Philo of Byzantium

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Philo of Byzantium, a Greek writer on mechanics, (born about 280 BCE) flourished during the latter half of the 2nd century B.C. (according to some, a century earlier). He was the author of a large work of which the fourth and fifth books are extant to some degree, which detail missiles, the construction of fortresses, provisioning, attack and defence (ed. R. Schone, 1893, with German translation in Hermann August Theodor Köchly's Griechische Kriegs-schriftstelle, vol. i. 1853; E. A. Rochas d'Aiglun, Poliorcetique des Grecs, 1872).

Another portion of the work, on pneumatic engines, has been preserved in the form of a Latin translation (De ingeniis spiritualibus) made from an Arabic version (ed. W. Schmidt, with German translation, in the works of Heron of Alexandria, vol. i., in the Teubner series, 1899; with French translation by Rochas, La Science des philosophes... dans l'antiquité, 1882).

The Philo line, a geometric construction that can be used to double the cube, is attributed to Philo.

The treatise De septem mundi miraculis, on the Seven Wonders of the World, wrongly attributed to Philo, probably belongs to the 6th century A.D. It is printed in R. Hercher's edition of Aelian (Teubner, 1858).