All Categories
    Filters
    Preferences
    Search

    About Time: A History of Civilization in Twelve Clocks

    £9.89
    £10.99
    Price-Match is available in-store for recommended titles in CCCU module handbooks
    ISBN: 9780241370513
    Products specifications
    Attribute nameAttribute value
    AuthorRooney, David
    Pub Date03/02/2022
    BindingPaperback
    Pages336
    Publisher: HAMISH HAMILTON
    Ship to
    *
    *
    Shipping Method
    Name
    Estimated Delivery
    Price
    No shipping options
    Availability: Available for despatch from the bookshop in 48 hours

    'An utterly dazzling book, the best piece of history I have read for a long time' Jerry Brotton, author of A History of the World in Twelve Maps

    'Not merely an horologist's delight, but an ingenious meditation on the nature and symbolism of time-keeping itself' Richard Holmes

    The measurement of time has always been essential to human civilization, from early Roman sundials to the advent of GPS. But while we have one eye on the time every day, are we aware of the power clocks have given governments, military leaders and business owners, and how they have shaped our lives and our world?

    In this spectacularly far-reaching book, David Rooney narrates a history of timekeeping and civilization in twelve concise chapters. Over their course, we meet the most epochal inventions in horological history, from medieval water clocks to Renaissance hourglasses, and from stock-exchange timestamps to satellites in Earth's orbit. We discover how clocks have helped people navigate the globe and build empires, but also, on occasion, taken us to the brink of destruction.

    This is the story of time, and the story of time is the story of us.