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In medieval and ancient philosophy, the Wheel of Fortune or Rota Fortunae is a symbol of the capricious nature of Fate. The wheel belongs to the goddess Fortuna ( Greek equivalent: Tyche ) who spins it at random, changing the positions of those on the wheel: some suffer great misfortune, others gain windfalls.
The Spinning Wheel is also the title/subject of a classic Irish folk song by John Francis Waller. [51] [52] A traditional Irish folk song, Túirne Mháire, is generally sung in praise of the spinning wheel, [53] but was regarded by Mrs Costelloe, who collected it, [54] as "much corrupted", and may have had a darker narrative. It is widely ...
Spinning is an ancient textile art in which plant, animal or synthetic fibres are drawn out and twisted together to form yarn. For thousands of years, fibre was spun by hand using simple tools, the spindle and distaff. After the introduction of the spinning wheel in the 13th century, the output of individual spinners increased dramatically.
Execution wheel (German: Richtrad) with underlays, 18th century; on display at the Märkisches Museum, Berlin The breaking wheel, also known as the execution wheel, the Wheel of Catherine or the (Saint) Catherine('s) Wheel, was a torture method used for public execution primarily in Europe from antiquity through the Middle Ages up to the 19th century by breaking the bones of a criminal or ...
Apart from treadwheels, medieval depictions also show cranes to be powered manually by windlasses with radiating spokes, cranks and by the 15th century also by windlasses shaped like a ship's wheel. To smooth out irregularities of impulse and get over 'dead-spots' in the lifting process flywheels are known to be in use as early as 1123.
In Baltic myth, Saule is the life-affirming sun goddess, whose numinous presence is signed by a wheel or a rosette. She spins the sunbeams. The Baltic connection between the sun and spinning is as old as spindles of the sun-stone, amber, that have been uncovered in burial mounds. Baltic legends as told have absorbed many images from ...
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The Spinning Wheel, by Northern Song (960–1127) artist Wang Juzheng. The Chinese invented the belt drive by the 1st century BC for silk quilling devices. [ 55 ] A print illustration from an encyclopedia depicting men employing the fining process to make wrought iron and working a blast furnace by smelting iron ore to produce pig iron.