A clock is an instrument used to indicate, keep, and co-ordinate time. The word clock is derived ultimately (via Dutch, Northern French, and Medieval Latin) from the Celtic words clagan and clocca meaning "bell". A silent instrument missing such a mechanism has traditionally been known as a timepiece. In general usage today a "clock" refers to any device for measuring and displaying the time. Watches and other timepieces that can be carried on one's person are often distinguished from clocks.
The clock is one of the oldest human inventions, meeting the need to consistently measure intervals of time shorter than the natural units: the day; the lunar month; and the year. Devices operating on several different physical processes have been used over the millennia, culminating in the clocks of today.
The study of timekeeping is known as horology.
Read more about Clock: Sundials and Other Devices, Water Clocks, Early Mechanical Clocks, How Clocks Work, Types, Purposes, Seismology, Specific Types of Clocks
Famous quotes containing the word clock:
“They’ll take suggestion as a cat laps milk;
They’ll tell the clock to any business that
We say befits the hour.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike,
The devil will come, and Faustus must be damned.
O I’ll leap up to my God: who pulls me down?
See, see, where Christ’s blood streams in the firmament.
One drop would save my soul, half a drop, ah my Christ.”
—Christopher Marlowe (1564–1593)
“What says the Clock in the Great Clock Tower?
And all alone comes riding there
The King that could make his people stare,
Because he had feathers instead of hair.
A slow low note and an iron bell.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)