Stage 3 - Investigation 23/01/10

The first ever recalled orrery was in 250BC although during that time, people had a different view and only knew of 5 planets around us. On a website it says; "The device imitated the motions of the sun and the moon as well as the five planets known at that time." A roman poet called Cicero said that it represented the moon and could even show eclipses around a short period of time. It wasn't accurate as it only had 5 planets, and during this time, no-one really knew of anything in space, and had no knowledge of how Earth existed, and were very religious during this period, meaning they weren't really interested in our solar system. From the photograph, it looks like the orrery was made from a stone-like material, and maybe carved with some sort of utensils. This would have been because they did not have any other materials or skills of which to use them with. However, the orrery does look like it would have taken a long time to make.

An orrery was made in 1712 by an english clockmaker called George Graham . It was a construction representing the Earth moving by clockwork and it was very precise with the Earth spinning on its axis and with its moon all orbiting the Sun and because of George Graham, we now have the word 'orrery'. However, the orrery couldn't be that accurate as they were yet to find out exactly how many planets were in our solar system and of they're mass relative to each other.

The largest orrery was built in 1744 and its still in use today. It was built into the ceiling of someone's living room, and the materials used include; wooden tyres, disks and nails. It is all very accurate with each planets time taken to move around the Sun. These materials were used probably because of availability at the time and the tools they had, for example they wouldn't have had a welder, therefore no metal could be used.

Nowadays, orreries are used widely in primary schools to help children understand space and planets. Also, some keen astromonists/scientists/geographer's like to have an orrery in their home or at their desk at work.

Orreries range in price from £10 to £1000's based on the accuracy, size and materials used to make it.