The dandy horse, an English nickname for what was first called a Laufmaschine ("running machine" in German), then a vélocipède or draisienne (in French and then English), and then a pedestrian curricle or hobby-horse,[1] or swiftwalker,[2] is a human-powered vehicle that, being the first means of transport to make use of the two-wheeler principle, is regarded as the first bicycle.[3] The dandy horse is a foot-propelled vehicle, powered by the rider's feet on the ground instead of the pedals of later bicycles. It was invented by Karl Drais (who called it a Laufmaschine [German: [ˈlaʊfmaˌʃiːnə], "running machine"]) in 1817, and then patented by him in France in February 1818 using the term vélocipède. It is also known as a Draisine (German: [dʁaɪˈziːnə] in German, a term used in English only for light auxiliary railcars regardless of their form of propulsion), and as a draisienne (French: [drɛzjɛn] in French and English. In English, it is also sometimes still known as a velocipede, but that term now also has a broader meaning.
- ^ Bicycle at Britannica.com
- ^ Kesteven, Guy, ed. (2014). 1001 Bikes to Dream of Riding Before You Die. Cassell. p. 25. ISBN 978-1-84403-763-6.
- ^ Higgins, Melissa (2015). How the Wheel Changed History. ABDO Publishing Company. p. 15. ISBN 9781629697734.