Who was Archimedes and tell about his Discoveries ?

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Archimedes was a Greek mathematician, philosopher and inventor who wrote important works on geometry, arithmetic and mechanics.

Archimedes was born in Syracuse on the eastern coast of Sicily and educated in Alexandria in Egypt. He then returned to Syracuse, where he spent most of the rest of his life, devoting his time to research and experimentation in many fields.

In mechanics he defined the principle of the lever and is credited with inventing the compound pulley and the hydraulic screw for raising water from a lower to higher level.

He is most famous for discovering the law of hydrostatics, sometimes known as 'Archimedes' principle', stating that a body immersed in fluid loses weight equal to the weight of the amount of fluid it displaces. Archimedes is supposed to have made this discovery when stepping into his bath, causing him to exclaim 'Eureka!'

Archimedes is the perfect embodiment of a man ahead of his time. Even amongst peers that practiced philosophy and the arts as well as established democracy, Archimedes of Syracuse outshined them all.A true polymath, Archimedes was active in the fields of astronomy, geometry, logic, physics, and mathematics, and was recognized as the best engineer and inventor of his time. As a part of his grand legacy, many of his inventions and discoveries from over 2,000 years ago are still in use today.

This ingeniously contrived device was invented by Archimedes to help poor farmers irrigate their crops.

The device consists of a screw mechanism inside a hollow casing. When the screw is rotated, either by windmill or manual labour, the bottom end of the screw scoops water, then moves it through the casing against gravity until it escapes through the last thread to reach irrigation canals.

the same principle is used in modern machinery for drainage and irrigation, and also in some types of high-speed tools. It can also be applied for handling light, loose materials such as grain, sand, and ashes. Of course, these look more impressive.

Throughout his career as an inventor, Archimedes would frequently be commissioned by the rulers of Syracuse to invent war machines to protect their fair city. Such is the case with his “burning mirrors” – a system of large mirrors placed on the walls of the city that concentrated solar power in order to burn any ships foolish enough to sail against Syracuse.

The story is extremely controversial, and even to this day historians and engineers alike debate whether this is a fact or myth.

The earliest account of Archimedes’ ancient death ray was written in the 12th century by Zonares and Tzetzes who were quoting an earlier, but now lost work called The Siege of Syracuse.

Apparently, in 1973 a Greek scientist, Dr. Ioannis Sakkas, became curious about whether Archimedes could really have used a “burning glass” to destroy the Roman fleet, so he set up an experiment involving 60 Greek sailors each using an oblong 3′ by 5′ flat mirror to focus light on a wooden rowboat 160 feet away.

The boat was set on fire fairly quickly, though it’s worth mentioning the boat was coated in tar paint, which is highly flammable. Tar paint was used frequently to coat ships back in Archimedes’ time.However, more recently, when the Mythbusters made their own reenactment, things didn’t go quite as smoothly. In 2010, 500 flat mirrors controlled by 500 volunteer middle and high school students were focused on the sail of a ship, which should have combusted at 500°F. After an hour, no more than 230°F could be reached, so the team classified this as ‘inconclusive’.

When faced with the challenge, Archimedes devised a clever science experiment to get to the bottom of things, but not until after thoroughly pondering the situation.

Legend has it that Archimedes was thinking about the golden crown while bathing in the public baths one day.

As he began to enter a cold bathtub for his final dip, he noticed water started dripping on the sides. As he continued to lower his body into the bath, even more water ran out over the sides of the tub.cc

He knew that if the crown was pure gold, its volume would be the same as that of the lump of gold (which he had made sure weighed the same as the crown), regardless of shape, and it would displace the same amount of water as the gold.

If the goldsmith had indeed cheated and replaced some of the gold with silver, then the volume of gold and silver would be greater, and thus the crown would displace more water. According to Vitruvius, Archimedes used this method and found the goldsmith had indeed cheated.

Archimedes, (born c. 287 BCE, Syracuse, Sicily [Italy]—died 212/211 BCE, Syracuse), the most-famous mathematician and inventor in ancient Greece. Archimedes is especially important for his discovery of the relation between the surface and volume of a sphere and its circumscribing cylinder.

He is known for his formulation of a hydrostatic principle (known as Archimedes’ principle) and a device for raising water, still used in developing countries, known as the Archimedes screw.

Archimedes probably spent some time in Egypt early in his career, but he resided for most of his life in Syracuse, the principal Greek city-state in Sicily, where he was on intimate terms with its king, Hieron II.

Archimedes published his works in the form of correspondence with the principal mathematicians of his time, including the Alexandrian scholars Conon of Samos and Eratosthenes of Cyrene.

He played an important role in the defense of Syracuse against the siege laid by the Romans in 213 BCE by constructing war machines so effective that they long delayed the capture of the city.

When Syracuse eventually fell to the Roman general Marcus Claudius Marcellus in the autumn of 212 or spring of 211 BCE, Archimedes was killed in the sack of the city.