The 2,000-Year-Old Vending Machine

The 2,000-Year-Old Vending Machine

The first vending machine was built 2,000 years ago, because people kept stealing holy water. 🏺💧

In the 1st century AD, Hero of Alexandria designed a temple jar that only poured holy water when you paid. No electricity, no springs, no gears: a coin falls on a tiny dish, tips a little seesaw, lifts a plug and lets the water flow, until the coin slides off and the plug drops shut. It's the same lever trick that's inside your toilet tank today. Then the idea vanished for 1,500 years, until English taverns brought back coin-operated "honour boxes" for tobacco.

Would this jar have stopped you? 👇

Sources: Hero of Alexandria, "Pneumatica", chapter 21 (tr. Bennet Woodcroft, 1851); MacTutor History of Mathematics, "Hero of Alexandria"; Smithsonian Magazine; SFO Museum, "The Automatic Age".

#history #ancientegypt #shorts