Original artwork, not a still
Notes on the Analytical Engine · 1843
The Analytical Engine weaves algebraical patterns just as the Jacquard loom weaves flowers and leaves.
Behind the line
What it means
Our interpretation.
Lovelace found the image that made the machine make sense: a loom that weaves flowers by reading cards could as easily weave algebra. In one sentence she links textiles, mathematics and design, and hints that symbols might stand for more than numbers. It appears on museum walls, computing-history timelines and Jacquard-loom exhibits wherever the lineage of programming is told.
Context reviewed
In context
Spoilers for Notes on the Analytical EngineShow the scene
The sentence appears in Note A of Ada Lovelace's notes to her 1843 translation of Luigi Menabrea's article on Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine, printed in Richard Taylor's Scientific Memoirs. Lovelace was explaining what set the Analytical Engine apart from Babbage's earlier Difference Engine: it used punched cards, a principle borrowed from Jacquard's loom, which controlled complicated woven patterns. The notes, signed A.A.L., ran far longer than the translation itself, and the last of them, Note G, holds her method for calculating Bernoulli numbers.
Sources (2)
- Menabrea and Lovelace, Sketch of the Analytical Engine with Notes (Fourmilab transcription)Note A, passage on the Jacquard principleReference checked
- Wikipedia: Ada LovelaceSection on Babbage's lecture and Notes A-GReference checked
Context reviewed
