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Mediaeval kites and Windsocks

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 July 2016

Clive Hart
Clive Hart*
Affiliation:
Department of English, University of Dundee
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Extract

We have grown used to the idea that in the Middle Ages inventors produced several forerunners, either real or imaginary, of modern aerodynamic devices. The helicopter was designed, in principle, before Leonardo, while the rigid aerofoil, in the form of the plane-surface kite, achieved a remarkable degree of sophistication before the end of the sixteenth century. It has commonly been assumed that among these mediaeval inventions we should include some sort of three-dimensional kite, a precursor of Hargrave's box-kite, either in the form of a windsock equipped with wings, or in that of a primitive hot-air balloon, with or without additional lifting force provided by wings. I wish to examine the evidence for the existence of these objects, and to make a fresh assessment of the likelihood of their ever having flown.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Aeronautical Journal , Volume 73 , Issue 708 , December 1969 , pp. 1019 - 1026
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Aeronautical Society 1969 

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References

References and Footnotes

1. Feldhaus, F. M., Die Technik der Vorzeit, Leipzig and Berlin, 1914, cols. 650-9Google Scholar; Berthelot, M., “Histoire des machines de guerre et des arts mécaniques au moyen âge”, Annates de chimie et de physique, 7e s, vol 19, pp 289–420, 1900 Google Scholar; von Romocki, S. J., Geschichte der Explo-sivstoffe, 2 vols, Berlin, 1895-6, vol I, pp 160-2Google Scholar.

2. Niedersächsische Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek, Göttingen, Codex phil 63.

3. Aim Marc XVI, 10, 7; Arrian, tact XXXV, 3; Suidas 119, 307; Lucian, De conscrib hist, 29; Hist Aug. Aureliani XXVIII, 5.

4. Rahn, I. R. (ed.) Das Psalterium aureum von Sand Gallen, St Gallen, p 33 Google Scholar and plate X, 1878.

5. See the Phaidon reproduction, ed. Sir Frank Stenton, London, plate 71, 1957.

6. Dlugosz F., Historia polonia, Leipzig, 1711, f 679. Dlugosz lived from 1415 to 1480.

7. Denk, F., Zwei mittelalterliche Dokumente zur Flug- geschichte und ihre Deutung. Sitzungsberichte der Physikalisch-medizinischen Sozietat in Erlangen, vol 71, pp 353-68. 1940 Google Scholar.

8. Quarg, G., Der Bellifortis von Conrad Kyeser aus Eichstätt, 1405, Technik Geschichte, vol 32, No 4, 1965, pp 26-8Google Scholar.

9. Oesterreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna, codex 3064, ff 4-7.

10. Hart, Clive, Kites: an Historical Survey, London, 1967, pp 68–70 Google Scholar, and Denk, op cit.

11. Some of these are reproduced in Feldhaus, op cit, and elsewhere; others are reproduced here for the first time.

12. The partial chronology given in Quarg, op cit, pp 7 ff, and in his introduction to the facsimile edition, Conrad Kyeser aus Eichstätt: Bellifortis, 2 vols, Düsseldorf, 1967, vol I, pp xxv-xxxii, is certainly faulty in several respects. Space is lacking here, however, to enter into the complex palaeographical issues involved.

13. Oesterreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna, codex 3062, f 128r.

14. Milemete, W. De, De nobilitatibus, sapientiis, et pru- dentiis regum, Christ Church, Oxford, ms 92, ff 77v-78r; ed James, M. R., London, 1913, pp 154-5Google Scholar.

15. Duhem, J., Les idées aéronautiques avant Montgolfier, 2 vols, Paris, 1943, vol 2, p 36.Google Scholar

16. Da Fontana, G. Metrologum de pisce cane et volucre, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munchen, codex icon 242, f 37r (early 15th century)Google Scholar.

17. Da Fontana. G. Metrologum de pisce cane et volucre, Biblioteca Universitaria di Bologna, ms 2705, ff 95T-96T.

18. Partington, J. R., suggested, very rightly, that “Fontana was within reach of the jet-propelled kite”. See his A History of Greek Fire and Gunpowder, Cambridge, 1960, p 162.Google Scholar

19. Giovanni della Porta, Magiae naturalis… libri iiii, Naples, 1558, pp 69-70.

20. Schwenter, D., Deliciae physico-mathematicae, Nörnberg, 1636, pp 472-5.