Ancient Greece:modrn Ship Bldg [DVD]

Description

Modern warships, cargo, and container ships are the cutting edge of maritime technology. But 2,500 years ago, no one dominated shipbuilding like the Greeks. We travel to Greece for a firsthand look at how their maritime expertise evolved. We examine a reproduction of the Greek warship called a trireme. A 3-D CGI reproduction captures the grandeur of the gigantic cargo ship the Syracusia. Host Michael Guillen demonstrates an Archimedean Screw--designed to pump water out of a ship's hold. He also demonstrates Archimedes' most famous discovery: the principle of buoyancy, a key component in any shipbuilding process. In England, we investigate the Antikythera device. After decades of study, historians have concluded that it was actually a celestial computer that tracked the movement of the Sun, Moon, Mars, Venus, Mercury, and a handful of stars. And on the Greek island Kalymnos, we learn how sponge diving evolved into the lucrative business of salvage diving.