Hydraulis - Ύδραυλις - Water Organ - The 1st Organ - FOLDER

The Hydraulis - the first organ

According to Greek and Roman engineers and mathematicians from the 1st century BC to the 2nd century AD, such as Vitruvius, Heron of Alexandria or Iulius Pollux, the Hydraulis was invented by Ctesibius.

Ctesibius, a Greek inventor and mathematician, is said to have invented the hydraulis in the 3rd century BC in Alexandria.

Records of Ctesibius’ water organ have not survived, but Vitruvius and Heron of Alexandria provide descriptions of how to build an organum hydraulicum.

Attempts have been made to illustrate the water organ described by Vitruvius and Hero of Alexandria since the Middle Ages.
But the old descriptions are very complicated

At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century people started to reconstruct the Hydraulis, referring to the texts of Vitruvius, Heron of Alexandria and to the latest archaeological findings.

The archaeological finds helped to understand the texts of Vitruvius and Hero of Alexandria.

During my Hydraulis research I saw some drawings of the Hydraulis in old books and as archaeological finds, I made a selection of them as 3D models which you can find in this folder.

If you need other views or renders of the Hydraulis models for your research or for your school project please PM me on Artstation.

The Hydraulis project is part of my Sheng series and shows the European level of knowledge about organ building before the Chinese mouth organ Sheng reached Europe around 1780.

Thank you for your TIME
Michael