Great robots of antiquity

Cory Doctorow 9:55 pm Sun Dec 19, 2010

Dark Roasted Blend does a roundup of wonderful, ingenious automata of ages past — the early clockwork robots that boggled crowds with their ticktock liveliness: "As watch making developed in the Age of Enlightenment in the eighteenth century, so did the art of creating mechanical people and animals. Jacques Vaucason created numerous working figures, including a flute player, which actually played the instrument, in 1738, plus this duck from 1739. The gilded copper bird could sit, stand, splash around in water, quack and even give the impression of eating food and digesting it:"

Amazing Automatons: Ancient Robots & Victorian Androids

(Thanks, Marilyn, via Submitterator)

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