Sources
| General | |
|---|---|
| National libraries | |
| Biographical dictionaries | |
| Other | |
Giovanni Padovani (or Paduani) (b. c. 1512) was an Italian mathematician and astronomer. He lived in Verona and was a student of Pietro Pitati. He published a number of esteemed treatises on various astronomical and mathematical subjects, the most well-known of which was a treatise on the sundial called Opus de compositione et usu multiformium horologiorum solarium, pro diversis mundi regionibus, idq(ue) ubique locorum tam in superficie plana horizontali quam murali quoruscumqu(ue) exposita sit, pertractans (Venice, 1570). An expanded and re-written version came out in 1582.
This manual includes instructions for the manufacture and laying out of mural (vertical) and horizontal sundials; contains extensive tables of declinations for various latitudes with both occidental and oriental examples; and provides instructions for the calculation of latitudes. This last section includes a description of a sundial calibrated for the measurement of unequal hours, such as those used in the ecclesiastic calendar, which foresaw twelve hours of light and twelve of dark, which was subject to severe seasonal variations.
| General | |
|---|---|
| National libraries | |
| Biographical dictionaries | |
| Other | |
An hour is a unit of time conventionally reckoned as 1⁄24 of a day and scientifically reckoned between 3,599 and 3,601 seconds, depending on the speed of Earth's rotation. There are 60 minutes in an hour, and 24 hours in a day.
Nevi'im is the second major division of the Hebrew Bible, between the Torah (instruction) and Ketuvim (writings). The Nevi'im are divided into two groups. The Former Prophets consists of the narrative books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings; while the Latter Prophets include the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Twelve Minor Prophets.
A sundial is a horological device that tells the time of day when direct sunlight shines by the apparent position of the Sun in the sky. In the narrowest sense of the word, it consists of a flat plate and a gnomon, which casts a shadow onto the dial. As the Sun appears to move through the sky, the shadow aligns with different hour-lines, which are marked on the dial to indicate the time of day. The style is the time-telling edge of the gnomon, though a single point or nodus may be used. The gnomon casts a broad shadow; the shadow of the style shows the time. The gnomon may be a rod, wire, or elaborately decorated metal casting. The style must be parallel to the axis of the Earth's rotation for the sundial to be accurate throughout the year. The style's angle from horizontal is equal to the sundial's geographical latitude.
In astronomy, an analemma is a diagram showing the position of the Sun in the sky as seen from a fixed location on Earth at the same mean solar time, as that position varies over the course of a year. The diagram will resemble a figure eight. Globes of Earth often display an analemma as a two-dimensional figure of equation of time vs. declination of the Sun.
The ascendant is the astrological sign on the eastern horizon of the sun sign when the person was born.
Exegesis is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text. Traditionally, the term was used primarily for work with religious texts, especially the Bible. In modern usage, exegesis can involve critical interpretations of virtually any text, including not just religious texts but also philosophy, literature, or virtually any other genre of writing. The phrase biblical exegesis is now used to distinguish studies of the Bible from other critical textual explanations.
Horology is the study of the measurement of time. Clocks, watches, clockwork, sundials, hourglasses, clepsydras, timers, time recorders, marine chronometers, and atomic clocks are all examples of instruments used to measure time. In current usage, horology refers mainly to the study of mechanical time-keeping devices, while chronometry more broadly includes electronic devices that have largely supplanted mechanical clocks for the best accuracy and precision in time-keeping.
A Qibla compass or qiblah compass is a modified compass used by Muslims to indicate the direction to face to perform prayers. In Islam, this direction is called qibla, and points towards the city of Mecca and specifically to the Ka'abah. While the compass, like any other compass, points north, the direction of prayer is indicated by marks on the perimeter of the dial, corresponding to different cities, or by a second pointer set by the user according to their own location. To determine the proper direction, one has to know with some precision both the longitude and latitude of one's own location and those of Mecca, the city toward which one must face. Once that is determined, the values are applied to a spherical triangle, and the angle from the local meridian to the required direction of Mecca can be determined.
ʿAbu al-Ḥasan Alāʾ al‐Dīn ʿAlī ibn Ibrāhīm al-Ansari known as Ibn al-Shatir or Ibn ash-Shatir was an Arab astronomer, mathematician and engineer. He worked as muwaqqit in the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus and constructed a sundial for its minaret in 1371/72.
The Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination, or more commonly known as the A-level, conducted by the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority (HKEAA), was taken by senior students at the end of their matriculation in Hong Kong between 1979 and 2012. It was originally the entrance examination in University of Hong Kong until the introduction of the Joint University Programmes Admissions System (JUPAS) in 1992, which made it the major university entrance examination until academic year 2011/2012.
The University of the East, also known as UE, is a private university located in Manila, Philippines. Founded in 1946, business tycoon Lucio Tan acquired the university in 1990. UE was once labeled as the "largest university in Asia" when its enrollment in the past reached over 65,000 students.
Amédée-François Frézier was a French military engineer, mathematician, spy, and explorer who is best remembered for bringing back five specimens of Fragaria chiloensis, the beach strawberry, from an assignment in South America, thus introducing this New World fruit to the Old. The standard author abbreviation Frez. is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.
Caleb Afendopolo was a Jewish polyhistor. He was the brother of Samuel ha-Ramati, ḥakam of the Karaite congregations in Constantinople and of Judah Bali, brother-in-law and disciple of Elijah Bashyatzi.
Abū al-Fath Abd al-Rahman Mansūr al-Khāzini or simply al-Khāzini was an Iranian astronomer of Greek origin from Seljuk Persia. His astronomical tables written under the patronage of Sultan Sanjar is considered to be one of the major works in mathematical astronomy of the medieval period. He provided the positions of fixed stars, and for oblique ascensions and time-equations for the latitude of Marv in which he was based. He also wrote extensively on various calendrical systems and on the various manipulations of the calendars. He was the author of an encyclopedia on scales and water-balances.
Tagg's Island, in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, is an island on the River Thames on the reach above Molesey Lock and just above Ash Island.
Astronomical rings, also known as Gemma's rings, are an early astronomical instrument. The instrument consists of three rings, representing the celestial equator, declination, and the meridian.
A sundial is a device that indicates time by using a light spot or shadow cast by the position of the Sun on a reference scale. As the Earth turns on its polar axis, the sun appears to cross the sky from east to west, rising at sun-rise from beneath the horizon to a zenith at mid-day and falling again behind the horizon at sunset. Both the azimuth (direction) and the altitude (height) can be used to create time measuring devices. Sundials have been invented independently in every major culture and became more accurate and sophisticated as the culture developed.
Dialing scales are used to lay out the face of a sundial geometrically. They were proposed by Samuel Foster in 1638, and produced by George Serle and Anthony Thompson in 1658 on a ruler. There are two scales: the latitude scale and the hour scale. They can be used to draw all gnomonic dials – and reverse engineer existing dials to discover their original intended location.
A schema for horizontal dials is a set of instructions used to construct horizontal sundials using compass and straightedge construction techniques, which were widely used in Europe from the late fifteenth century to the late nineteenth century. The common horizontal sundial is a geometric projection of an equatorial sundial onto a horizontal plane.
Ibn Al‐Raqqam Muḥammad Ibn Ibrahim Al‐Mursi Al‐Andalusi Al‐Tunisi Al‐Awsi also known as Ibn Al‐Raqqam was a 13th century Andalusian-Arab astronomer, mathematician and physician; but also a Sunni Muslim theologian and jurist.
