Museo Galileo
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Virtual Museum
Container for Landriani's "Chronohyometer"
    • Setting:
      Room XIV
    • Inventor:
      Marsilio Landriani
    • Maker:
      unknown
    • Place:
      Italian
    • Date:
      late 18th cent.
    • Materials:
      zinc, glass, ivory
    • Dimensions:
      height 480 mm
    • Inventory:
      3926
    • Container for Landriani's "Chronohyometer" (Inv. 3926)

This is a part of the "chronohyometer" invented by Marsilio Landriani c. 1780. The instrument was originally a pluviograph (rain gauge). It consisted of an open-air collector that conveyed the rainwater into a small funnel connected to a moving lever. The filling of the funnel caused the lowering of the lever. This, in turn, actuated a white pencil that left a mark on a blackened disk, driven by clockwork., The funnel was periodically emptied through a small glass siphon into the rain-gauge container. This consisted of a cylinder closed at the bottom and fitted with a faucet and vertical tube. The quantity of rain was measured in the container. A series of small glass siphons, used to empty the funnel, has survived.