The ingenious wine-jug of Philon (3rd c. B.C.)
The first "intelligent" appliance of domestic use in human history It was a jug -conception of Philon of Byzantium- from which water, wine or watered-wine, depending on the will of the cupbearer, was poured automatically.
It consisted of a vertical diaphragm that separated the jug into the compartments of water and wine, and the outlet fluid pipes which, however, were found one inside the other so that outside the jug they appeared as one. The jug had an airtight lid which made it impossible for the fluids to flow at its inversion, because of the vacuum that was created by the inability to substitute the outlet fluids with air. Two tubes began in the middle of the jug (the one communicated wit ...
It consisted of a vertical diaphragm that separated the jug into the compartments of water and wine, and the outlet fluid pipes which, however, were found one inside the other so that outside the jug they appeared as one. The jug had an airtight lid which made it impossible for the fluids to flow at its inversion, because of the vacuum that was created by the inability to substitute the outlet fluids with air. Two tubes began in the middle of the jug (the one communicated wit ...
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Image and text © Archimede's Museum, 2022