ANCIENT DISCOVERIES: Ancient Power

How did the Ancient harness Power? Did the inventors of the classical era and beyond have an understanding of the amazing power and properties of modern inventions?

Did Archimedes use solar power to defeat the Romans? Was he the first to concentrate the power of the sun? Early historical accounts of the battle of Syracuse in 212BC claim that Archimedes used polished shields to focus light onto the sails of the invading Roman ships and set them ablaze. But there are other intriguing and incredible objects.

Sitting in the National Museum of Iraq is an earthenware jar about the size of a man's fist. Its existence could require history books throughout the world to be rewritten. The jar appears to be an electric battery pre-dating Christ. Did the ancient world master electricity nearly two millennia before the modern world?

A recent discovery of a floor mill in Barbegal, southern France contained 16 waterwheels which operated the mill. Is this one of the first examples of a Roman Industrial revolution technology - 1800 years before our own?