NavList:

Regarding the "Ramsden sextant from c.1783" at the NMM...

The book "Sextants at Greenwich: A Catalogue of the Mariner's Quadrants, [etc.]" By W.F.J. Morzer Bruyns and Richard Dunn (Oxford University Press, 2009) is available in "Limited Preview" through Google Books. The section available for reading includes a substantial portion of the history, about 30 fascinating pages out of 80, and a small sample from the instrument catalog itself. Here is the link to it:
http://books.google.com/books?id=OOr6Dk54A2AC

When you get there, try searching on "micrometer" just for example. Browsing the sections available, I learned some bits of sextant history that I had never heard before. The "Limited Preview" capability of Google Books is a function of national and regional copyright laws and legal deals made by Google so this may only work from computers with IP addresses located in the US.

This book has been discussed briefly on NavList before, primarily for its high price which is clearly driven by expectations of library and institutional sales. The book looks wonderful. Even at its current price, I may yet buy a copy. And incidentally, the dollar(USD)/pound exchange rate is relatively good right now ($1.51 buys one pound), so it may be a good time for us Americans to pick up a copy.

And for Richard Dunn, please tell us anything and everything about the book and its production. How long did you work on it?

-FER

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