Object Details
maker
Meffert, Uwe
Description
The faces of this cube are blue, orange, green, pink, yellow and white. Each face is divided into a central square and four surrounding isosceles right triangles. The puzzle was invented by Tony Durham of England and marketed by Uwe Meffert of Germany.
Unlike the Rubik’s Cube, moves do not rotate a single face of the cube. Rather, each rotation divides the cube into two congruent polyhedra that meet in a regular hexagon. The edges of that hexagon trace the hypotenuses of the right triangles on adjacent faces of the cube. The mechanism used is different from that used in the Rubik’s Cube.
Meffert had earlier developed the Pyraminx, a twisting puzzle shaped as a regular tetrahedron, a pyramid with four faces that are all equilateral triangles, and called this puzzle a Pyraminx Cube. The name Skewb was suggested by Douglas Hofstadter an 1982 article in Scientific American.
For more information about the Rubik’s Cube and other twisting puzzles that use the same or similar mechanisms see 1987.0805.01.
Reference:
Douglas R. Hofstadter, “METAMAGICAL THEMAS: Beyond Rubik’s Cube: spheres, pyramids, dodecahedrons and God knows what else,” Scientific American, vol. 247, #1, July, 1982, pp. 16-31, esp. p. 20.
Location
Currently not on view
Credit Line
Gift of Cecil Smith
Date made
1982
ID Number
2006.0061.15
catalog number
2006.0061.15
accession number
2006.0061
Object Name
puzzle
Physical Description
paper (overall material)
plastic (overall material)
metal (overall material)
Measurements
overall: 5.5 cm x 5.5 cm x 5.5 cm; 2 5/32 in x 2 5/32 in x 2 5/32 in
See more items in
Medicine and Science: Mathematics
Science & Mathematics
Twisting Puzzles
Data Source
National Museum of American History
Subject
Mathematical Recreations
Mathematics
Link to Original Record
Record ID
nmah_1301132