The Feraths

Measuring the height of a mountain

On Ciniz University in 1759, an object has been developed to measure the height of mountains. The object is a closed glass cylinder, with only one opening, a glass "vein" that sticks up next to the cylinder. The "vein" ends in a kind of funnel. Through the funnel, the object is partly filled with a coloured liquid (usually water with some paint in it).

Now, the water level in the cylinder and the vein must have a certain height.
Experiments taught that if one walks up a mountain, the water level in the vein gets higher and the level in the cylinder lower. More experiments made it possible to have indications on the level.
With the object, it is possible to walk up a mountain, see at which indication the water level is when the top is arrived, then walk down again, walk another mountain and see if the water level on top of this mountain is higher or lower than on the previous mountain.

The indications became known as Feraths. A mountain or hill can thus be a certain amount of Feraths high - the higher you climb, the more feraths you will have. Important was to decide which place had zero Feraths. So people went looking for Daleths lowest point. Eventually, the bottom of the Arhym gong tower was picked as "zero".
Taking the object to other gong towers laid a network of Feraths indications throughout the land. And gauging the objects from there, all mountains could be equally good measured.

High tide

The experiments also showed that the water level could change when the object did not move. The scientists who studied this, eventually came to the conclusion that the ground we walk on has some fluctuations in height, just like high tide and low tide in the sea.
A student noticed that the weather was worse at days Airtha had gone "low tide" and usually beautiful on "high tide" days. This effect has been studied a few days, until the scientist discovered that the aforementioned student spend a lot of time in the taverns of Ciniz.
Later so-called scientists came to the conclusion, that with "high tide" the ground was closer to the clouds, so it was logic it would rain more.

However, the student, Harun Garwelsz of Dohn, met Damiran, the Count of Ciniz. Harun frequented the "Black Rose Tavern", just around the corner of the Palace of Ciniz, the favourite evening tavern of the count when he had worked late. Over a Cinizian ajuins stew and a good glass of Dragon Blood, the two met. Harun told the count about his discovery, and the count asked to do further experiments. He, Damiran would pay for the expenses and a salary.
So Harun experimented and wrote a book on his discoveries "High tide for the cloudships". Damiran gave him the Master title for this book in 1761, but Harun would be known as "his Cloudship" among serious scientists until the invention of the first steam engines, back in the 1810s .

"High tide for the cloudships" was all about the forecasting of weather changes by watching the liquid going up and down in the vein of the Ferathsmeter. Numerous tests and experiments involving frogs, flies, Banjafojl, different kinds of liquid, various ferathsmeters and a lot of travel and climbing resulted in the conclusion Harun had made earlier: with low tide of Airtha, bad weather with a lot of wind and rain was coming up, and with high tide, the weather would be fine, dry and relatively warm.
The low tide of the ground did not have anything to do with the low tide of the sea, another important conclusion Harun made, although both the tides of the sea and the ground were not explained.
Harun made a theory that the Ferathsmeter could measure the pressure of the air on the liquid. If he blew in the vein, the liquid would get lower. Strangely enough, if he heated the cylinder, the feraths would add and add up, until the liquid started boiling dangerously. Before Harun could really think about his theories on air pressure, volume and heat, Damiran died in 1762 and the project had to stop because of a lack of money.

Current use of the feraths

The device measuring pressure of gasses (air) has been used for the steam engine security in later years. Under Count Yzabrân of Ciniz, who had studied "High tide of the cloudships" closely and financed additional research, the device became obligatory for steam engines and was made better to serve that purpose.

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