Ancient Calendar

• Ancient civilization depended upon the movement of sun, moon, and stars to measure
time and months, seasons, and years.
• Ice age hunters 200,000 years ago drew lines, gouged bones and sticks to count days of
the phase change of moons.
• Sumerians in Tigris-Euphrates developed a calendar that divided a year into 30 day
months, divided a day into 12 periods(span of 2 hours) and divided those 12 periods into
30 parts (span of 4 minutes).
• Earliest calendar was in Egypt based on lunar cycle but later was observed that the “Dog
Major” (Sirius) rose next to sun every 365 days. Based on that, the earliest calendar was
created that began around 3100 BCE.
• Before 2000 BCE, the Babylonians used a year of 12 that used 29 day (that is now leap
year) and 30 day lunar months, giving a 354 day yea.
• Mayans of Central America relied on Sun, moon and planet of Venus to develop 260
days and 365 days calendar.
• This idea spread across Central America between 2600 BCE and 1500 CE. By the time
period between 250 and 900, it was almost known by everybody in Central America.
• Their calendars later became portions of the great Aztec calendar stones that included
series of logical diagram to separate seasons corresponding to rituals.
• “Our present civilization has adopted a 365 day solar calendar with a leap year occurring
every fourth year (except century years not evenly divisible by 400)”

Early Clocks

Sundials

• 5000 to 6000 years ago great civilizations in the Middle East and North Africa
began to make clocks.
• Egyptians made a shadow clock out of obelisks. They are like examples of
Washington Monument. It was built around 3500 BCE.
• As the Sun moved, shadows casted on the obelisk that separated the
morning and the afternoon. Then, the architecture would’ve been marked by
lines to give more accurate time.
• Egyptians also built another form of sun clocks that was portable, which came
around 1500 BCE.
• “This device divided a sunlit day into 10 parts plus two "twilight hours" in the
morning and evening. When the long stem with 5 variably spaced marks was
oriented east and west in the morning, an elevated crossbar on the east end
cast a moving shadow over the marks. At noon, the device was turned in the
opposite direction to measure the afternoon hours”
• “Merkhet” is an astronomical tool built by Egyptians around 600 BCE by
aligning with the Pole Star. This was used to mark the night time hours.
 • Hemispherical dial was invented in 300 BCE by cutting a depression of a bowl
shape on a stone with the sun dial arms marking 4 different sets of line for
different seasons.

Water Clocks

• Clepsydras were named by Greeks is a type of water clock invented by

Egyptian. It was buried under tomb of pharaoh Amenhotep around 1500 BCE.
Greeks found it and started using them around 325 BCE. It was made from
stone vessels with sloping slides that had small holes that allowed drip of
water at a constant rate.
• Other clepsydras included cylindrical or bowl-shaped containers designed to
slowly fill with water coming in at a constant rate. Markings on the inside
surfaces measured the passage of "hours" as the water level reached them.
These clocks were used to determine hours at night, Another version
consisted of a metal bowl with a hole in the bottom; when placed in a
container of water the bowl would fill and sink in a certain time. These were
still in use in North Africa in the 20th century.
• Between 100 BCE and 500 CE, Greeks and Romans added complexity to the
water clocks to make the water flow constant by regulating pressure.
• Andronikons, a Macedonian astronomer, helped in construction of Horologion,
translated as the Tower of the Winds, in Athens. “This octagonal structure
featured both sundials and mechanical hour indicators. It featured a 24 hour
mechanized clepsydra and indicators for the eight winds from which the
tower got its name and it displayed the seasons of the year and astrological
dates and periods. The Romans also developed mechanized clepsydras.”
• In Far East, the technology of making clocks developed from 200 to 1300 CE.
Su Sang and his associates built a clock tower in 1088 CE. The tower
incorporated a “water-driven escapement invented about 725 CE. The Su
Sung clock tower, over 30 feet tall, possessed a bronze power-driven
armillary sphere for observations, an automatically rotating celestial globe,
and five front panels with doors that permitted the viewing of changing
manikins which rang bells or gongs, and held tablets indicating the hour or
other special times of the day.”