Greek Fire: A Byzantine Mystery
What Was Greek Fire? Greek fire was a Byzantine incendiary weapon, deployed at sea from the late seventh century onward, that burned on water, clung to wood and flesh, and could be extinguished only with great difficulty. The Byzantines projected it from bronze siphons mounted on warships, used it in hand grenades, and guarded its […]
The Baghdad Battery: Ancient Electricity
What Is the Baghdad Battery? The Baghdad Battery is a clay jar, roughly thirteen centimeters tall, holding a copper cylinder and an iron rod, recovered near Baghdad in the late 1930s and dated by most scholars to the Parthian or early Sasanian period (roughly 250 BCE to 650 CE). Wilhelm König, who studied it at […]