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| KNAUSS, Fredrich von
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| Selbstchreibende Wundermaschinen
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| Vienna, (privately printed), 1780
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| First edition.
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| Octavo.
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| Contemporary calf-backed boards.
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Fredrich von Knauss (1724 - 1789) was a master watchmaker and mechanician who is credited with making the first writing automaton. He built several during his career, each more elaborate than the previous. The general design involved a disembodied hand holding a quill pen that was driven by a programmed drum (much like a player piano) to move in emulation of a person writing out a text. He later adapted one of his automatons to write specific letters on command using a manual keyboard, thus gaining lasting fame as the inventor of the typewriter.
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During the 18th century a number of master mechanicians undertook to build automata that could emulate the movements and functions of animals and humans. One of the most famous was Jacques Vaucanson, who built a lifesize human figure that could play a flute. Vaucanson's flute player was an extraordinary triumph of mechanics, hydraulics, and pneumatics that actually blew through a real flute while moving its fingers to play a melody. These automata were much more than just exercises in virtuoso mechanical ingenuity - they were often motivated by philosophical questions as to whether a living creature was merely a mechanical entity driven entirely by natural principles that could be discovered and emulated by scientists and engineers (see, e.g., La Mettrie, Man a Machine).
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