Description
Builder of the first pinwheel design calculating clock, Poleni was a pioneer of mechanical computation. Made of wood, his calculating clock was built in 1709; he destroyed it after hearing that Antonius Braun had received 10,000 Guldens for dedicating a pinwheel machine of his own design to the emperor Charles VI of Vienna.
Poleni described his machine in his Miscellanea in 1709, but it was also described by Jacob Leupold in his Theatrum Machinarum Generale, ("The General Theory of Machines"), which was published in 1727.
