Hero of Alexandria, a Greek-Egyptian mathematician and engineer, described the aeolipile in the 1st century CE.
Notes on verification
Well corroborated by Smithsonian, Britannica, and Wikipedia; minor scholarly disagreement exists over Hero's exact dates but consensus supports 1st century CE. [cascade flags: aggregator_dropped_primary_exists | tier=unverified indep_score=0.5 clusters=1 claim_tier=notable] [kind-backfill 2026-09-15: kind=attributed eligibility=high] [harvest 2026-09-17: +3 source(s) on new hosts; tier unverified->silver indep=0.95 clusters=3]
Sources
- Aeolipile (wikipedia)
- https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/object/nmah_1761328 (corroboration)
- https://www.britannica.com/technology/aeolipile (corroboration)
- https://arxiv.org/pdf/1101.3470 (corroboration)
- https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/hero-alexandria (corroboration)