The Vitruvius' Tale of Archimedes and the Golden Crown

TL;DR

This paper explores the historical method attributed to Archimedes for determining gold purity in a crown, analyzing its practicality through experiments based on Vitruvius's description of water displacement techniques.

Contribution

It provides a detailed discussion and experimental validation of the ancient water displacement method for measuring irregular objects' volume, as described by Vitruvius.

Findings

The water displacement method is feasible with a water-clock vessel.

Experimental results support the historical account of Archimedes' technique.

The method's accuracy depends on precise volume measurements.

Abstract

The paper discusses the tale that we can find in "The Architecture" by Vitruvius, on a method used by Archimedes to determine the percentage of gold and silver in a crown. The method is based on the immersion of bodies, allowing the evaluation of their volume in the case of irregular shapes. The measurement, as reported in "The Architecture", seems to be difficult to realize. But, using a vessel for a water-clock, the approach that Vitruvius described is possible. Here the discussion and experiments.