BY THE ARCHAEOLOGIST EDITOR GROUP
The Antikythera Mechanism, the first “computer” of humanity, is the focus of the most well-known and recognizable “archaeologist”, Indiana Jones, and his most recent investigation into the biggest riddle of antiquity. In this article, you will find everything you need to know about this miracle, which continues to astound us thousands of years after it was created.
Divers discovered an old wreckage off the coast of Antikythera around 1900. However, one of the important ancient objects they managed to recover is the smallest and divided into various fragments, which is a true miracle whose value at that time they could not even imagine. With the limited resources available at the time and with significant losses (one dead diver and two permanently paralyzed), they managed to recover many important ancient objects.
IMAGE: WIKIMEDIA (LEFT), © 2020 TONY FREETH (RIGHT)
A "computer" that was capable of giving its user knowledge that we also did not know the people of the Hellenistic Period possessed was described in the research of the following decades as being an incredibly complex and unimaginable device for the tools and knowledge of antiquity. It moved thanks to a system of dozens of gears.
Years passed, and while the significance of this finding was recognized early on, it took us until the contemporary period, when we could completely comprehend it thanks to the development of specific digital devices like spectrographs.
Greek professor of space physics and leader in the study of the Antikythera Mechanism, Xenophon Moussa, presented the first comprehensive and contemporary study in conjunction with academics from other countries as part of the mechanism's research program.
At the same time, an exact functional replica of the Mechanism was built at the "Kostas Kotsanas Museum of Ancient Greek Technology," both in terms of physical size (tablet size) and much larger, in order to understand how the invention functions with all of this intricate gearing that our prehistoric forefathers used to observe and predict the motions of the planets in our solar system.
We can only infer that he did because the probe is still open. The logic behind how it works is that by entering the right information into the device, we can observe things like solar eclipses and moon phases, as well as look up to 400 years into the past and future! The precise dates of significant holidays like the Olympic Games, Isthmia, and Nemea can be inferred from these facts. A current and precise astronomical calendar accomplishes this.
According to specialists, gathering this information would require literally centuries of sky-watching and meticulously documenting all phenomena, so that with all of this and the necessary technology, which we did not know existed, a true ancient tablet could be built.
The answers cannot all be found in archeology. Perhaps this is why the finest, Indiana Jones, was chosen, providing the culmination of his expeditions with a wider mythological dimension and contributing to the preservation of this priceless ancient legacy.
The plot of the new Indiana Jones’ movie
As Indiana Jones and Oxford archaeologist Basil Shaw try to collect the Lance of Longinus from a fortress in the French Alps in 1944, the Nazis seize them. Astrophysicist Jürgen Voller notifies his superiors that the Lance is a fake but that he has discovered half of the Antikythera device called Archimedes' Dial, which was created by the ancient Syracusan mathematician Archimedes. This device reveals temporal fissures and enables potential time travel. Jones frees Basil and makes his getaway on a train carrying stolen artifacts. The two jump from the train barely in time for the Allied soldiers to stop it when he has the Dial piece.
Jones, who is now elderly and resides in New York City, retired from Hunter College in 1969. Due to Jones growing depressed and secluded after their son Mutt was killed in the Vietnam War, Marion left and filed for legal separation. Archaeologist Helena Shaw, Jones' goddaughter, shows up unannounced and claims she is there to conduct a study on the Dial. Jones cautions that before giving the Dial to Jones to burn (which he never did), her late father, Basil, became obsessed with examining it.
Voller's henchmen attack Jones and Helena as they are removing the Dial-Half from the college archives. The CIA aids Voller, who is currently employed by NASA under the guise of "Dr. Schmidt." In order to sell the Dial on the illegal market, Helena, who is later revealed to be an antiquities smuggler, flees with it. Jones is falsely accused of killing two of his coworkers, which forces him to flee through a parade commemorating the Apollo 11 moon landing, an anti-war demonstration, and the New York City Subway. He looks for Sallah, an old acquaintance who is now a cab driver in New York.
Sallah predicts that before he assists Jones in leaving the country, Helena will probably auction the Dial in Tangier. Jones stops Helena's unlawful private auction at a hotel in Tangier, but Voller and his goons show up and take the relic. Together, Jones, Helena, and Teddy Kumar, her teen sidekick, chase the suspects through the streets in a tuk-tuk. After the American government denounces Voller for turning rogue, the CIA attempts to capture him, but Voller's accomplices kill the agents and take their chopper.
Jones, Helena, and Teddy pursue Voller to Greece, where they join forces with Renaldo, an experienced diver who was formerly Jones' old friend. By using Basil's study as a guide, they scuba dive to an old shipwreck in the Aegean Sea and recover a "graphikos" tablet with instructions for getting to the other half of the Dial. When Voller gets there, he kills Renaldo. While being pursued by Voller, Jones' group escapes and travels to Sicily.
Jones and Helena discover Archimedes' grave, the second part of the Dial, and a 20th-century wristwatch on Archimedes' skeletal arm inside the Ear of Dionysius grotto. Jones is wounded when Voller arrests him. Teddy and Helena break free, pursuing Voller. Voller discloses his plans to time travel to 1939 in order to kill Adolf Hitler and aid Germany in winning World War II after putting the Dial back together. Voller turns on the Dial at an airstrip and finds a time rift in the sky. Helena stows out via the plane's landing gear as Jones is held captive on Voller's hijacked aircraft. Teddy flies on a different plane after them.
Jones discovers that continental drift might have changed the chronology's coordinates as he gets closer to the breach. The group arrives at the Siege of Syracuse in 212 BC rather than 1939. The opposing troops mistake Voller's aircraft for a dragon and shoot it down. When Teddy makes a successful landing, Jones and Helena jump out of the plane just before it crashes, killing everyone on board. Among the debris, Archimedes discovers Voller's body and wristwatch. While keeping the watch, he gives Jones the Dial. Jones and Helena find out that Archimedes built the Dial so that people from the future might travel via cracks that only led to 212 BC. Jones wants to stay behind when the fissure starts to collapse because he feels he has nowhere to go back to. Helena knocks Jones out because she won't give up on him.
A recuperating Jones awakens to find Helena, Teddy, Sallah, and Marion in his contemporary apartment. Jones and Marion make up romantically after the others have left.
