So I was on a comment section of a video about the Islamic golden age and there was this guy that says that Charlemagne receive a brass water clock by the Abbasid caliph in Baghdad, Harun al-Rashid in 807 ad
What he also says is that they (Charlemagne and the Frank's) though that the clock was which craft.
Did he receive a clock like that ?
Did they think that it was which craft ?
Also, how did Europeans reacted to such things as mechanical clocks, moving (statues?) like those in Constantinople (lions that roared and moved and golden birds that sing)
Thanks in advance
Annales regni Francorum does account for an embassy in 807 from "the king of Persia" made of his legate Abdella [Abdallah] and two monks missioned by the patriarch of Jerusalem (one of them being a native of Germania). The gifts they brang made a great impression on the court, among them a lined tent and huge wall tapestries of magnificent size and colours, perfumes, oinments and balms, precious silk cloakes
and furthermore a brass clock wonderfully assembled by means of mechanical art. the course of the twelve hours encircled the face and with small brass ball falling as the hour was finished and ringing by their fall a cymbal set below. There was furthermore a same numbers of horsemen going out twelve openings at the end of the hours and closed, by going out, the opening that were previously closed. There was also a lot of things in this clock that would be too long to describe there.
You might notice the lack of "witchraft!" and rather an admirative interest before this " arte mechanica mirifice conpositum ", wonderfully assembled by means of mechanical art. Not a moment the author of the Annals is questioning the nature of the clock.
Unfortunately, we don't know how it worked : it was quite possibly hydraulic, in continuing the tradition of Late Ancient clocks such as described by Procopus, but with the addition of falling balls ringing hours sourced elsewhere in medieval Arabo-Islamic treaties.
Liutprand of Cremona provides with a description of his embassy and reception by Constantine VII in 949.
In front of the emperor’s throne was set up a tree of gilded bronze, its branches filled with birds, likewise made of bronze gilded over, and these emitted cries appropriate to their species. Now the emperor’s throne was made in such a cunning manner that at one moment it was down on the ground, while at another it rose higher and was to be seen up in the air. This throne was of immense size and was, as it were, guarded by lions, made either of bronze or wood covered with gold, which struck the ground with their tails and roared with open mouth and quivering tongue. Leaning on the shoulders of two eunuchs, I was brought into the emperor’s presence. As I came up the lions began to roar and the birds to twitter, each according to its kind, but I was moved neither by fear nor astonishment . . . After I had done obeisance to the Emperor by prostrating myself three times, I lifted my head, and behold! the man whom I had just seen sitting at a moderate height from the ground had now changed his vestments and was sitting as high as the ceiling of the hall.
What's showing trough is that the intended audiance or recievers of mechanical displays or gifts were to feel, and did felt, admiration before these mechanical prowesses, imitating or mastering what would have been restricted to the "natural" order mickmiked by mechanical automa.
