Renaissance technology was the set of European artifacts and inventions which spread through the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

period, roughly the 14th century through the 16th century. The era is marked by profound technical advancements such as the

printing press A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a printing, print medium (such as paper or cloth), thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in whi ...

, linear perspective in drawing,

patent law A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...

, double shell domes and bastion fortresses. Sketchbooks from artisans of the period ( Taccola and

Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 1452 - 2 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially rested o ...

, for example) give a deep insight into the mechanical technology then known and applied. Renaissance science spawned the

Scientific Revolution The Scientific Revolution was a series of events that marked the emergence of History of science, modern science during the early modern period, when developments in History of mathematics#Mathematics during the Scientific Revolution, mathemati ...

; science and technology began a cycle of mutual advancement.

Renaissance technology

Some important Renaissance technologies, including both innovations and improvements on existing techniques: *mining and metallurgy *

blast furnace A blast furnace is a type of metallurgical furnace used for smelting to produce industrial metals, generally pig iron, but also others such as lead or copper. ''Blast'' refers to the combustion air being supplied above atmospheric pressure. In a ...

enabled

iron Iron is a chemical element; it has symbol Fe () and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, forming much of Earth's o ...

to be produced in significant quantities *

finery forge A finery forge is a forge used to produce wrought iron from pig iron by decarburization in a process called "fining" which involved liquifying cast iron in a fining hearth and decarburization, removing carbon from the molten cast iron through Redo ...

enabled

pig iron Pig iron, also known as crude iron, is an intermediate good used by the iron industry in the production of steel. It is developed by smelting iron ore in a blast furnace. Pig iron has a high carbon content, typically 3.8–4.7%, along with si ...

(from the blast furnace) into bar iron (

wrought iron Wrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content (less than 0.05%) in contrast to that of cast iron (2.1% to 4.5%), or 0.25 for low carbon "mild" steel. Wrought iron is manufactured by heating and melting high carbon cast iron in an ...

) *

slitting mill Slitting Mill is a small village on the outskirts of Rugeley, Staffordshire. At the 2001 census, it had a population of 265. The village is within Rugeley civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish use ...

mechanized the production of iron rods for nailmaking *

smeltmill Smeltmills were water-powered water mill, mills used to smelting, smelt lead or other metals. The older method of smelting lead on wind-blown bole hills began to be superseded by artificially-blown smelters. The first such furnace was built by Bu ...

increased the output of

lead Lead () is a chemical element; it has Chemical symbol, symbol Pb (from Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a Heavy metal (elements), heavy metal that is density, denser than most common materials. Lead is Mohs scale, soft and Ductility, malleabl ...

over previous methods ( bole hill)

Late 14th century

Some of the technologies were the

arquebus An arquebus ( ) is a form of long gun that appeared in Europe and the Ottoman Empire during the 15th century. An infantryman armed with an arquebus is called an arquebusier. The term ''arquebus'' was applied to many different forms of firearms ...

and the

musket A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket gradually dis ...

15th century

The technologies that developed in Europe during the second half of the 15th century were commonly associated by authorities of the time with a key theme in Renaissance thought: the rivalry of the Moderns and the Ancients. Three inventions in particular — the

firearm A firearm is any type of gun that uses an explosive charge and is designed to be readily carried and operated by an individual. The term is legally defined further in different countries (see legal definitions). The first firearms originate ...

s, and the nautical

compass A compass is a device that shows the cardinal directions used for navigation and geographic orientation. It commonly consists of a magnetized needle or other element, such as a compass card or compass rose, which can pivot to align itself with No ...

— were indeed seen as evidence that the Moderns could not only compete with the Ancients, but had surpassed them, for these three inventions allowed modern people to communicate, exercise power, and finally travel at distances unimaginable in earlier times. Crank and connecting rod The crank and

connecting rod A connecting rod, also called a 'con rod', is the part of a reciprocating engine, piston engine which connects the piston to the crankshaft. Together with the crank (mechanism), crank, the connecting rod converts the reciprocating motion of the p ...

mechanism which converts circular into reciprocal motion is of utmost importance for the mechanization of work processes; it is first attested for Roman water-powered sawmills. During the Renaissance, its use is greatly diversified and mechanically refined; now connecting-rods are also applied to double compound cranks, while the

flywheel A flywheel is a mechanical device that uses the conservation of angular momentum to store rotational energy, a form of kinetic energy proportional to the product of its moment of inertia and the square of its rotational speed. In particular, a ...

is employed to get these cranks over the 'dead-spot'. Early evidence of such machines appears, among other things, in the works of the 15th-century engineers Anonymous of the Hussite Wars and Taccola. From then on, cranks and connecting rods become an integral part of machine design and are applied in ever more elaborate ways:

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 ...

's ''The Diverse and Artifactitious Machines'' of 1588 depicts eighteen different applications, a number which rises in the 17th-century ''Theatrum Machinarum Novum'' by Georg Andreas Böckler to forty-five. Printing press Printer in 1568-ce

The introduction of the mechanical

movable type Movable type (US English; moveable type in British English) is the system and technology of printing and typography that uses movable Sort (typesetting), components to reproduce the elements of a document (usually individual alphanumeric charac ...

by the German goldsmith

Johannes Gutenberg Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg ( – 3 February 1468) was a German inventor and Artisan, craftsman who invented the movable type, movable-type printing press. Though movable type was already in use in East Asia, Gutenberg's inven ...

(1398–1468) is widely regarded as the single most important event of the second millennium, and is one of the defining moments of the Renaissance. The Printing Revolution which it sparks throughout Europe works as a modern "agent of change" in the transformation of medieval society. The mechanical device consists of a

screw press A screw press is a type of machine press in which the ram is driven up and down by a screw. The screw shaft can be driven by a handle or a wheel. It works by using a coarse screw to convert the rotation of the handle or drive-wheel into a small d ...

modified for printing purposes which can produce 3,600 pages per workday, allowing the mass production of printed books on a proto-industrial scale. By the start of the 16th century, printing presses are operating in over 200 cities in a dozen European countries, producing more than twenty million volumes.Febvre, Lucien; Martin, Henri-Jean (1976): "The Coming of the Book: The Impact of Printing 1450–1800", London: New Left Books, quoted in: Anderson, Benedict: "Comunidades Imaginadas. Reflexiones sobre el origen y la difusión del nacionalismo", Fondo de cultura económica, Mexico 1993, , pp. 58f By 1600, their output had risen tenfold to an estimated 150 to 200 million copies, while Gutenberg book printing spread from Europe further afield. The relatively free flow of information transcends borders and induced a sharp rise in Renaissance literacy, learning and education; the circulation of (revolutionary) ideas among the rising middle classes, but also the peasants, threatens the traditional power monopoly of the ruling nobility and is a key factor in the rapid spread of the

Protestant Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the papacy and ...

. The dawn of the Gutenberg Galaxy, the era of mass communication, is instrumental in fostering the gradual

democratization of knowledge The democratization of knowledge is the acquisition and spread of knowledge amongst a wider part of the population, not just privileged elites such as clergy and academics. Libraries, in particular public libraries, and modern information techn ...

which sees for the first time modern media phenomena such as the press or

bestseller A bestseller is a book or other media noted for its top selling status, with bestseller lists published by newspapers, magazines, and book store chains. Some lists are broken down into classifications and specialties (novel, nonfiction book, cookb ...

s emerging. The prized

incunable An incunable or incunabulum (: incunables or incunabula, respectively) is a book, pamphlet, or broadside that was printed in the earliest stages of printing in Europe, up to the year 1500. The specific date is essentially arbitrary, but the ...

s, which are testimony to the aesthetic taste and high proficient competence of Renaissance book printers, are one lasting legacy of the 15th century. Homo Volans

Parachute The earliest known

parachute A parachute is a device designed to slow an object's descent through an atmosphere by creating Drag (physics), drag or aerodynamic Lift (force), lift. It is primarily used to safely support people exiting aircraft at height, but also serves va ...

design appears in an anonymous manuscript from 1470s

Renaissance Italy The Italian Renaissance ( ) was a period in History of Italy, Italian history between the 14th and 16th centuries. The period is known for the initial development of the broader Renaissance culture that spread across Western Europe and marked t ...

; it depicts a free-hanging man clutching a crossbar frame attached to a conical canopy. As a safety measure, four straps run from the ends of the rods to a waist belt. Around 1485, a more advanced parachute was sketched by the polymath

in his '' Codex Atlanticus'' (fol. 381v), which he scales in a more favorable proportion to the weight of the jumper. Leonardo's canopy was held open by a square wooden frame, altering the shape of the parachute from conical to pyramidal. The Venetian inventor

Fausto Veranzio Fausto Veranzio (; ; Hungarian language, Hungarian and Latin regional pronunciation, Vernacular Latin: ''Verancsics Faustus'';Andrew L. SimonMade in Hungary: Hungarian contributions to universal culture/ref> Claims that Veranzio successfully tested his parachute design in 1617 by jumping from a tower in Venice cannot be substantiated; since he was around 65 years old at the time. Mariner's astrolabe The earliest recorded uses of the

astrolabe An astrolabe (; ; ) is an astronomy, astronomical list of astronomical instruments, instrument dating to ancient times. It serves as a star chart and Model#Physical model, physical model of the visible celestial sphere, half-dome of the sky. It ...

for navigational purposes are by the Portuguese explorers Diogo de Azambuja (1481), Bartholomew Diaz (1487/88) and

Vasco da Gama Vasco da Gama ( , ; – 24 December 1524), was a Portuguese explorer and nobleman who was the Portuguese discovery of the sea route to India, first European to reach India by sea. Da Gama's first voyage (1497–1499) was the first to link ...

(1497–98) during their sea voyages around Africa. Dry dock While

dry dock A dry dock (sometimes drydock or dry-dock) is a narrow basin or vessel that can be flooded to allow a load to be floated in, then drained to allow that load to come to rest on a dry platform. Dry docks are used for the construction, maintenance, ...

s were already known in

Hellenistic In classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Greek history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC, which was followed by the ascendancy of the R ...

shipbuilding, these facilities were reintroduced in 1495/96, when Henry VII of England ordered one to be built at the Portsmouth navy base.

16th century

Floating dock The earliest known description of a floating dock comes from a small Italian book printed in Venice in 1560, titled ''Descrittione dell'artifitiosa machina''. In the booklet, an unknown author asks for the privilege of using a new method for the salvaging of a grounded ship and then proceeds to describe and illustrate his approach. The included

woodcut Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking. An artist carves an image into the surface of a block of wood—typically with gouges—leaving the printing parts level with the surface while removing the non-printing parts. Areas that ...

shows a ship flanked by two large floating trestles, forming a roof above the vessel. The ship is pulled in an upright position by a number of ropes attached to the superstructure. Lifting tower A lifting tower was used to great effect by Domenico Fontana to relocate the monolithic

Vatican obelisk The Vatican Obelisk is an List of Egyptian obelisks, Egyptian obelisk, one of the thirteen ancient List of obelisks in Rome, obelisks of Rome. This obelisk is located in St. Peter's Square, in Vatican City. It is the only ancient obelisk in Rome t ...

in Rome. Its weight of 361 t was far greater than any of the blocks the Romans are known to have lifted by cranes.53.3 t at Trajan's Column (); 60−100 t at the Jupiter temple of

Baalbek Baalbek (; ; ) is a city located east of the Litani River in Lebanon's Beqaa Valley, about northeast of Beirut. It is the capital of Baalbek-Hermel Governorate. In 1998, the city had a population of 82,608. Most of the population consists of S ...

(). Mining, machinery and chemistry A standard reference for the state of mechanical arts during the Renaissance is given in the mining engineering treatise '' De re metallica'' (1556), which also contains sections on geology, mining and chemistry. ''De re metallica'' was the standard chemistry reference for the next 180 years.

Early 17th century

Newspaper The

newspaper A newspaper is a Periodical literature, periodical publication containing written News, information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as poli ...

is an application of the printing press from which the press derives its name. The 16th century sees a rising demand for up-to-date information which can not be covered effectively by the circulating hand-written newssheets. For "gaining time" from the slow copying process,

Johann Carolus Johann Carolus (26 March 1575 − 15 August 1634) was a German publisher of the first newspaper, called ''Relation aller Fürnemmen und gedenckwürdigen Historien'' (). The ''Relation'' is recognised by the World Association of Newspapers, as ...

of Strassburg is the first to publish his German-language ''Relation'' by using a printing press (1605). In rapid succession, further German newspapers are established in Wolfenbüttel (''

Avisa Relation oder Zeitung ''Avisa Relation oder Zeitung'' was one of the first news-periodicals in the world. It was published in Wolfenbüttel, Germany, in 1609. The printer/publisher was Lucas Schulte. The first issue states that the news had been collected from vario ...

''), Basel, Frankfurt and Berlin. From 1618 onwards, enterprising Dutch printers take up the practice and begin to provide the English and French market with translated news. By the mid-17th century it is estimated that political newspapers which enjoyed the widest popularity reach up to 250,000 readers in the Holy Roman Empire, around one quarter of the literate population. Air-gun In 1607 Bartolomeo Crescentio described an

air gun An air gun or airgun is a gun that uses energy from compressed air or other gases that are mechanically pressurized and then released to propel and accelerate projectiles, similar to the principle of the primitive blowgun. This is in contr ...

equipped with a powerful spiral spring, a device so complex that it must have had predecessors. In 1610 Mersenne spoke in detail of "sclopeti pneumatici constructio", and four years later Wilkins wrote enthusiastically of "that late ingenious invention the wind-gun" as being "almost equall to our powder-guns". In the 1650s Otto von Guericke, famed for his experiments with vacua and pressures, built the ''Madeburger Windbuchse'', one of the technical wonders of its time.

Tools, devices, work processes

15th century

Cranked Archimedes' screw The German engineer Konrad Kyeser equips in his '' Bellifortis'' (1405) the

Archimedes' screw The Archimedes' screw, also known as the Archimedean screw, hydrodynamic screw, water screw or Egyptian screw, is one of the earliest documented hydraulic machines. It was so-named after the Greek mathematician Archimedes who first described it ...

with a crank mechanism which soon replaces the ancient practice of working the pipe by treading. Cranked reel In the textile industry, cranked

reel A reel is a tool used to store elongated and flexible objects (e.g. yarns/ cords, ribbons, cables, hoses, etc.) by wrapping the material around a cylindrical core known as a '' spool''. Many reels also have flanges (known as the ''rims'') arou ...

s for winding skeins of yarn were introduced in the early 15th century. Brace The earliest carpenter's braces equipped with a U-shaped grip, that is with a compound crank, appears between 1420 and 1430 in

Flanders Flanders ( or ; ) is the Dutch language, Dutch-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to culture, la ...

. Cranked well-hoist The earliest evidence for the fitting of a well-hoist with cranks is found in a miniature of c. 1425 in the German ''Hausbuch of the Mendel Foundation''. Paddle wheel boat powered by crank and connecting rod mechanism While paddle wheel boats powered by manually turned

crankshaft A crankshaft is a mechanical component used in a reciprocating engine, piston engine to convert the reciprocating motion into rotational motion. The crankshaft is a rotating Shaft (mechanical engineering), shaft containing one or more crankpins, ...

s were already conceived of by earlier writers such as Guido da Vigevano and the Anonymous Author of the Hussite Wars, the Italian Roberto Valturio much improves on the design in 1463 by devising a boat with five sets of parallel cranks which are all joined to a single power source by one

; the idea is also taken up by his compatriot Francesco di Giorgio. Rotary grindstone with treadle Evidence for rotary grindstones operated by a crank handle goes back to the

Carolingian The Carolingian dynasty ( ; known variously as the Carlovingians, Carolingus, Carolings, Karolinger or Karlings) was a Frankish noble family named after Charles Martel and his grandson Charlemagne, descendants of the Arnulfing and Pippinid c ...

'' Utrecht Psalter''. Around 1480, the crank mechanism is further mechanized by adding a treadle. Geared hand-mill The geared hand-mill, operated either with one or two cranks, appears in the 15th century.

16th century

Grenade musket Two 16th-century German grenade muskets working with a

wheellock A wheellock, wheel-lock, or wheel lock is a friction-wheel mechanism which creates a spark that causes a firearm to fire. It was the next major development in firearms technology after the matchlock, and the first self-igniting firearm. Its name ...

mechanism are on display in the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich.Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, München, Inv. nos. W 1450, W 1451

Technical drawings of artist-engineers

The revived scientific spirit of the age can perhaps be best exemplified by the voluminous corpus of

technical drawing Technical drawing, drafting or drawing, is the act and discipline of composing drawings that visually communicate how something functions or is constructed. Technical drawing is essential for communicating ideas in industry and engineering. ...

s which the artist-engineers left behind, reflecting the wide variety of interests the Renaissance '' homo universalis'' pursued. The establishment of the laws of linear perspective by

Brunelleschi Filippo di ser Brunellesco di Lippo Lapi (1377 – 15 April 1446), commonly known as Filippo Brunelleschi ( ; ) and also nicknamed Pippo by Leon Battista Alberti, was an Italian architect, designer, goldsmith and sculptor. He is considered to ...

gave his successors, such as Taccola, Francesco di Giorgio Martini and

, a powerful instrument to depict mechanical devices for the first time in a realistic manner. The extant sketch books give modern historians of science invaluable insights into the standards of technology of the time. Renaissance engineers showed a strong proclivity to experimental study, drawing a variety of technical devices, many of which appeared for the first time in history on paper. However, these designs were not always intended to be put into practice, and often practical limitations impeded the application of the revolutionary designs. For example, da Vinci's ideas on the conical

or the winged flying machine were only applied much later. While earlier scholars showed a tendency to attribute inventions based on their first pictorial appearance to individual Renaissance engineers, modern scholarship is more prone to view the devices as products of a technical evolution which often went back to the Middle Ages.

Notes

Footnotes

References

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Renaissance Technology Technology by period

Technology Technology is the application of Conceptual model, conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word ''technology'' can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible too ...

Renaissance technology

Late 14th century

15th century

16th century

Early 17th century

Tools, devices, work processes

15th century

16th century

Technical drawings of artist-engineers

See also

Notes

Footnotes

References

External links