Robots, clocks and computers: How Ancient Greeks got there first

A humanoid figure dressed as a maid holds a jug in its right hand and, as hidden gears click and whirr, lifts it and pours wine into a cup a bystander has placed into the palm of its left.
The robot is a recreation of the automatic servant of Philon, designed more than 2,200 years ago by a Greek engineer and operating through a complex mechanism of springs, weights and air pressure that also allowed it to dilute the alcohol with water.
It is the focal point of an exhibition of more than 100 inventions that highlight the vast extent of Ancient Greece's technological legacy and also features an analogue computer, an alarm clock and automatic fire doors.
"By just opening up the hood of a modern car, you will see bolts and nuts, screws, automatic pilots. All of these were just some of the inventions [pioneered]... by the ancient Greeks that were the building blocks of...

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