Sextants at Greenwich : a catalogue of the mariner's quadrants, mariner's astrolabes, cross-staffs, backstaffs, octants, sextants, quintants, reflecting circles and artificial horizons in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich / W.F.J. Mörzer Bruyns ; with a contribution by Richard Dunn
Abbreviations; PART ONE: HISTORICAL BACKGROUND; 1 An introduction to the history of celestial navigation; 2 The history and development of instruments for measuring altitude at sea before the octant; 3 The invention of the octant, and its development and diffusion; 4 The sextant and further improvements in the eighteenth century; 5 Innovations and production in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; 6 Collecting and interpreting navigation at Greenwich; PART TWO: THE CATALOGUE; Explanation; Appendix 1 The Adams and other significant collections: a checklist
Summary
Sextants at Greenwich consists of two main sections: The introductory chapters and the catalogue of navigating instruments of the National Maritime Museum. The first section gives a general overview of the history of celestial navigation with an emphasis on the instruments that were developed and used for that purpose, between about 1450 and the 1970s. The instruments in the catalogue form the main thread in these chapters. The catalogue consists of 347 entries of instruments for celestial navigation, the octants, sextants and related instruments preserved in the National Maritime Museum. Each
