A brief history of the invention of screws

The first person to describe the spiral was the Greek scientist Archimedes (circa 287 BC - 212 BC). The Archimedes spiral is a huge spiral mounted in a wooden cylinder that lifts water from one level to another and irrigates the field. The true inventor may not be Archimedes himself. Maybe he just described something that already exists. It may have been designed by the craftsmen of ancient Egypt to use irrigation on both sides of the Nile.
In the Middle Ages, carpenters used wooden nails or metal nails to connect furniture to wooden structures. In the 16th century, nailers began to produce nails with spirals that could connect things more securely. That is a small step from this type of nail to the screw.
Around 1550 AD, the first metal nuts and bolts that appeared as fasteners in Europe were hand-made on a simple wooden lathe.
Screwdrivers (screws) appeared in London around 1780. Carpenters found that screwing a screw with a screwdriver can fix things better than a hammer, especially when it comes to fine-grained screws.
In 1797, Mozley invented the all-metal precision screw lathe in London. The following year, Wilkinson made a nut and bolt making machine in the United States. Both machines produce universal nuts and bolts. Screws are quite popular as fixed parts because an inexpensive production method has been found at that time.
In 1836, Henry M. Philips applied for a patent for the screw of the cross recessed nail head, which marked a significant advancement in the screw base. Unlike conventional slotted head screws, the Phillips head screw has a Phillips head screw head edge. This design makes the screwdriver automatically centered and not easy to slip off, so it is very popular. Universal nuts and bolts connect the metal parts together, so in the 19th century, the wood used to make the machine building was replaced with metal bolts and nuts.

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