History of the Hour: Clocks and Modern Temporal Orders

History of the Hour: Clocks and Modern Temporal Orders by Dohrn-van Rossum, Gerhard. paperback edition. ISBN: 9780226155111.

In this sweeping study of the organization of time, Dohrn-van Rossum offers fresh insight into the history of the mechanical clock and its influence on European society from the late Middle Ages to the industrial revolution. Detailing the clocks effects on social activity, he presents a vivid picture of a society regulated by the precise measurement of identical hours. "In tracing the evolution of time consciousness with scholarship and skill . . . Dohrn-van Rossum evokes the many ways that the small moments of life have come to be reckoned with the passage of time."—Dava Sobel, Civilization "Dohrn-van Rossum paints a highly nuanced picture of times conquest of modern life."—Steven Lagerfeld, Wilson Quarterly "This book is definitive in showing the clocks pervasive influence over European society."—Virginia Quarterly Review "[A] delightful, excellently translated history."—Choice "Dohrn-van Rossum has produced a persuasive and brilliantly documented new understanding of how modern time-consciousness arose."—Owen Gingerich, Nature