Underground Rivers - University of New Mexico

Chapter 9 -- Thermodynamic Engines
CHAPTER 9
THERMODYNAMIC ENGINES
This chapter deals with underground rivers powered by heat, but in before we ignite the hearth,
we need an ample reservoir of water.
Hydrophylacia
Athanasius Kircher (1602-1680), a prolific polymath, was the world’s first scientist to support
himself through his writings. His syncretistic scholarship paid little attention to disciplines. A
Jesuit living in an age still rocked by Reformation, Kircher heeded the Holy Scriptures, but from
Kircher's viewpoint, a "Turris Babel" reaching the heavens seemed impractical. By his reckoning,
it would require 3,000,000 tons of building material just to reach the moon. But worse, the edifice
would pull the earth from the center of the universe.
Kircher's two-volume Mundus Subterraneus (1665) was
the first printed work on geophysics. Not constrained
by its title, however, the work included maps of the solar
surface, global ocean circulation and Atlantis.
Regarding the subterraneus,
The Underground World is a well framed house with
distinct Rooms, Cellars, and Storehouses, by great
Art and Wisdom fitted together.
Kircher's theory of holes on the ocean floor connecting
to underground brooks was embellished with mention
dragons and gargantuan lizards.
.
Kircher's most-dramatic contribution to geologic graphic art is the hollow-mountain water cavern,
the "hydrophylacium," "phylacium" being Latin for "storehouse." That Kircher placed such
caverns above sea level suggests that he believed them to drain by gravity.
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