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Hydrostatics and hydraulics
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Hydrostatics studies the laws of the equilibrium of fluids, while hydraulics deals mainly with the practical problems relating to the motion of water and the use of its force. Some important observations on bodies immersed or floating in water are attributed to Archimedes, while dozens of different hydraulic apparatuses were known since antiquity.

Galileo studied the phenomena of bodies immersed in water, proposed a different version of the hydrostatic balance, and made some interesting observations on pumps. In the seventeenth century, Blaise Pascal clarified the basic concepts of hydrostatics, while in the eighteenth century Leonhard Euler and Daniel Bernoulli laid the foundations of modern hydrodynamics.

Eighteenth-century collections of scientific instruments commonly included—in addition to devices for demonstrating the hydrostatic paradox—many models of hydraulic machines such as pumps, water-screws, and Hero's fountains.

Objects
Apparatus for showing the hydrostatic paradox

Apparatus for showing the hydrostatic paradox

Inv. 1370
Maker unknown, second half 18th cent.

Apparatus for showing the parabolic path of liquids

Apparatus for showing the parabolic path of liquids

Inv. 1024
Maker unknown, second half 18th cent.

Castelli hydraulic pump (hydraulic fan)

Castelli hydraulic pump (hydraulic fan)

Inv. 1029
Maker unknown, Florence, 1794

Hero's fountain

Hero's fountain

Inv. 2153
Maker unknown, second half 18th cent.

Mixing faucet

Mixing faucet

Inv. 1014
Giuseppe Leonardi, Milan, 1824

Model of Archimedean screw or cochlea

Model of Archimedean screw or cochlea

Inv. 998
Maker unknown, second half 18th cent.

Model of Archimedean screw or cochlea

Model of Archimedean screw or cochlea

Inv. 999
Maker unknown, second half 18th cent.

Model of hydraulic pump with alterations by Sisson

Model of hydraulic pump with alterations by Sisson

Inv. 978/a, 3775
Maker unknown, English?, second half 18th cent.