the.com/clocks
a machine we built to chop the infinite into bills, alarms, and regret
means Devices that measure and display the passage of time, typically in hours, minutes, and seconds.
from From Middle English 'clok' or 'clokke,' borrowed from Middle Dutch 'clocke' or Old North French 'cloque' — all meaning 'bell.' This is no accident: the earliest mechanical clocks didn't have faces at all, they rang the hours. You heard time before you saw it. The word traces back to Medieval Latin 'clocca,' bell, possibly of Celtic origin. So every clock still carries a bell in its name, even the silent digital ones glowing on your nightstand.
- first mechanical
- medieval monks built them to nail prayer times
- no zero
- clocks count to twelve, never to nothing
- leap second
- Earth wobbles, so we secretly add seconds
- atomic precision
- best clocks lose one second in billions of years
- clockwise
- chosen to mimic a sundial's shadow
big ben — great bell in elizabeth tower, palace of westminster, london, rung since 1859
doomsday clock — bulletin of the atomic scientists symbolic timepiece set to 90 seconds to midnight in 2023
astronomical clock prague — medieval clock in old town square performing hourly shows since 1410