Monday, 24 October 2011

Bessler's defence statement

It has often been suggested that perhaps Bessler was not as innocent as he claimed, otherwise he would have done more to defend himself against the claims of the maid. Well he did, but the records of his defence are unpublished as yet.

On New Year's day in 1728, shortly after the maid's accusations were made, Bessler began writing a 60 page statement concerning the claims of his maid and others and answering all accusations with a strong and righteous defence. I have a copy which, unfortunately, is largely illegible (for me at least) as it is the version Bessler kept for his records. The clean copy is undergoing restoration currently and may not be available for some time to come.

The little I have been given reveals that he complains frequently about the 'evil maid' and also about a large group of conspirators who have acted against him. They include several of his first wife's in-laws, including his former mother-in-law, his sisters-in-law and their husbands and other hangers on. His father-in-law was dead and therefore his wife was left to her own devices and she had little or no money and so she headed for Kassel to ingratiate herself with her daughter, Barbara, who unfortunately died in May 1726. Apparently the mother-in-law, also called Barbara, tried to manipulate Bessler to her financial advantage. His official title of Commercial Councellor gave him access to a number of schemes, some of the funding of which, she tried to divert for her own purposes. It seems that the accusations of the maid may well have been instigated by Barbara senior in an effort to threaten/blackmail Bessler into giving in to her coercions.

If this seems unlikely, remember that the maid had already served two prison sentences - and Barbara senior was the subject of a thirteen year long investigation into an infanticide in which herself, her maid and two of her daughters was involved.  The legal investigators had been searching for the maid who was 'lost', and it is suggested that with Barabara senior's husband's death and therfore the withdrawal of his protection as Mayor of their towm she had to flee, and so she headed for the maid's home and her recently deceased daughter. The baby in question might have been Bessler's, conceived on an earlier visit, but there is no evidence yet to prove or disprove that possibility.

I look forward to the day when the cleaned document is available and we can at last get the other side of the story.

JC

Thursday, 20 October 2011

Johann Bessler's Hydrostatic balance.

In 1720 Johann Bessler is recorded as having made a hydrostatic balance for Johann Adam Cass. I have included a picture of it, as it still exists in the Landesmuseum in Kassel. I don't know how much of the whole instrument was down to Bessler, but looks well made.


This picture is from a book written by Henri Michel, called "Scientific Instruments in Art and History" Viking 1967.  He writes:-
"The balance shown here was made in 1720, by Johann Ernst Elias Bessler (1680- 1745), (known as Orffyreus, and notorious for his "Wheel" or perpetual motion machine) for the military engineer Johann Adam Cass of Kassel".

There is also a picture of the same instrument in "Die Naturwissenschaftlich-Technischesammlung" by Ludolf Von Mackensen (Kassel: George Wenderloth Verlag, 1991).

It will be recalled that Johann Adam Cass was a witness and one of the signatories and chief examiner of the Gera wheel. It seems that he moved to Kassel shortly after Bessler, to be in charge of military engineering there there.

In 1720 Cass published a book called "Neu verbesserter Ingenieur" which means "New Advanced Engineering", In 1722 he published "Nouveau corrige ou par des demostrations guide de l'ingenieur à la veritable mathematique",meaning "New or corrected by demonstration, Engineering Guide to mathematical truth". These publications were sponsored by Karl, the Landgrave.

The hydrostatic balance was a frequent component of perpetual motion designs and is still sometimes introduced as part of the mechanism.  Bessler seems to have included them in some of his Maschinen Tractate designs

I have also included the concept in my own designs from time to time but in the end I prefer the simplicity of weights, but are we denying the potential benefits of a the hydrostatic balance?  I don't think so.

JC

Thursday, 13 October 2011

A real Bessler documentary on the cards?

Wow! You guys have been busy, it's taken me an hour just to catch up on all your comments. I hate to interrupt the flow with a blog but perhaps you can continue here or on the previous blog?

I'm back after a delightful week in sunny Spain, and among the emails awaiting me, I received an interesting one from an Italian documentary maker, who wishes to produce a film about Johann Bessler.

They say that they would use me as the main narrator (God help them!) and intend to film in the Trivulziana Library of the Castello Sforzesco in Milan. Interestingly for me, somebody on the Bessler forum kindly brough to my attention the existence of another copy of Das Triumphirende which is held at that this particular library.  I was able  to obtain high definition copies of their portraits from the library. This is the only other example that I'm aware of which includes the double portraits with the hole in one as did my own copy, which I used to have but which I passed on to another, safer pair of hands.

I assume (at this early stage I have no details) that if we are to film in this famous library, that I shall be able to see and examine this copy and I am delighted at the prospect.

The company, FarmStudioFactory, are an Italian film and television production company, but appear to make films for other people so it will be interesting to try to get some background on this to see where the idea originated.  I scraped up a few details on the library as I was so interested in it and this is what I found:-
"Along with the Cathedral - Milan's most famous and much beloved monument - the big Castle is linked to the vicissitudes and dramatic events that the city has experienced over the past centuries. For many years, in fact, it has represented a symbol of the power in the hands of the Dukes, as well as of the foreign dominators. Only at the beginning of the 20th century the Castle assumed its distinctive role, becoming a place of culture, which hosted numerous Lombard art collections. The Castle was named after Francesco Sforza, who transformed it into a ducal residence in 1450. But its origins date back to the second half of the 14th century, at the time of Galeazzo II Visconti.
Hosted inside the Castello Sforzesco is the revered Trivulziana Library. The library can be accessed to examine parchments, documents, records and prints. The Historic Archive preserves all the acts of the Municipality of Milan and of the Duchy dating back as far as 1385."
I also would like to know the history, the provenance,  of this particular copy of the Das Tri and how it came to reside in Italy. I have always believed that the other countries of Europe might hold some further accounts of Johann Bessler and it seems to me that a documentary about him could engage the attention of the right people to bring such information to the surface.

I'll tell you more when I know more. I should not get too excited as this kind of thing has happened to me before, more than once, and the project has always gone out like a damp squib!

JC

Monday, 3 October 2011

Pendulums again.

Still trying to find the time to make my latest mechanism, unfortunately another week in Spain looms close, so it looks as though I'll be delayed again! Who am I kidding, I love it there! This week has seen the hottest October since records began, with temperatures of 29 degrees Celsius( that's 84F deg in real money!) - I know that's not particularly hot but for October its just amazing. It's all going downhill again on Tuesday so it looks as though my trip is timed to perfection. I will be connected there so I can keep any eye on things and maybe even write a blog about the wine, beer and sangria!

I'm tangled up in thoughts about the second drawing in Das Tri at the moment, and trying to discern exactly what Bessler was trying to tell us with the double drawing. The large triangular pendulum is intriguing and the three different angles seem to point, in my opinion, to the thirty degrees at the bottom - maybe its critical? I have the thought that a weight about to fall through 90 degrees ( a quarter) would need to be leaning a little in order to begin its fall as soon as possible. Each number on the clock is seperated by thirty degrees, so one o'clock is thirty degrees from twelve o'clock. Should we start the fall at one o'clock to stop at three o'clock?

JC

Johann Bessler’s Coded Secret Information is Ignored.

I expect everyone knows I believe Bessler’s wheel had five mechanisms.  Before you move on and dismiss what I’m going to write, just hang on...