The Astrolabe Project (original) (raw)
Related papers
CATCHING THE STARS: THE USING ON NAVIGATION AND EXTANT EXAMPLES OF ASTROLABE
Astrolabe which was a device used on navigation by navigators until the 18th century, was used in areas such as representing of the various graphical problems, measuring of the altitude angels of the stars, determining of the latitudes, measuring of the time, obtaining information about the zodiac and etc. in astronomy. Astrolabe which was a portable device like a quadrant and used upright on observation, the altitude and positions of the stars and the sun were measured and located by an astrolabe on the horizon. Astrolabe was the most common and best-known device in astronomy and known by the Greeks in the 2ⁿᵈ-4th centuries BC. It can be known that, however it was developed in ancient times, its variations and usage was increased in the Arab-Islamic culture in the 8th-9th centuries.[1] Astrolabe which was learned by Muslims during the period of the Crusades and the Andalusia, was used on the open sea navigation especially by the Spanish and Portuguese navigators thanks to its practical usage about measuring of the latitudes according to the polar altitude. Towards the end of the 15th century, astronomy studies which were developed as a continuation of the Islamic culture in Ottoman were institutionalized and continued in “Müneccimbaşılık”. The using and producing of astrolabes were continued until the 18th century in muvakkithanes and observatories under this institution.[2] There are protected and extant examples of astrolabes in the various museums in İstanbul. The article aims to study, the principles, usage and extant examples of astrolabe on the İstanbul Topkapı Palace Museum, İstanbul Kandilli Observatory and İstanbul Maritime Museum.
237 - KING 2007 - article “Astrolabes, quadrants, and calculating devices” (< Enc. Islam Three)
Astrolabe (Ar. asṭurlāb or aṣṭurlāb), is a Greek invention of late antiquity, which Muslims first encountered in the second/eighth century in Ḥarrān. The utility of the instrument-a mirror of the universe that can be held in the hand-immediately inspired them to make astrolabes of their own, with the earliest surviving Islamic astrolabe dating from late second/eighth-century Baghdad. The instrument has many uses, especially as an analogue computer and for astronomical timekeeping, as well as for deriving basic information for a horoscope. Muslim astronomers in Baghdad in the third/ninth century also developed three different kinds of portable quadrants used for trigonometric calculations and for timekeeping.
The forgotten nautical astronomical instruments
Firenze University Press eBooks, 2022
Astrology and meteorology have always had great importance for agriculture and navigation. This paper describes some measuring and forecasting instruments which, at their design epoch, had a moderate success in sailing a small sea like the Mediterranean, but then over time they were forgotten because they were supplanted by other more reliable instruments even in the largest seas. In particular, we refer to the instruments for astrology, starting with a device, the parapegma, made when meteorology was still a particular aspect of astrology. The second instrument is a calculator for determining the position of the stars; so some instruments are then described to establish, for example, the position of a ship with respect to the Sun or the North Pole, and others to determine direction and speed of ship. The short list ends with a return to meteorology with two storm forecasters, essential for quite sailing which, unfortunately, never worked as their inventors hoped. 1 Only the second book of the work has survived [1001].
Astrolabes in Medieval Cultures
2019
Co-Editors: Josefina Rodríguez-Arribas, Charles Burnett, Silke Ackermann and Ryan Szpiech First published as a special issue of the journal Medieval Encounters (vol. 23, 2017), this volume brings together fifteen studies on various aspects of the astrolabe in medieval cultures. Contributors are Silke Ackermann, Emilia Calvo, John Davis, Laura Fernández Fernández, Miquel Forcada, Azucena Hernández, David A. King, Taro Mimura, Günther Oestmann, Josefina Rodríguez-Arribas, Sreeramula Rajeswara Sarma, Petra G. Schmidl, Giorgio Strano, Flora Vafea, and Johannes Thomann.
In the ninth or tenth century CE scholars in the Islamic world made an innovation in astronomical instrumentation by combining the standard northern and southern astrolabes to create a class of astrolabes known to the modern literature as “mixed astrolabes”. The Musarṭan (or crab shaped) astrolabe is one of the more well-known astrolabes of this kind in the medieval Islamic world. In addition to the standard, medieval literature on astrolabe-making which reveals the geometric-astronomical structure of the Musarṭan astrolabe, several specialized treatises were written on its operation including the _Mukhtaṣar dar maʿrifat-i usṭurlāb-i Musarṭan wa Muqawwas_ (Compendious [treatise] on knowledge of the Musarṭan and the Muqawwas astrolabes), written in Persian by a certain Pīr Muḥammad, known as Ḥakīm-i Tabrīzī (fourteenth-fifteenth century CE, Tabriz). This recently rediscovered text is, chronologically, the latest known text written on the use of the Musarṭan astrolabe. However what makes this work distinct from its peer texts, of which half a dozen are extant today, is the isolation of its author from the other texts. This isolation is not only suggested by Tabrīzī, who claims to have discovered how to work with an instrument that was unknown in his time and place, but is also attested by the contents of his treatise. In this paper, based on my critical edition of Tabrīzī’s text, I first demonstrate the disconnection of Tabrīzī from the literature on the Musarṭan astrolabe. I contrast the terminology that he uses to describe this astrolabe, the definitions that he provides for them, and his approach to the complications of the instrument’s operation with what can be found in the earlier literature, especially in the two earliest, extant works on this instrument by Abū Saʿīd al-Sijzī (ca. 945–ca. 1020 CE). Based on Tabrīzī’s text as well as on other works on the mixed astrolabes, especially that of Abū Naṣr Aḥmad b. Zarīr (twelfth century CE), I investigate the possibility of an oral tradition on the Musarṭan astrolabe as an auxiliary source for Tabrīzī. I then show how, in isolation from the textual tradition on mixed astrolabes, Tabrīzī succeeded in writing a “user’s manual” for the Musarṭan astrolabe mainly by learning from a specimen of this instrument in his possession. Hence, Tabrīzī’s then 450 year-old Musarṭan astrolabe becomes the main vehicle for the transmission of knowledge about this instrument’s operation.
Science and Engineering in the Islamic Heritage: Research Articles (March 2017), 2024
Islamic astrolabes and astronomical tables (zijes) were improvements on Greek antecedents, and were employed both to educate non-specialists about basic astronomical concepts, and to enable faster calculations of planetary positions and other astrological parameters. Both astrolabes and tables encode a complex trigonometry, so the user needs merely to turn a dial, aligning certain marks and reading off the result from the astrolabe, or simply to perform basic arithmetic on the tables to derive planetary positions. In addition, the astrolabe was an important vehicle for the transmission of mathematics and astronomy to Europe, since not only was it a symbol of Muslim pre-eminence in science for medieval Europeans, but it also inspired them to acquire the mathematics and astronomy required to use it. Furthermore, one of the most significant engineering advances of medieval Europe, the mechanical clock, is shown to have been derived partly from the technology of the astrolabe. Lastly, astrolabes and zijes are useful in modern history of science courses, to help students grasp the technical sophistication of Muslim civilization. Three example assignments and workshops are discussed. 1) Students use tables to calculate selected features of their birth charts (positions of sun, Mars and Ascendant). 2) Students construct an astrolabe from scratch, using compass, pencil, card stock paper, and an acetate sheet. (Professor Saliba made me do this in graduate school, and it was one of the most important exercises I ever did). And 3) Students learn how to use the astrolabe for time-keeping and selected astrological calculations.
Astrolabe engraved on a brass disc Parts 1,2,3, 2023
Astrolabe devised for measuring angles, for nautical or topographical applications. It was engraved in a brass disc which has a double Quadrant of Shadows, with his Altimetric Scales divided in 60 parts, and with sides marked as "Umbra Recta" and "Umbra Versa". In the brass disc was also engraved a "Curved_lines Quadrant Sundial", calculated for a latitude 40°N. (Toledo ?). By its calligraphy, the astrolabe can be dated in the early XVI Century. and is identical to the one proposed by Alonso de Chaves in his "Quatripartitu", written in 1537, and to the one that can be seen in the Planispheres of Diego Ribero delineated after 1527. The brass disc, belongs to Alfonso Pastor-Moreno, which is also the author of the present paper.
Nautical Astronomy : From the Sailings to Lunar Distances
Proceedings of the Canadian Society for History and Philosophy of Mathematics, Volume 19, pp 265 - 288, 2006
""From the mid sixteenth century through the mid eighteenth century advances in science, mathematics, and technology enabled the navigator, cartographer, or surveyor to determine both his latitude and longitude from celestial observations. This paper explores the history of the development of those techniques. The period during which these ideas grew from theoretical speculations to practical tools, a period of two and one-half centuries, was spurred on by the nancial encouragement of governments and commercial interests and the contributions of major gures such as Kepler, Newton, Briggs, Napier, Vernier, Harrison, Mayer, Flamsteed, Maskelyne, Bowditch, and others. ================= A partir du mi seizieme siecle par le mi dix-huitieme siecle, les avances en science, les mathematiques, et la technologie ont permis au navigateur, au cartographe, ou a l'arpenteur de determiner sa latitude et longitude des observations celestes. Cet article explore l'histoire du developpement de ces techniques. La periode l'ou ces idees se sont developpees des speculations theoriques aux outils pratiques, une periode d'environ deux cents et cinquante ans, a ete incitee par l'encouragement nancier des gouvernements et des interests commerciaux et les contributions des gures principales telles que Kepler, Newton, Briggs, Napier, Vernier, Harrison, Mayer, Flamsteed, Maskelyne, Bowditch, et d'autres.""