Talk:Trammel of Archimedes

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The article links to Archimedes without any explanation of the historical context of the Trammel of Archimedes. Is Archimedes credited with inventing the device, or simply describing the underlying principles of the ellipse? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.94.157.242 (talk • contribs)

That's a good question (which I don't know the answer to, unfortunately.) You may want to try asking over at the Reference desk. Siawase (talk) 18:08, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Useless Machine

The article suggests by its references (both forward and backward) that the trammel is a useless machine. Seeing how the trammel is (other than construction with a piece of rope and two nails) the only known way of -precisely- manufacturing an ellipse in e.g. woodworking or metalworking, the machine most definitively serves a useful purpose. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.192.110.134 (talk) 15:34, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Tusi Couple

This article seems incorrect. I believe this is properly described as a Tusi Couple which has it's own page. Originally discovered in the 13th century. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Veloman (talk • contribs) 00:10, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

It can also be used to make a circle: sources: numberphile channel Bueatiful Trigonometry on youtube(June 16, 2020); Youtube: mathloger - secrets of the nothing grinder, december 2019. It is related to an elipsograph — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.82.110.99 (talk) 18:56, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Where does the name "trammel of archimedes" come from?

The oldest use of the name trammel of Archimedes I can find is from ~1940 by Robert C. Yates, and before about 2000 that name was extremely rare. Among the few other early sources I can find is Cundy and Rollett (1961) [1951]. As another example, Apostol and Mnatsakanian (2009) JSTOR 27642689 cite Yates for the name. But older sources (and some newer) of which there are many dating back to the 17th century if not before just call it an elliptic trammel or elliptic compass or the like. Dörrie (1965) [1932] just calls it a trammel. It doesn't seem like Archimedes is involved with it in any way, as far as I can tell. Does anyone know how his name got attached / when? Did Yates make it up or get it from somewhere else? Were there other influential sources? It even seems plausible that Wikipedia itself has been responsible for popularizing the name.

It's not clear to me that "Trammel of Archimedes" is really the most appropriate title for this article. it might be better to have a more general article about tools for drawing ellipses, called ellipsograph or the like, and make this just one section of it. –jacobolus (t) 08:19, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

I think this might be an answer, from Gunther (1923), Early Science in Oxford, p. 138:

The principle involved in the elliptical trammel was known to the Greek geometers. Proclus (A.D. 410–485), of the Platonic school at Athens, in his commentary to Euclid, gave a method for the mechanical construction of an ellipse, which was based on the use of the instrument described by Nicomedes (born about 270 B.C.) (my bold).

So it seems Yates (or someone before him) got Nicomedes confused for Archimedes. But note that Nicomedes' instrument as used by Proclus to draw an ellipse is not the same as the device under discussion here; it's only based on some of the same underlying mathematical relations. –jacobolus (t) 09:06, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

A footnote in Blake (1900) "The Ellipsograph of Proclus" JSTOR 2369752:

The discovery of the first property is accredited to Proclus; Chasles, "Aperçu historique," p. 49. The well-known chuck for turning figures with elliptical cross-sections, invented by Leonardo da Vinci, is an application of the mechanism. For other historical notes, see Burmester. "Lehrbuch der Kinematik I," Leipzig, 1888, pp. 36-42; A. v. Braunmühl, "Studie über Curvenerzeugung" in the "Katalog mathematischer Modelle," by Dyck.

–jacobolus (t) 09:32, 30 June 2024 (UTC)