artists and historians.
History and design
![Agostino Ramelli from Diverse et artificiose machine cropped](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2d/Agostino_Ramelli_from_Diverse_et_artificiose_machine_cropped.jpg)
The bookwheel, in its most commonly seen form, was invented in 1588 by
Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Ita ...
military engineer
Military engineering is loosely defined as the art, science, and practice of designing and building military works and maintaining lines of military transport and military communications. Military engineers are also responsible for logistics b ...
Agostino Ramelli
Agostino Ramelli (1531–ca. 1610) was an Italian engineer best known for writing and illustrating the book of engineering designs ''Le diverse et artificiose machine del Capitano Agostino Ramelli'', which contains, among others, his desig ...
, presented as one of the 195 designs in ''Le diverse et artificiose machine del Capitano Agostino Ramelli'' (''The various and ingenious machines of Captain Agostino Ramelli'').
[Brashear, Ronald]
"Ramelli's Machines: Original drawings of the 16th century machines"
Smithsonian Libraries. To ensure the books remained at a consistent angle, Ramelli incorporated an
epicyclic gearing
An epicyclic gear train (also known as a planetary gearset) consists of two gears mounted so that the center of one gear revolves around the center of the other. A carrier connects the centers of the two gears and rotates the planet and sun gea ...
arrangement, a complex device that had only previously been used in
astronomical clock
An astronomical clock, horologium, or orloj is a clock with special mechanisms and dials to display astronomical information, such as the relative positions of the Sun, Moon, zodiacal constellations, and sometimes major planets.
Definition
...
s. Ramelli's design is unnecessarily elaborate, as he likely understood that
gravity
In physics, gravity () is a fundamental interaction which causes mutual attraction between all things with mass or energy. Gravity is, by far, the weakest of the four fundamental interactions, approximately 1038 times weaker than the stro ...
would also have been effective (as it is with a
Ferris wheel
A Ferris wheel (also called a Giant Wheel or an observation wheel) is an amusement ride consisting of a rotating upright wheel with multiple passenger-carrying components (commonly referred to as passenger cars, cabins, tubs, gondolas, capsules ...
, invented centuries later); but the gearing system allowed Ramelli to display his mathematical prowess.
[Rybczynski, Witold. ''One Good Turn: A Natural History of the Screwdriver and the Screw''. Scribner, 2000.] While other people would go on to build bookwheels based on Ramelli's design, Ramelli did not in fact ever construct his own.
[Garber, Megan]
"Behold, the Kindle of the 16th Century"
''The Atlantic''. Published 27 February 2013.
In order to keep the books in an upright position, the gears in the epicyclic gearing must have a gear ratio of
, where
may be any positive real number. That is, the sun gear must have the same shape as the secondary planet gears. The primary planet gears may be of any size. Indeed, the primary planet gears may even be of unequal sizes, and the bookwheel would still function.
To what extent bookwheels were appreciated for their convenience versus their
aesthetic
Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed th ...
qualities remains a matter of speculation according to American engineer
Henry Petroski
Henry Petroski (February 6, 1942) is an American engineer specializing in failure analysis. A professor both of civil engineering and history at Duke University, he is also a prolific author. Petroski has written over a dozen books – beginning ...
.
[Petroski, Henry. ''The Book on the Book Shelf''. Knopf, 1999.] Ramelli himself described the bookwheel as a "beautiful and ingenious machine, very useful and convenient for anybody who takes pleasure in study, especially for those who are indisposed and tormented by
gout
Gout ( ) is a form of inflammatory arthritis characterized by recurrent attacks of a red, tender, hot and swollen joint, caused by deposition of monosodium urate monohydrate crystals. Pain typically comes on rapidly, reaching maximal intensit ...
."
[Ramelli, Agostino. ''Le diverse et artificiose machine.'' 1588. Quoted in Rybczynski, Witold. ''One Good Turn: A Natural History of the Screwdriver and the Screw''. Scribner, 2000.] Ramelli's reference to gout, a condition that impairs mobility, demonstrates the appeal of a device that allows access to several books while the reader is seated. However, Petroski notes that Ramelli's illustration lacks space for writing and other scholarly work, and that the "fanciful wheel" may not have been appropriate for any activity beyond reading.
While the design of the bookwheel is commonly credited to Ramelli, some historians dispute that he was the first to invent such a device.
Joseph Needham
Noel Joseph Terence Montgomery Needham (; 9 December 1900 – 24 March 1995) was a British biochemist, historian of science and sinologist known for his scientific research and writing on the history of Chinese science and technology, in ...
, a historian of
Chinese technology
Science and technology in China have developed rapidly during the 1980s to 2010s, and major scientific and technological achievements have been made since the 1980s. From the 1980s to the 1990s, the Chinese government successively launched t ...
, stated that revolving bookcases, though not vertically oriented, originated in China "perhaps a thousand years before Ramelli's design was taken there."
Influence and legacy
![BookwheelThysianaLeiden1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/35/BookwheelThysianaLeiden1.jpg)
The bookwheel was an early attempt to solve the problem of managing
increasingly numerous printed works, which were typically large and heavy in Ramelli's time.
It has been called one of the earliest "information retrieval" devices and has been considered a precursor to modern technologies, such as
hypertext
Hypertext is E-text, text displayed on a computer display or other electronic devices with references (hyperlinks) to other text that the reader can immediately access. Hypertext documents are interconnected by hyperlinks, which are typi ...
and
e-reader
An e-reader, also called an e-book reader or e-book device, is a mobile electronic device that is designed primarily for the purpose of reading digital e-books and periodicals.
Any device that can display text on a screen may act as an e-read ...
s, that allow readers to store and cross-reference large amounts of information.
Other inventors, such as
French inventor Nicolas Grollier de Servière
Nicolas Grollier de Servière (1596–1689) was a French inventor and ornamental turner who became well known for creating a series of fantastic machines.
Grollier de Servière, a cousin of Jean Grolier de Servières (1489/90–1565), Treas ...
(1596–1689), proposed their own variations on Ramelli's design.
Of the dozens of bookwheels built in the 17th and 18th centuries, 14 are known to survive: in
Ghent
Ghent ( nl, Gent ; french: Gand ; traditional English: Gaunt) is a city and a municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of the East Flanders province, and the third largest in the country, exceeded in ...
,
Hamburg
(male), (female) en, Hamburger(s),
Hamburgian(s)
, timezone1 = Central (CET)
, utc_offset1 = +1
, timezone1_DST = Central (CEST)
, utc_offset1_DST = +2
, postal ...
,
Klosterneuburg
Klosterneuburg (; frequently abbreviated as Kloburg by locals) is a town in Tulln District in the Austrian state of Lower Austria. It has a population of about 27,500. The Klosterneuburg Monastery, which was established in 1114 and soon after give ...
,
Cracow,
Lambach
Lambach () is a market town in the Wels-Land district of the Austrian state of Upper Austria on the Ager and Traun Rivers. A major stop on the salt trade, it is the site of the Lambach Abbey, built around 1056. Notable alumnus from the local e ...
,
Leiden
Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wit ...
,
Naples
Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...
(2),
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
,
Prague
Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...
(2),
Puebla City
Puebla de Zaragoza (; nah, Cuetlaxcoapan), formally Heroica Puebla de Zaragoza, formerly Puebla de los Ángeles during colonial times, or known in English simply as Puebla, is the seat of Puebla Municipality. It is the capital and largest city ...
,
Wernigerode
Wernigerode () is a town in the district of Harz, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Until 2007, it was the capital of the district of Wernigerode. Its population was 35,041 in 2012.
Wernigerode is located southwest of Halberstadt, and is picturesquely s ...
and in
Wolfenbüttel
Wolfenbüttel (; nds, Wulfenbüddel) is a town in Lower Saxony, Germany, the administrative capital of Wolfenbüttel District. It is best known as the location of the internationally renowned Herzog August Library and for having the largest c ...
.
In contemporary times, the bookwheel is valued for its historical importance, decorative appeal, and symbolic significance. Ramelli's design has been recreated by artists such as
Daniel Libeskind
Daniel Libeskind (born May 12, 1946) is a Polish–American architect, artist, professor and set designer. Libeskind founded Studio Daniel Libeskind in 1989 with his wife, Nina, and is its principal design architect.
He is known for the design a ...
,
[Allen, Greg]
"On The Making Of The Lost Biennale Machines Of Daniel Libeskind"
Greg.org. and it inspired the name of the
Smithsonian Library's blog "Turning the Book Wheel".
[Blog post](_blank)
Smithsonian Library.
Modern reproductions
A group of undergraduate engineering students at the
Rochester Institute of Technology
Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) is a private university, private research university in the town of Henrietta, New York, Henrietta in the Rochester, New York, metropolitan area. The university offers undergraduate and graduate degree ...
(RIT) constructed two bookwheels in 2018 based on Ramelli's design, but using modern tools and processes.
Built from historically accurate materials such as European beech and white oak wood, each bookwheel weighs 600 pounds and can hold eight books.
The bookwheels are on display at two libraries in
Rochester, New York
Rochester () is a City (New York), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, the county seat, seat of Monroe County, New York, Monroe County, and the fourth-most populous in the state after New York City, Buffalo, New York, Buffalo, ...
: the
Cary Graphic Arts Collection
The Cary Graphic Arts Collection is a library and archive of books, type specimens, manuscripts, documents, and artifacts related to the history of graphical communication. Located in Wallace Library at the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), ...
at RIT and Rossell Hope Robbins Library at the
University of Rochester
The University of Rochester (U of R, UR, or U of Rochester) is a private research university in Rochester, New York. The university grants undergraduate and graduate degrees, including doctoral and professional degrees.
The University of Roc ...
.
Another modern reproduction was built by the
Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal
The Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal (''Library of the Arsenal'', founded 1757) in Paris has been part of the Bibliothèque nationale de France since 1934.
History
The collections of the library originated with the private library of Marc-René, 3rd ...
in Paris, based on their model, to allow people to see how the mechanism is working without causing damage to the original.
Publications (selection)
* John Considine: 'The Ramellian Bookwheel'. In
''Erudition and the Republic of Letters'', 2016, 1: 4, 381–411* E. Hanebutt-Benz: ''Die Kunst des Lesens. Lesemöbel und Leseverhalten vom Mittelalter bis zur Gegenwart''. Frankfurt a. M., Museum für Kunsthandwerk, 1985.
* M. Boghardt: 'Das Wolfenbuetteler Bücherrad'. In: ''Museum'', April 1978, 58–60.
* Martha Teach Gnudi & Eugene S. Ferguson: ''Ramelli's ingenious machines. The various and ingenious machines of Agostino Ramelli (1588)''. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1976. (Repr. 1987 & 1994)
* Bert S. Hall: 'A revolving bookcase by Agostino Ramelli'. In: ''Technology and culture'', 11 (1970), 389–400.
* M. von Katte: 'Herzog August und die Kataloge seiner Bibliothek In: ''Wolfenbuetteler Beiträge'', 1 (1972), 174–182.
* A.G. Keller: ''A theatre of machines''. London, Chapman and Hall, 1964.
* John Willis Clark: ''The care of books. An essay on the development of libraries and their fittings, from the earliest times to the end of the eighteenth century''. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1901.
epr. Cambridge 2009: * Agostino Ramelli: ''Le diverse et artificiose machine''. Composte in lingua Italiana et Francese. Paris, 1588 (Repr.: Franborough, Hants, 1970
Google Books
References
External links
''drifts through debris'' an art installation inspired by Ramelli's design
"Ramelli's Bookwheel" history and commentary from New York University's Department of Media, Culture, and Communication
Ramelli's Rotating Reader engineering schematics from Rochester Institute of Technology used to create modern reproductions of the bookwheel
{{Good article
Reading (process)
Furniture
Epicyclical gearing
Rotating machines
16th-century inventions