Chapter 461 The Disappearing Leap Year

After determining gravity as the anchor point, the only question becomes how to convert the gravity number into length.

And it’s best that no matter what weight instrument is used for measurement, the result will not change.

The engineering priests' chattering gradually stopped. They scratched their heads, wrinkled their noses, and wrote and drew on the ground, but still couldn't figure it out.

Horn interrupted the discussion of the engineering priests with a smile: "In fact, natural sites that are not disturbed by measuring instruments do exist."

"What is it?"

Horn didn't say anything, but just pointed to the corner of the office building not far in front of him.

On the ground paved with slabs of stone and wood, a large pendulum clock more than one meter tall was leaning quietly against the corner.

"Ah, I understand." After some confusion and thought, a former watchmaker slapped his head suddenly, "Pendulum!"

"Hahahaha." Horn laughed. He finally heard the answer he wanted, which was also the answer that Shilov and he discussed.

Use the simple pendulum effect.

Although the civilization of the Empire declined, the Aiel people gradually discovered the pendulum effect, but they have not yet come to a conclusion.

But Horn knew that when a simple pendulum performs a back-and-forth periodic motion, the time it takes for one round trip is related to the length of the pendulum and the acceleration of gravity, and has nothing to do with the amplitude or the mass of the pendulum ball.

In other words, no matter how heavy the pendulum is or how large its swing is, the time it takes to swing depends only on the length of the pendulum and gravity.

Ignoring the slight differences in gravity in different regions, the pendulum's length must be the same as long as the same amount of time is given for each swing.

No matter what kind of ball they use or what the amplitude is, as long as the time for one round trip is the same, the length of the pendulum will be the same.

Although there are still some errors, they are definitely much smaller than the current old systems.

"That's easy then." The watchmaker's voice gradually became louder, but when he noticed Horn was looking at him, he immediately lowered his voice.

"Hey, are you shy?" Horn waved at him, "What do you think? Let me see it."

Under the gaze of other engineering priests, the watchmaker stepped out reluctantly and said, "My humble opinion is that the day you set is 24 hours and 86400 seconds.

We selected a pendulum clock, and when it swings exactly 86400 times a day, we recorded its pendulum length and established it as a standard unit of length.

"We will use the transliteration of the ancient Aiel Empire's unit of length, Leia, and temporarily call it Nemamet, or meter for short." Horn continued with his thoughts.

"But Your Majesty, wouldn't it take a whole day every time?"

"Stupid." As soon as the man finished speaking, his companion next to him began to refute him, "Just bring a normal pendulum clock and compare it with it, and you will know."

"What if there is no normal pendulum clock, or the normal pendulum clock happens to be broken?"

"If there is no clock in the village, go to the town. If the clock in the town is broken, go to the city."

These people are among the smartest citizens, and many of them have even been to college, so they can quickly draw inferences from what they have learned.

"How about all cities adjust to the same time in the future, once a month, based on our Qiumu Island labor clock."

"In this case, we can use the 24 hours of a certain day in the year on Qiumu Island to determine the length, and then update the standard ruler once a year."

Seeing their excitement, Horn did not get excited with them.

Because he knew that this problem was far from as simple as he had imagined.

This world has a festival called Dong Lin that is similar to the Winter Solstice, and it also has four seasons, which must mean that there is an angular deviation between the continent and the sun.

So the time between sunrise on the first day and sunrise on the second day is not necessarily 24 hours, and a few seconds of error is normal. These small errors accumulate and become a huge error, which is a leap month.

Then according to common sense, this world should have leap years and peace years.

But the magical point is that there were records of leap years in the ancient Seven Hills period and even in the early days of the Aiel Empire.

On the contrary, when the empire moved eastward, the leap year miraculously disappeared.

Even scholars at the time ridiculed the leap year as a flaw in the ancient Aelian calendar, "creating a non-existent day every four years."

As for what changes took place in the calendar between the early days of the Aiel Empire and the empire's eastward migration, Horn could not find any historical data.

Until now, there is no setting for leap years in any calendar.

What Horn found most difficult to understand was that, although there was no leap year, the farming seasons in the calendar were not delayed at all.

If there were no leap year, the calendar would have been in a mess after thousands of years.

But the millennial calendar published by the church is still functioning normally.

Considering that this is a world with magic and witches, Horn reasonably wonders if magic is causing these anomalies.

So he hopes that the priests of these engineering research institutes can cooperate with the wizards to start a real scientific research project.

They need to take pendulum clocks to various places to measure time and figure out whether the "disappeared leap year" has really disappeared or just disappeared in the calendar.

"Your Majesty." While the others were discussing, the engineering priest who had just proposed measuring time and length quietly walked to Horn's side and said, "Now that the unit of length has been determined, what about weight and capacity?"

Horn glanced at him and asked, "What's your name?"

"Hawk Compno." The engineering priest responded with his head down.

"Compno? Who is Robert to you?" This is a rare surname. Horn immediately thought of Robert Compno of the White Mountain Priory. "Stand up straight and talk to me."

"That's right, my brother." Hawke straightened his back quickly, "But my magic power is too low and my talent is very poor. I usually make a living by carving and making water clocks for the dignitaries.

Last year, I was reported as a wizard by my peers, so I went home to help Robert."

"Okay, good boy, don't worry, your achievements here will not be less than Robert's." Horn patted his butt, stood up, and came to the group of arguing engineering priests.

"Silence!" the gendarmes shouted in unison, and the priests immediately stopped talking.

"After we calculate the meter using the length of the pendulum, we define one cubic meter as one meter for each length, width and height, and one cubic meter of water as one ton. In this way, we have the units of measurement for length, volume and weight." Horn explained to the priests.

"In the future, all markets must use standard weights and measures, and market clerks must conduct regular inspections to prevent fraud by using weights and measures to shortchange people by pounds or ounces."

"This is more painful than killing the fathers of those Aiel people..." Someone said this quietly, and the engineering priests couldn't help but burst out laughing.

But Sisi rubbed his head and questioned: "If this policy is implemented, everyone will be in chaos. I am afraid that someone will take advantage of the chaos to make a profit."

"It doesn't matter. We can use the metric system and the old system in parallel. The Papal Palace uses the metric system for collecting taxes and doing business anyway." With a wave of his hand, Horn determined the future system of weights and measures.

“So, my task for you is to go to various places to test the pendulum length and time. After the test, establish a set of standard measurement molds as soon as possible.

The later adjustments should be completed as much as possible before the autumn harvest next year. You can determine the specific matters in the meeting, and then give me a timetable and milestone list.

The main persons in charge of this mission are, um, my secretary, Monk Bonard, and Father Hawke."

(End of this chapter)