When did the time unit "carved" first appear, and which country first used this expression.

China, of course. According to the Records of Leaked Engraving in the Liang Dynasty, the leaky carving originated from the legendary Yellow Emperor era. According to records and archaeological evidence, it was strictly used in the Han Dynasty.

Leak engraving is the oldest timing equipment in China. Leakage is a leaky pot, and the passage of time is measured by the amount of water leakage, which is a timekeeper; Lettering is a graduated scale, which is used to indicate the specific time reflected by water leakage, and it is a time telling device. A time measuring device-leaky engraving is produced by combining leaky engraving. According to the Records of Leaked Engraving in the Liang Dynasty, the leaky carving originated from the legendary Yellow Emperor era. There is leakage first, then there is engraving, that is, it is very troublesome to measure time by how many pots are leaked at first, and it is difficult to accurately time, so there is a leaky pot with a mark engraved on the pot wall. According to records and archaeological evidence, it was strictly used in the Han Dynasty. Xu Shen's Shuo Wen Jie Zi in the Han Dynasty said: "Leak, connect water with copper (copper pot); Carve a festival and stay up all night. " It can be inferred that the time in the Han Dynasty was measured in a quarter of an hour. At that time, the time was slightly less than I5 minutes, which is related to the fact that we call 15 minutes a quarter of an hour today.

The leaky carving is also called the water clock. Before the appearance of mechanical clock, it was always the main equipment for court timing. In the Han Dynasty, there was water leakage with compensation pot, which could keep constant water pressure. Zhang Hengshi connected the leaky carving with siphon with the armillary sphere, and made the automatic water transport armillary sphere. In the Tang Dynasty, a group of monks also transformed the leaky carving into a "clock" that can automatically tell the time. In the Song Dynasty, Yan Su used the overflow principle to create the lotus leakage, which made the manufacture of the leakage carving a formula and used it for hundreds of years.

State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping

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What is the unit of carving?

In ancient times, besides sundials, time was also measured by clepsydra. This timing method divides a day and night into 100 minutes (one minute is equivalent to today's 14.4 minutes), so there is a saying of "carving" in ancient languages.

The "leakage" in the "missing carving" refers to the leaky pot; "Carving" means carving a sword. Cleavage is a more useful timer than sundial. It can be used for timing and punctuality, and is not limited by night and weather changes.

The earliest clepsydra was very simple. It was a pot with a hanging beam, with a small hole at the bottom and a scale on the handle of the arrow. You can judge the time by the proportion of water retreating.

After continuous improvement, the structure of the missing carving is more and more perfect. At present, the most complete carving of ancient missing time in China was in the Yuan Dynasty, and it is now in the Chinese History Museum. This set of leaky pots consists of four leaky pots, which are placed on a stepped pedestal and are 2.64 meters high. From top to bottom, the top leaky pot is called the day pot, the second floor is called the moon pot, the third floor is called the star pot, and the bottom floor is called the collection pot. There is a dripping faucet at the lower part of the Sun Moon Star Pot, and the water drips down the faucet in turn. There is a fixed copper ruler in the center of the copper cover of the pot, and the words "Time to Hai" are engraved from top to bottom, * * * twelve o'clock. There is also a wooden floating arrow, fixed on the column, close to the copper ruler, pointing to the time scale.

Leak carving has always played an important role in the ancient timekeeping in China, and it was not until modern western clocks and watches were introduced to China and popularized that they gradually withdrew from the historical stage.

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