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To George's list of errors/misconceptions I'd like to add two:

1. The Viking "sun compass" is pure conjecture, although the NMM (and the
Danish Maritime Museum in Helsing�r) present it as fact, alas, in their
exhibition. The most active promotor of this alleged Viking instrument is
S�ren Thirslund, who has published a slim volume about it in several
languages. The idea has been rejected by most experts on early navigation,
among them Eva Taylor and William E. May (A Norse Bearing-Dial? in: Journal
of the Institute of Navigation, Vol. 7(1954), 78 - 81), and - still the best
book on Viking Navigation - Uwe Schnall, Navigation der Wikinger, Oldenburg
1975.

There was a lively discussion about this in several mailing lists which has
been collected by James Enterline in a "Sun Ray Disk White Paper".
Unfortunately it seems to have disappeared from the net - so it goes, says
Bokonon. I have a copy if anyone cares to have it. The result of the
discussion seems to be that the presumptions about the lines on the disk
just don't fit the facts (the lines, that is).

2. The "polynesian" stick charts are not polynesian but micronesian, and
they' ve got nothing to do with the stars but depict islands and the swell
patterns around them. 

The literature on them is abundant, just see: Sch�ck, Die Stabkarten der
Marshall-Insulaner, Hamburg 1902, or: Winkler, On Sea Charts Formerly Used
in the Marshall Islands, with Notices on the Navigation of These Islanders
in General, in: Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian
Institute 1899, Vol. 54 (1901), 487 - 508.

But never mind: A "History of Navigation" published a few years ago in
Germany (and reprinted since then) is full of stupid mistakes; the author is
someone who was obviously hired by the publishing house of Peter Tamm (the
man who was granted a multi million sum by the city of Hamburg to house his
maritime collection of mostly militaria in a new museum notwithstanding the
fact that Hamburg already has two important museums with maritime
departments) and has never done any research in this field.  

Dr. Wolfgang K�berer
Wolfsgangstr. 92
D-60322 Frankfurt am Main
Tel: + 49 69 95520851
Fax: + 49 69 558400
e-mail: koeberer@navigationsgeschichte.de

-----Urspr�ngliche Nachricht-----
Von: NavList@fer3.com [mailto:NavList@fer3.com] Im Auftrag
von George Huxtable
Gesendet: Mittwoch, 3. Oktober 2007 15:55
An: NavList@fer3.com
Betreff: [NavList 3335] Re: BBC - A History of Navigation


Here is my list of errors, which will make sense only to those that can 
bring themselves to look at that website.

1. "The Polynesians could calculate their positions from the currents of the
waves". What on earth are "the currents of the waves"? And how could anyone
"calculate" position that way?

2. "Ptolemy's maps were rediscovered in the 15th century and were used until
the 18th". I can't class this one as an error, but I'm very surprised by the
claim that a Ptolemy map was used until the 18th century. Is there any
backing for that claim?

3. "The Pole star is near a group of stars known as the Plough or the Big
Dipper, and is itself part of the Great Bear"  Not that near, it's about 10
degrees away, and it is NOT part of the Great Bear [that's the same thing as
the Plough or Big Dipper or Ursa Major]  but is part of the Little Bear or
Ursa Minor, as the picture shows. As for the Great Bear, its stars are in
the wrong positions, completely jumbled about.

4. The backstaff illustration shows the observer looking toward the Sun.
That isn't the way it was used. The Sun was behind the observer's back,
throwing a shadow, which is why it was called a backstaff. That's the whole
point of the instrument. The text mentions only looking at the horizon,
saying nothing about the Sun and shadow.

5. The text describing an octant is illustrated by another picture of the 
backstaff, not an octant.

6. Compass. Did the ancient Greeks have a compass? I don't believe it.
Evidence, please.

7. The king's complaint resulted, not from ignorance of longitude, but the
fact that his mapmakers HAD CORRECTLY measured the longitudes of the
boundaries of France. However, that was by a method that was unusable at
sea. And it was Louis XIV, not Louis XVI.

8. Cook didn't visit Tasmania on his first voyage. (He did on his third).

9. There were various ways of spelling Maskelyne, but never, I think,
Meskalyne.

10. Lunar table method. The "several hours for a lunar calculation" applied
BEFORE Maskelyne's lunar tables were published. But those tables were there
to bypass nearly all of that work, reducing the calculation to less than
half an hour. This is a common mistake, told by many that should know
better. It seems to gain authority at each retelling. But it's quite wrong.

11. 1884 conference. Map has Rio de Janeiro spelled wrong.

=========================

No doubt, you could unearth your own additions to that list.

George.

contact George Huxtable at george@huxtable.u-net.com
or at +44 1865 820222 (from UK, 01865 820222)
or at 1 Sandy Lane, Southmoor, Abingdon, Oxon OX13 5HX, UK.





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