Table orrery by Hartog van Laun (c. 1733-1815), Amsterdam, c. 1800-1808 wood, brass, ivory. The instrument-maker Harton van Laun designed a table orrery - a mechanical device to show the relative positions and movement of the sun, earth, moon and planets. He used the instrument for his own lectures, but he achieved true success with it only when the Amsterdam professor Jan Hendrik van Swinden fully explained it at the Felix Meritis Society in 1802 and published articles about it. Photo via Newscom