Talk:Ellipsograph

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The article links to Archimedes without any explanation of the historical context of the Trammel of Archimedes. Is Archimedes credited with inventing the device, or simply describing the underlying principles of the ellipse? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.94.157.242 (talk • contribs)
 * That's a good question (which I don't know the answer to, unfortunately.) You may want to try asking over at the Reference desk. Siawase (talk) 18:08, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Useless Machine
The article suggests by its references (both forward and backward) that the trammel is a useless machine. Seeing how the trammel is (other than construction with a piece of rope and two nails) the only known way of -precisely- manufacturing an ellipse in e.g. woodworking or metalworking, the machine most definitively serves a useful purpose. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.192.110.134 (talk) 15:34, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Tusi Couple
This article seems incorrect. I believe this is properly described as a Tusi Couple which has it's own page. Originally discovered in the 13th century. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Veloman (talk • contribs) 00:10, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

It can also be used to make a circle: sources: numberphile channel Bueatiful Trigonometry on youtube(June 16, 2020); Youtube: mathloger - secrets of the nothing grinder, december 2019. It is related to an elipsograph — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.82.110.99 (talk) 18:56, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Where does the name "trammel of archimedes" come from?
The oldest use of the name trammel of Archimedes I can find is from ~1940 by Robert C. Yates, and before about 2000 that name was extremely rare. Among the few other early sources I can find is Cundy and Rollett (1961) [1951]. As another example, Apostol and Mnatsakanian (2009) cite Yates for the name. But older sources (and some newer) of which there are many dating back to the 17th century if not before just call it an elliptic trammel or elliptic compass or the like. Dörrie (1965) [1932] just calls it a trammel. It doesn't seem like Archimedes is involved with it in any way, as far as I can tell. Does anyone know how his name got attached / when? Did Yates make it up or get it from somewhere else? Were there other influential sources? It even seems plausible that Wikipedia itself has been responsible for popularizing the name.

It's not clear to me that "Trammel of Archimedes" is really the most appropriate title for this article. it might be better to have a more general article about tools for drawing ellipses, called ellipsograph or the like, and make this just one section of it. –jacobolus (t) 08:19, 30 June 2024 (UTC)


 * I think this might be an answer, from Gunther (1923), Early Science in Oxford, p. 138:
 * The principle involved in the elliptical trammel was known to the Greek geometers. Proclus (A.D. 410–485), of the Platonic school at Athens, in his commentary to Euclid, gave a method for the mechanical construction of an ellipse, which was based on the use of the instrument described by Nicomedes (born about 270 B.C.) (my bold).
 * So it seems Yates (or someone before him) got Nicomedes confused for Archimedes. But note that Nicomedes' instrument as used by Proclus to draw an ellipse is not the same as the device under discussion here; it's only based on some of the same underlying mathematical relations. –jacobolus (t) 09:06, 30 June 2024 (UTC)
 * A footnote in Blake (1900) "The Ellipsograph of Proclus" :
 * The discovery of the first property is accredited to Proclus; Chasles, "Aperçu historique," p. 49. The well-known chuck for turning figures with elliptical cross-sections, invented by Leonardo da Vinci, is an application of the mechanism. For other historical notes, see Burmester. "Lehrbuch der Kinematik I," Leipzig, 1888, pp. 36-42; A. v. Braunmühl, "Studie über Curvenerzeugung" in the "Katalog mathematischer Modelle," by Dyck.
 * –jacobolus (t) 09:32, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

Requested move 1 July 2024

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. Consensus to rename and rescope the article as proposed. Participants appear to prefer covering both topics within a single article rather than splitting. (closed by non-admin page mover) ModernDayTrilobite (talk • contribs) 14:17, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Trammel of Archimedes → Ellipsograph – The "elliptic trammel" or "elliptic compass", sometimes since ~1940 misattributed as the "trammel of Archimedes" even though it has nothing to do with Archimedes, is one type of tool for drawing ellipses or "ellipsograph". The more generic term "ellipsograph" currently redirects to this article, and ellipsographs in general are described in a section near the end. In my opinion this article would be improved by re-organizing it to make the general topic of drawing ellipses be its root scope, with the elliptic trammel as a top-level section, as a sibling to other instruments/methods for drawing ellipses. An alternative would be to split this into two pages, one called "elliptic trammel" and the other called "ellipsograph", but in my opinion the scope would be substantially overlapping and we don't have enough to say to make a single unified article swell beyond reasonable size constraints for Wikipedia articles. Readers interested in the elliptic trammel per se would benefit from reading the basic context belonging at an article about ellipsographs in general. –jacobolus (t) 04:26, 1 July 2024 (UTC)


 * Support the rename and reorganization. If a historically inaccurate name is attested, then we can report it, but we don't need to emphasize the misconception. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 21:14, 3 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Sure, that's fair enough. I mostly always find it amazing how these names are made up from some mistake or misconception, and then stick because apparently nobody ever fact checks anything. :-P –jacobolus (t) 23:42, 3 July 2024 (UTC)
 * For anyone curious about what kind of content might be included in such a broader article, Stanley's Descriptive Treatise on Mathematical Drawing Instruments includes a nice chapter about ellipsographs. –jacobolus (t) 04:28, 4 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Hasluck (1903) Practical draughtsmen's work also has a nice chapter on ellipse drawing. –jacobolus (t) 08:44, 4 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Support rename and recontextualization per the section above, do not support splitting. Broad context likely helps readers, per nom. Apostol and Mnatsakanian (2009) seem a good model to follow on handling the current title, noting "Trammel of Archimedes" as a known name alongside concerns about it. Wetzel (2010) notes trammels in general are a subset of ellipsographs/elliptic compasses, and provides the example of an oblique trammel as well as the standard "Archimedes" one. CMD (talk) 04:49, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Reorganization / move
Thanks user:ModernDayTrilobite for moving this. Sorry I haven't yet jumped in with changes to match my proposal above. I got distracted by trying to understand the etymology of the word "trammel", which is currently quite incorrect in most dictionaries in my opinion, and am in the process of trying to figure out how to write a good Wiktionary entry, citing sources, formatting quotations, and so on. (My current collection of research materials about that can be found at wikt:user:jacobolus/trammel.) I'm going to try to work on this page soon though. :-) –jacobolus (t) 05:45, 10 July 2024 (UTC)