the.com/watermill
a river convinced to do your chores while it pretends to just keep flowing
means A mill whose machinery is driven by a waterwheel turned by flowing or falling water, traditionally used to grind grain.
from A plain compound of "water" and "mill," both Old English words: "water" from wæter and "mill" from mylen, itself borrowed early from Latin molina ("grinder"), related to molere, "to grind." The thing is far older than the English name — the Romans were already harnessing rivers this way — but the word simply bolts the source to the machine: the water that does the work, and the mill that takes the credit.
- ancient tech
- Romans ground grain with them over 2,000 years ago
- power scale
- Once outnumbered England's people-driven industry entirely
- two flavors
- Undershot, overshot — physics decides which spins harder
- domesday count
- England had 6,000 mills recorded in 1086
- slow death
- Steam engines ended their reign in the 1800s
peirce mill — historic gristmill on rock creek in washington dc, operated since 1820
philipsburg manor — restored 17th-century watermill in tarrytown, new york that ground grain for decades
claude monet's giverny mill — french impressionist's water mill and pond in vernon that he painted obsessively in the 1890s