NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Wright's 1599 Chart showing Scillies
From: Peter Fogg
Date: 2007 Nov 30, 11:03 +1100
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From: Peter Fogg
Date: 2007 Nov 30, 11:03 +1100
George writes:
I doubt if any longitude could be determined to better than a
degree or two that way, but even so, that would be better than dead
reckoning.
Given that "a degree or two" amounts to 60 to 120 nautical miles, surely this is a bit of a sweeping generalisation?
My own readings indicate that navigators who had to depend on dead reckoning managed much better results than this. Again, this depends on the specific circumstances; if crossing vast oceans without any correction then yes, a degree or two could be a modest error in those circumstances.
The voyaging we are considering here, from the Azores northeast towards Britain, is more modest in scope, and a significant component involves a change in latitude rather than longitude.
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