Leonardo da Vinci designed a chain pump to raise water using linked buckets.
In a chain pump, a continuous loop carries containers or paddles upward through a pipe or channel. As the loop moves, the containers lift water from a lower level and discharge it at the top. Leonardo’s notebooks contain studies of water-raising machines based on chains, buckets, and rotating mechanisms.
The device belongs to a long history of hydraulic technology rather than being an entirely new invention by Leonardo. Chain pumps were known in earlier cultures, including ancient China, and related water-raising devices existed elsewhere before the Renaissance.
Leonardo’s contribution was his detailed mechanical analysis and adaptation of such systems to engineering problems. A chain pump differs from a piston pump, which moves water through reciprocating pressure, and from a water wheel, which is primarily driven by flowing water.