Editing Clock tower (section)

==History==
[[File:Tower of the Winds.jpg|thumb|left|The [[Tower of the Winds]] in [[Athens]], built {{Circa|50 BC}} during [[Roman Greece]]]]
Although clock towers are today mostly admired for their aesthetics, they once served an important purpose. Before the middle of the twentieth century, most people did not have watches, and prior to the 18th century even home clocks were rare. The first [[clock]]s did not have faces, but were solely [[striking clock]]s, which sounded bells to call the surrounding community to work or to prayer. They were therefore placed in towers so the bells would be audible for a long distance. Clock towers were placed near the centres of towns and were often the tallest structures there. As clock towers became more common, the designers realized that a [[Clock face|dial]] on the outside of the tower would allow the townspeople to read the time whenever they wanted.

The use of clock towers dates back to [[Ancient history|antiquity]]. The earliest clock tower was the [[Tower of the Winds]] in [[Athens]], which featured eight [[sundial]]s and was created in the 1st century BC during the period of [[Roman Greece]]. In its interior, there was also a [[water clock]] (or clepsydra), driven by water coming down from the [[Acropolis, Athens|Acropolis]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Noble |first1=Joseph V. |last2=de Solla Price |first2=Derek J. |title=The Water Clock in the Tower of the Winds |journal=[[American Journal of Archaeology]] |date=1968 |volume=72 |issue=4 |pages=345–355 (353) |doi=10.2307/503828 |jstor=503828 |s2cid=193112893 }}</ref>

[[File:Villard de honnecourt skizze turm.gif|thumb|right|upright=.70|Presumably the first depiction of a medieval central European clock tower (without the actual [[turret clock]]) in the 13th century by [[Villard de Honnecourt]]]]

In [[Song dynasty]] [[History of China|China]], an [[astronomical clock]] tower was designed by [[Su Song]] and erected at [[Kaifeng]] in 1088, featuring a liquid [[escapement]] mechanism.<ref>Bodde, Derk (1991), ''Chinese Thought, Society, and Science'', Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, p. 140.</ref> In England, a clock was put up in a clock tower, the medieval precursor to [[Big Ben]], at [[City of Westminster|Westminster]], in 1288;<ref name="Britannica">Clocks, ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' 5, 835 (1951).</ref><ref>Frederick Tupper, Jr., 'Anglo-Saxon Dæg-Mæl', ''Publications of the Modern Language Association of America'', Vol. 10, No. 2 (1895), p. 130, citing ''Archæologia'', v, 416.</ref> and in 1292 a clock was put up in [[Canterbury Cathedral]].<ref name="Britannica" /> The oldest surviving turret clock formerly part of a clock tower in Europe is the [[Salisbury Cathedral clock]], completed around 1390. A clock put up at [[St. Albans]], in 1326, 'showed various astronomical phenomena'.<ref name="Britannica" />

[[Al-Jazari]] of the [[Artuqid dynasty]] in [[Upper Mesopotamia]] constructed an elaborate clock called the "castle clock" and described it in his ''Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices'' in 1206. It was about {{convert|3.3|m|ft|abbr=off}} high, and had multiple functions alongside [[timekeeping]]. It included a display of the [[zodiac]] and the solar and lunar paths, and a pointer in the shape of the [[Crescent|crescent moon]] that travelled across the top of a [[gate]]way, moved by a hidden [[cart]] and causing automatic doors to open, each revealing a [[mannequin]], every hour.<ref>Howard R. Turner (1997), ''Science in Medieval Islam: An Illustrated Introduction'', p. 184. [[University of Texas Press]], {{ISBN|0-292-78149-0}}.</ref><ref>[[Donald Routledge Hill]], "Mechanical Engineering in the Medieval Near East", ''Scientific American'', May 1991, p. 64-69. ([[cf.]] [[Donald Routledge Hill]], [http://home.swipnet.se/islam/articles/HistoryofSciences.htm Mechanical Engineering] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071225091836/http://home.swipnet.se/islam/articles/HistoryofSciences.htm |date=December 25, 2007 }})</ref> It was possible to re-program the length of [[Daytime (astronomy)|day]] and [[night]] daily in order to account for the changing lengths of day and night throughout the year, and it also featured five [[robot]]ic musicians who automatically play music when moved by [[lever]]s operated by a hidden [[camshaft]] attached to a [[water wheel]].

Line (mains) synchronous tower clocks were introduced in the United States in the 1920s.