Why do clocks run clockwise?

Question

Why do clocks run clockwise?

Answer 1

because it was designed that way. there a custom made watches and clocks where in the numbers are counter-clockwise and so is its hands. Iv'e seen some. You can even find some in e-bay.

Answer 2

No reason. My atomic clock doesn't.

There were only two ways to go, clockwise (as we know it) was chosen. No two ways about it. If counter-clockwise (as we know it) was chosen, then it would have been "clockwise."

I know it has nothing to do with the earth's rotation because viewed from the north star, the earth rotates counter-clockwise, but viewed from above the south pole, the earth rotates clockwise. It's all relative.

Unless you want to refer to the sundials used before clocks were invented. If you placed a sundial in the northern hemisphere, and pointed it north, the object in the middle's (whatever it may be) shadow would move in a clockwise direction. Now that I think about it, this is probably why. But then again, what if it is in the southern hemisphere? It's counter-clockwise. So apparently the north hemipshere people invented the clock.

Answer 3

Convention.  As a novelty, some clocks have been made to run counterclockwise.

Answer 4

no reason:

Why houses are called houses and are not called sanananchiuses?

Answer 5

'Clockwise' is defined as the direction that the hands on a clock turn. But why do clock hands turn this way? Many things turn in the opposite direction ... baseball players run the bases counterclockwise, horses race counterclockwise around the track, and jar lids unscrew counterclockwise. Why do clocks run clockwise?

The reason might be quite simple. Our original clocks were sundials.

In the northern hemisphere, where sundials were first used extensively, the shadow on a sundial moves around its face in a clockwise direction, as the sun moves across the sky.

Mechanical clocks with hands were originally built to imitate the path of a sundial shadow.

Answer 6

In the northern hemisphere, if a sun dial is facing north, the shadow will run clockwise across the face throughout  the day. Sundials where the first clocks.