The first drawing of Bessler’s wheel, in his book, ‘Das Triumphirende’ seems to be a rough copy of the one which appeared in an earlier publication, ‘Grundlicher Bericht’. I say ‘a copy’ and that is the key to deciphering the two drawings; there are a number of tiny variations which seem on surface to be simple errors, but in fact are deliberate and when correctly read reveal additional information. His first book, ‘Grundlicher Bericht’ or ‘Thorough Report’ was published in 1715, and this document contains a drawing of his wheel which, it seems, gives nothing away but in reality is full of information.

Both wheel drawings are basically the same but R.R. Gould, in his commentary on the drawings described the second version of the drawing as having been accomplished more crudely than the first, however for reasons which will become clear, the second drawing has been simplified but is as painstakingly drawn as the first. The difference is simply to enable the reader to understand what he is looking at more easily. A close up of a digitally scanned image of the drawing shows the same care and attention to detail as was shown in the first drawing. 

The first thing to notice is that the rope which runs upwards to the right, from the pulley attached to the floor, runs behind the wheel. In the following drawing you can see the added lines in red.

I filled in the missing rope line, and realised immediately that there was the potential for a particular geometric construction – a pentagram. I noted the positioning of other parts of the drawing and was able to fill in the additional lines. The other points of the pentagram matched other features of the wheel and extending the lines brought them into alignment with them; and there are other confirmatory points which I have left out to avoid over-filling the drawing with a confusion of lines. The main thing is that there is clearly a pentagram within the circumference of the wheel. The same construction can also be made in the second ‘Das Triumphirende’ drawing.

It will be noticed that there is an additional line that bisects the top angle where the rope re-appears from behind the wheel. This is a line indicated in the original drawing by the presence of the triangular padlock situated on the floor at the bottom left of the wheel. The fact that it is triangular (not an uncommon design at the time) and therefore has a point, allows the alignment to run through the point and the centre of the wheel and culminate precisely at the apex of the angle formed by the rope and the line which runs from that point down to the centre of the supporting pillar.

Both of these pictures have another geometric figure incorporated in them. The reason for not exploring it now is that it forms a key to yet another area of coded information secreted within both these drawing

For more information about Johann Bessler and to obtain copies of his books with English translations go to www.free-energy.co.uk

Copyright © 2009 John Collins.