完訳 からくり図彙 注解付き［改訂版］

Karakuri Zui (Annotated, Revised)

€85 — VAT included

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In 1796 Hanzo Hosokawa published a manual for building automata: a doll that carries a cup of tea across the tatami, stops when the cup is lifted, turns, and goes back. It is generally counted as Japan's first book of mechanical engineering. This edition sets the original woodblock plates beside a modern annotated reading, with the mechanisms lettered so you can follow gut string, whalebone spring and wooden cam through the drawing. The band around the cover calls it the origin of the Japanese robot. That is a publisher's line, but not a foolish one — the tea doll is built to be charming rather than useful, which is a decision about machines that this country has gone on making. Namiki Shobo, revised edition. Japanese text; the plates need no translation.