I see wonderful things

Imagine being at a banquet when a silver stag starts moving across the table and stops in front of you. Made in Augsburg around 1620 by goldsmith Joachim Friess, this automaton shows Diana, goddess of the hunt, riding a stag. The stag’s body is hollow, its head comes off, and the whole figure was designed to carry wine. When it stopped in front of a guest, that person was expected to lift the stag and drink what was inside. I can see why people might have laughed. But I also wonder how comfortable it felt to be the one singled out, with the whole table watching. The machine made it look like chance had chosen but someone had built the game, and everyone knew what the "winner" had to do. That’s the part I find more interesting than the clever mechanism. It turned an awkward demand into entertainment, so nobody at the table had to say, "I chose you." We still hand decisions over to spins, draws and algorithms. Sometimes that's fun. Sometimes it just makes it easier to pretend no one was responsible. Visual: AI-generated reconstruction inspired by Diana and the Stag; not a photograph of the original. Source: The Metropolitan Museum of Art https://t.co/YMPF8tj5Yq

— HerodotusWave (@HerodotusWave) October 6, 2026