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| von Drais's Non-BIKE |
Daft diversion this week has been wondering
what bikes the Olympian gods would have ridden if the ancient Greeks had invented
the velocipede. I have been moving house to Cambridgeshire with no functioning TV
or internet, yet somehow have still been deafened by the national media’s
obsession with ‘British supremacy’ at cycling in response to the feats of
Bradley Wiggins, Laura Trott etc.
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| Kirkpatrick MacMillan |
I don’t often pull my northern ancestry
card, but it needs pointing out that all three claimants to the title of ‘inventor
of the bicycle’ were actually Scotsmen: Kirkpatrick MacMillan, Gavin Dalzell
and Thomas McCall. (I do not count Baron Karl von Drais’s silly Laufmaschine, which was not a machine at
all, but a pedal-less glorified scooter). MacMillan was a blacksmith from
Dumfriesshire who worked, appropriately enough, at the Vulcan Foundry in
Glasgow. His 1839 two-wheeled vehicle really
did transmit power from human feet via crankshafts to rotating hubs.
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| Hephaestus' magic wheelchair |
Given that the ancient Greeks,
especially Vulcan/Hephaestus, were brilliant at mechanical engineering, I have
always been puzzled that they did not invent the bike. Hephaestus, who was
club-footed, made himself this elaborate chariot, but still ended up on most
vases riding a humble donkey.
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| ZEUS and HERA |
So while we unpacked the endless boxes
and worried that the cat might head off back to the Cotswolds, I mentally
suited pictures of historical bikes to some of the Olympians. Any suggestions
for those still missing—Athena, Apollo, Hermes etc.—gratefully received.
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| Artemis |
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| Aphrodite |
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| DIONYSUS |
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| POSEIDON |
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| Demeter and Persephone |
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