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There are numerous candidates to claim the title of “world’s most significant innovation.” The wheel. The printing press. The steam engine.

As per a recent publication, though, that honor belongs to a mechanised sawmill conceived through Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.

“Prior to mechanised cutting, building a simple trading ship required around 10 lumberjacks laboring over three months,” notes the author. “Using wind-driven sawmills, the same quantity of cut lumber could be produced within seven days.”

Thanks to their rapid mechanical cutter, that turned logs to planks using virtually no manual labor, Dutch builders could construct vessels faster compared to anyone else, an advantage that unleashed a century of Dutch naval, financial as well as artistic dominance in Europe and the world.

The First Genuine Manufacturing Machine

Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, contends the writer, was “mankind’s initial true industrial apparatus.” A windmill rotated a gear. A single part converted the rotary movement to up-and-down motion for the saw. Another component transformed that same spinning motion into a sideway’s movement advancing the log toward the blade. A geared mechanism shifted the log forward one precise increment each stroke.

“Each element seemed simple by itself. Corneliszoon’s genius lay in how to integrate these parts so the machine acted within a perfectly controlled order, cutting on every descending stroke while moving on every upward stroke. It was a remarkably intelligent use of fundamental parts.”

Which leads us to the current puzzle. I’d like you to reimagine one of the basic ideas behind this historic invention.

Round and Up

Construct a machine which converts rotary motion into up-and-down motion. You have these components exclusively: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two rods. A “guide”, which is a cylinder or sleeve through which one of the bars will fit snugly. (Assume it is possible to put things on a base, so the components don’t collapse.)

I’ll be back at 5pm UK featuring the answer.

Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Rather, feel free to suggest (less celebrated) contenders as the world’s most impactful invention.