Federico-Thesis

Wi_o_logy_

Pre electrical long range communication system

The horizontal line pushes us towards the matter
the vertical one towards the spirit.
Franco Battiato, Inneres Auge

First (and probably only) axiom: I don't think I should use the word wireless in this first chapter since in this epoque wires didn't exist.

I think there are mainly two macro categories in the pre electrical time, talking about long range. Ephemeral and device-less tecniques such as smoke signals and whistle language are very ancient disciplines that often belong to the inner culture of a community. Let's think about the Silco Gomero, used in La Gomera, an island in the archipelago of Canarie: a whistle language composed by two whistled vowels and four consonants, probably originated in the 15th Century. An interesting adopting of the languge, in the last century, was to alarm La Gomera people about the spanish police "Guardia Civil": "When some inhabitants in La Gomera were being chased by the police Guardia Civil, people would quickly call in Silbo: Careful! Here's comes the Guardia Civil and is looking for you! Go hide!"

But actually I would prefer to focus on long-range systems that imply a device, an external tool where the information is deployed.

A static example is the menhir, a stone changed from its original settlment by a human force: the simplest objects, but with the greatest density of meaning, of the entire Stone Age.

Menhir is the first situated object, the first artificial element in space: one of the first examples of architecture, an artifect aimed to be hotspots for communities. Its inner symbolic meaning is methonimic, the information of its existance is spread thanks to the menhir itself, thanks to its size in its artificial settlment. A menhir it's subsequently a basic beacon: it sends one signal, its existance.

People can set variables in form of attributes and in form of devices:

• attributes as auretic power, the force capable to set a shared of ineffable understanding of the common good;
• devices as middle physical medium that perform a protocol, such as flags.

Auretic power

The desire that push humans to elevate a rock in order to spread meaning of existance has an interesting symbolic connotation. A desire to stabilize the vertical dimension, a way to feel a connection to up there. In the horizontal dimension, the stones were signals which revealed the geography of the place, serving to describe its physical structure and its productive and/or mystical-religious utilization.

Performing protocols+

A clear evolution of menhir is the beacon: beacons has been quite important in history of communication, as soon variables has been added to them, and protocols as well, beacons became semaphors, a multi-signal device with an incredible inner power. Semaphor means, from Greek, signal (sema) bearer (phoros): its etimology already suggest its obvious use: transmit messages between two points. This apparatus can be performed with different middle devices: usually fire, lights, flags, water and moving arms.

The Phryctoria and the annunciation of the win over Troy

An ancient well-documented fire-based semaphor is the Phryctoria, used in Ancient Greece. The phryctoriae were towers built on certain top of hills so that one tower would be visible to the next. The system is easy: the protocol of the Phryctoriae is based on the use of two groups of torchs, left side and right side, from one to five torches each side. The encryption/decription is just based on the letters of the Greek alphabet which are listed on a table, then the coordinate of each letter was communicated through the game of torch: column/row for left/right. The table is based on the Polybius square, if you want to communicate the Delta, you will have on the left hand one torch and on the right hand four torches.

In the tragedy Agamemnon, Aeschylus describes how the message for the fall of Troy arrived at Mycenae using phryctoriae:

Chorus But what herald could get here so quickly?

Clytaemestra The great god of fire himself, Hephaistos! He has sent a bright light from Mount Ida, in Troy. Then, torch to torch, like a human herald, this light first shone in Trojan Ida, then on Mount Hermes in Lemnos and from that island, the third torch arrived at Zeus’ Rock at Mount Athos. Then with a huge leap over the great sea, the flame travelled hard but happily and, like the sun, transferred its rays through the watchtowers of Makistos.

From there, without delay, like a good herald, refuting sleep, conquering sleep flew far to the streams of Evripos where it tells the news to the guards of MountMessapios, in Evoea... [...]

Chorus Madam, I shall thank the gods later but first, let me enjoy the story even more while you’re telling it again.

Clytaemestra answers to the question how was possible to know if the Achaeans won against the trojans, as it was impossible for a courier to have travelled just in a night. "The great god of fire himself", Aeschylus writes, configuring, through this formula, the god Hephaistos in the device in question. The medium I'm talkin about was a state-of-art artifact: the geographical establishment, ownership, management and maintenance of these communication networks by the ancient Greek culture was of great importance in their spread and expansion.