هندام

From Middle Persian (hndʾm /⁠handām⁠/, “member, limb”) or Persian هندام (handâm). Compare Persian اندام (andâm).

• IPA^(key): /hin.daːm/

هِنْدَام • (hindām) m

1. (obsolete) a kind of simple machine doubling the physical power of a man
   • 1377, Ibn Khaldun, Prolegomena‎:

     وَرُبَّمَا يَتَوَهَّمُ كَثِيرٌ مِنَ ٱلنَّاسِ إِذَا نَظَرَ إِلَى آثَارِ ٱلْأَقْدَمِينَ وَمَصَانِعِهِمُ ٱلْعَظِيمَةِ مِثْلَ إِيوَانِ كِسْرَى وَأَهْرَامِ مِصْرَ وَحَنَايَا ٱلْمُعَلَّقَةِ وَشَرْشَالَ بِٱلْمَغْرِبِ إِنَّمَا كَانَتْ بِقَدْرِهِمْ مُتَفَرِّقِينَ أَوْ مُجْتَمِعِينَ فَيَتَخَيَّلُ لَهُمْ أَجْسَامًا تُنَاسِبُ ذَٰلِكَ، أَعْظَمَ مِنْ هَٰذِهِ بِكَثِيرٍ فِي طُولِهَا وَقَدْرِهَا لِتُنَاسِبَ بَيْنَهَا وَبَيْنَ ٱلْقَدْرِ ٱلَّتِي صَدَرَتْ تِلْكَ ٱلْمَبَانِي عَنْهَا، وَيَغْفُلُ عَنْ شَأْنِ ٱلْهِنْدَامِ وَٱلْمُخَالِ وَمَا ٱقْتَضَتْهُ فِي ذَٰلِكَ ٱلصِّنَاعَةُ ٱلْهَنْدَسِيَّةُ.

     warubbamā yatawahhamu kaṯīrun mina n-nāsi ʔiḏā naẓara ʔilā ʔāṯāri l-ʔaqdamīna wamaṣāniʕihimu l-ʕaẓīmati miṯla ʔīwāni kisrā waʔahrāmi miṣra waḥanāyā l-muʕallaqati wašaršāla bi-l-maḡribi ʔinnamā kānat biqadrihim mutafarriqīna ʔaw mujtamiʕīna fayataḵayyalu lahum ʔajsāman tunāsibu ḏālika, ʔaʕẓama min hāḏihi bikaṯīrin fī ṭūlihā waqadrihā litunāsiba baynahā wabayna l-qadri llatī ṣadarat tilka l-mabānī ʕanhā, wayaḡfulu ʕan šaʔni l-hindāmi wal-muḵāli wamā qtaḍathu fī ḏālika ṣ-ṣināʕatu l-handasiyyatu.

     Perhaps, if many think about the remnants of the ancients and their great buildings like the arcade-yard of Khusrow and the pyramids of Egypt and the connected cambers and Cherchell in the Maghreb, they were in their size piecemeal or collective work and one has to imagine their bodies to match that, much so in their length and scale to find an analogy between them and between the scale from which these buildings have risen; one fails to pay heed to the employment of machines duplicating power and the block and tackle and that which one availed oneself of in such engineering work.

2. symmetry
3. tidiness