Potter's wheel in the context of "Lathe"

A wheel is a rotating component (typically circular in shape) that is intended to turn on an axle bearing. The wheel is one of the key components of the wheel and axle which is one of the six simple machines. Wheels, in conjunction with axles, allow heavy objects to be moved easily facilitating movement or transportation while supporting a load, or performing labor in machines. Wheels are also used for other purposes, such as a ship's wheel, steering wheel, potter's wheel, and flywheel.

Common examples can be found in transport applications. A wheel reduces friction by facilitating motion by rolling together with the use of axles. In order for a wheel to rotate, a moment must be applied to the wheel about its axis, either by gravity or by the application of another external force or torque.

Woodturning is the craft of using a wood lathe with hand-held tools to cut a shape that is symmetrical around the axis of rotation. Like the potter's wheel, the wood lathe is a mechanism that can generate a variety of forms. The operator is known as a turner, and the skills needed to use the tools were traditionally known as turnery. The skills to use the tools by hand, without a fixed point of contact with the wood, distinguish woodturning and the wood lathe from the machinist's lathe, or metal-working lathe.

Items made on the lathe include tool handles, candlesticks, egg cups, knobs, lamps, rolling pins, cylindrical boxes, Christmas ornaments, bodkins, knitting needles, needle cases, thimbles, pens, chessmen, spinning tops; legs, spindles, and pegs for furniture; balusters and newel posts for architecture; baseball bats, hollow forms such as woodwind musical instruments, urns, sculptures; bowls, platters, and chair seats. Industrial production has replaced many of these products from the traditional turning shop. However, the wood lathe is still used for decentralized production of limited or custom turnings. A skilled turner can produce a wide variety of objects with five or six simple tools. The tools can be reshaped easily for the task at hand.

The appearance of Celts in Transylvania can be traced to the later La Tène period (c. 4th century BCE).Excavation of the great La Tène necropolis at Apahida, Cluj County, by Ștefan Kovács at the turn of the 20th century revealed the first evidence of Celtic culture in Romania. The 3rd–2nd century BCE site is remarkable for its cremation burials and chiefly wheel-made funeral vessels.

A historical timeline of the Celts of Transylvania can be derived from archaeological finds at La Tène, but there are almost no ancient records that allow reconstruction of political events in the area. The Celts exercised politico-military rule over Transylvania between the 4th and 2nd century BCE and brought with them a more advanced iron-working technology. They were also responsible for the spread of the potter's wheel into a much wider area than the one they occupied.

Perdix (Ancient Greek: Πέρδιξ meaning "partridge") was a nephew and student of Daedalus in Greek mythology, claimed to have invented the potter's wheel, the saw, and the compass. In other sources, Perdix was the name of Daedalus's sister, and her inventor son was named Talos or Attalus.

Coiling is a method of creating pottery. The coiling technique is used to construct ceramic vessels through the repeated winding of long, cylindrical pieces of clay on top of one another. This technique can be used in combination with other techniques such as: throwing on a potter's wheel, slab building, wheel coiling, beating, and pinching.

The benefits of coiling as compared to throwing on a potter's wheel are that coiling allows for greater variety in the shape of the vessel: coiled vessels can be any shape, with more extreme fluctuations in the walls by allowing the clay to dry in-between building stages.

The Yaz culture (named after the type site Yaz-Tappe, Yaz Tepe, or Yaz Depe, near Baýramaly, Turkmenistan) was an early Iron Age culture of Margiana, Bactria and Sogdia (c. 1500–500 BC, or c. 1500–330 BC). It emerges at the top of late Bronze Age sites (BMAC), sometimes as mud-brick platforms and sizeable houses associated with irrigation systems. Ceramics were mostly hand-made, but there was increasing use of wheel-thrown ware. Bronze and iron arrowheads, iron sickles and carpet knives are among other artifacts that have been found.

With the farming citadels and absence of burials it has been regarded as a likely archaeological reflection of early East Iranian culture as described in the Avesta. So far, no burials related to the culture have been found, and this is taken as possible evidence of the Zoroastrian practice of exposure or sky burial.

In Greek mythology, the name Hyperbius (Ancient Greek: Ὑπέρβιος Ὑpérvios means "of overwhelming strength") may refer to:

• Hyperbius, son of Ares, reputedly the first to have killed an animal.
• Hyperbius, son of Aegyptus, who married and was killed by the Danaid Celaeno, or by Eupheme.
• Hyperbius, son of Oenops, a defender of Thebes in the war of the Seven against Thebes, appointed by Eteocles to defend the Oncaidian Gate against Hippomedon. He had an image of Zeus on his shield.
• Hyperbius, an Athenian, brother of Agrolas or Euryalus. The two brothers were credited with inventing the technique of building with bricks, and with construction of the first brick houses in Athens, as well as of the wall around Acropolis.
• Hyperbius, a Corinthian credited with invention of the potter's wheel.