Renaissance Science – XLVIII

Using the simplest and widest definition as to what constitutes a scientific instrument, it is literally impossible to say who first created, devised, used a scientific instrument or when and where they did it. My conjecture would be that the first scientific instrument was some sort of measuring device, a rod, or a cord to standardise a unit of measurement, almost certainly taken from the human body: a forearm, the length of a stride or pace, maybe a foot, a unit that we still use today. It is obviously that all the early great civilisation, Indus valley, Yellow River, Yangtze River, Fertile Crescent and so on, definitely used measuring devices, possibly observational devices, instruments to measure or lay out angles, simple compasses to construct circles, all of them probably as much to do with architecture and surveying, as with anything we might now label science.

This is the Royal cubit rod of Amenemope – a 3320-year-old measuring rod which revealed that Egyptians used units of measurement taken from the human body. The basic unit was the cubit – the length from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger, about 45cm. Source: British Museum

Did the early astronomers in China, India, Babylon use some sorts of instruments to help them make their observations? We know that later people used sighting tubes, like a telescope without the lenses, to improve the quality of their observations, did those first astronomers already use something similar. Simple answer, we don’t really know, we can only speculate. We do know that Indian astronomers used a quadrant in their observation of solar eclipses around 1000 BCE. 

Turning to the Ancient Greeks we initially have a similar lack of knowledge. The first truly major Greek astronomer Hipparkhos (c. 190–c. 120 BCE) (Latin Hipparchus) definitely used astronomical instruments but we have no direct account of his having done so. Our minimal information of his instruments comes from later astronomers, such as Ptolemaios (c. 100–c. 170 CE). Ptolemaios tells us in his Mathēmatikē Syntaxis aka Almagest that Hipparkhos made observations with an equatorial ring.

The easiest way to understand the use of an equatorial ring is to imagine a ring placed vertically in the east-west plane at the Earth’s equator. At the time of the equinoxes, the Sun will rise precisely in the east, move across the zenith, and set precisely in the west. Throughout the day, the bottom half of the ring will be in the shadow cast by the top half of the ring. On other days of the year, the Sun passes to the north or south of the ring, and will illuminate the bottom half. For latitudes away from the equator, the ring merely needs to be placed at the correct angle in the equatorial plane. At the Earth’s poles, the ring would be horizontal. Source: Wikipedia

At another point in the book Ptolemaios talks of making observations with an armillary sphere and compares his observations with those of Hipparkhos, leading some to think that Hipparkhos also used an armillary sphere. Toomer in his translation of the Almagest say there is no foundation for this speculation and that Hipparkhos probably used a dioptra. [1]

Ptolemaios mentions four astronomical instruments in his book, all of which are for measuring angles: 

1) A double ring device and

Toomer p. 61

2) a quadrant both used to determine the inclination of the ecliptic.

Toomer p. 62

3) The armillary sphere, which he confusingly calls an astrolabe, used to determine sun-moon configurations. 

Toomer p. 218

4) His parallactic rulers, used to determine the moon’s parallax, which was called a triquetrum in the Middle Ages. 

Toomer p. 245

Ptolemaios almost certainly also used a dioptra a simple predecessor to the theodolite used for measuring angles both in astronomy and in surveying. As I outlined in the post on surveying, ancient cultures were also using instruments to carry out land measuring.

Graphic reconstruction of the dioptra, by Venturi, in 1814. (An incorrect interpretation of Heron’s description) Source: Wikimedia Commons

Around the same time as the armillary sphere began to emerge in ancient Greece it also began to emerge in China, with the earliest single ring device probably being used in the first century BCE. By the second century CE the complete armillary sphere had evolved ring by ring. When the armillary sphere first evolved in India is not known, but it was in full used by the time of Āryabhata in the fifth century CE.

Armillary sphere at Beijing Ancient Observatory, replica of an original from the Ming Dynasty

A parallel development to the armillary sphere was the celestial globe, a globe of the heavens marked with the constellations. In Greece celestial globes predate Ptolemaios but none of the early ones have survived.  In his Almagest, Ptolemaios gives instruction on how to produce celestial globes. Chinese celestial globes also developed around the time of their armillary spheres but, once again, none of the early ones have survived. As with everything else astronomical, the earliest surveying evidence for celestial globes in India is much later than Greece or China.

The Farnese Atlas holding a celestial globe is the oldest known surviving celestial globe dating from the second century CE Source: Wikimedia Commons

In late antiquity the astrolabe emerged, its origins are still not really clear. Ptolemaios published a text on the planisphere, the stereographic projection used to create the climata in an astrolabe and still used by astronomers for star charts today. The earliest references to the astrolabe itself are from Theon of Alexandria (c. 335–c. 414 CE). All earlier claims to existence or usage of astrolabes are speculative. No astrolabes from antiquity are known to have survived. The earliest surviving astrolabe is an Islamic instrument dated AD 315 (927-28 CE).

North African, 10th century AD, Planispheric Astrolabe Khalili Collection via Wikimedia Commons

Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages saw a steady decline in the mathematical sciences and with it a decline in the production and use of most scientific instruments in Europe until the disappeared almost completely. 

When the rapidly expanding Arabic Empire began filing their thirst for knowledge across a wide range of subjects by absorbing it from Greek, Indian and Chinese sources, as well as the mathematical disciplines they also took on board the scientific instruments. They developed and perfected the astrolabe, producing hundreds of both beautiful and practical multifunctional instruments. 

As well large-scale astronomical quadrants they produced four different types of handheld instruments. In the ninth century, the sine or sinical quadrant for measuring celestial angles and for doing trigonometrical calculations was developed by Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī. In the fourteenth century, the universal (shakkāzīya) quadrant used for solving astronomical problems for any latitude. Like astrolabes, quadrants are latitude dependent and unlike astrolabes do not have exchangeable climata. Origin unknown, but the oldest known example is from 1300, is the horary quadrant, which enables the uses to determine the time using the sun. An equal hours horary quadrant is latitude dependent, but an unequal hours one can be used anywhere, but its use entails calculations. Again, origin unknown, is the astrolabe quadrant, basically a reduced astrolabe in quadrant form. There are extant examples from twelfth century Egypt and fourteenth century Syria.

Horary quadrant for a latitude of about 51.5° as depicted in an instructional text of 1744: To find the Hour of the Day: Lay the thread just upon the Day of the Month, then hold it till you slip the small Bead or Pin-head [along the thread] to rest on one of the 12 o’Clock Lines; then let the Sun shine from the Sight G to the other at D, the Plummet hanging at liberty, the Bead will rest on the Hour of the Day. Source: Wikimedia Commons
Astrolabic quadrant, made of brass; made for latitude 33 degrees 30 minutes (i.e. Damascus); inscription on the front saying that the quadrant was made for the ‘muwaqqit’ (literally: the timekeeper) of the Great Umayyad Mosque of Damascus. AH 734 (1333-1334 CE) British Museum

Islamicate astronomers began making celestial globes in the tenth century and it is thought that al-Sufi’s Book of the Constellations was a major source for this development. However, the oldest surviving Islamic celestial globe made by Ibrahim Ibn Saîd al-Sahlì in Valencia in the eleventh century show no awareness of the forty-eight Greek constellations of al-Sufi’s book.

Islamicate mathematical scholars developed and used many scientific instruments and when the developments in the mathematical sciences that they had made began to filter into Europe during the twelfth century scientific renaissance those instruments also began to become known in Europe. For example, the earliest astrolabes to appear in Europe were on the Iberian Peninsula, whilst it was still under Islamic occupation.  

Canterbury Astrolabe Quadrant 1388 Source Wikimedia Commons
Astrolabe of Jean Fusoris, made in Paris, 1400 Source: Wikimedia Commons

The medieval period in Europe saw a gradual increase in the use of scientific instruments, both imported and locally manufactured, but the use was still comparatively low level. There was some innovation, for example the French Jewish scholar, Levi ben Geshon (1288–144), published the first description of the cross staff or Jacob’s staff, used in astronomy, surveying, and navigation, in his Book of the Wars of the Lord (originally in Hebrew but also translated into Latin). 

…of a staff of 4.5 feet (1.4 m) long and about one inch (2.5 cm) wide, with six or seven perforated tablets which could slide along the staff, each tablet being an integral fraction of the staff length to facilitate calculation, used to measure the distance between stars or planets, and the altitudes and diameters of the Sun, Moon and stars

Source

A Jacob’s staff, from John Sellers’ Practical Navigation (1672) Source: Wikimedia Commons

Also, the magnetic compass came into use in Europe in the twelfth century, first mentioned by Alexander Neckam (1157–1217) in his De naturis rerum at the end of the century.

The sailors, moreover, as they sail over the sea, when in cloudy whether they can no longer profit by the light of the sun, or when the world is wrapped up in the darkness of the shades of night, and they are ignorant to what point of the compass their ship’s course is directed, they touch the magnet with a needle, which (the needle) is whirled round in a circle until, when its motion ceases, its point looks direct to the north.

Petrus Pereginus (fl. 1269) gave detailed descriptions of both the floating compass and the dry compass in his Epistola de magnete

However, it was first in the Renaissance that a widespread and thriving culture of scientific instrument design, manufacture, and usage really developed. The steep increase in scientific instrument culture was driving by the substantial parallel developments in astronomy, navigation, surveying, and cartography that began around fourteen hundred that I have already outlined in previous episodes of this series. Renaissance scientific instrument culture is too large a topic to cover in detail in one blog post, so I’ll only do a sketch of some major points and themes with several links to other earlier related posts.

Already, the first Viennese School of Mathematics, which was heavily involved in the development of both astronomy and cartography was also a source of scientific instrument design and manufacture.Johannes von Gmunden (c. 1380–1442) had a notable collection of instruments including an Albion, a multipurpose instrument conceived by Richard of Wallingford (1292–1336).

Albion front side Source: Seb Falk’s Twitter feed
Albion rear Source: Seb Falk’s Twitter feed

Georg von Peuerbach (1423–1461) produced several instruments most notably the earliest portable sundial marked for magnetic declination.

Folding sundial by Georg von Peuerbach

His pupil Regiomontanus (1436–1476) wrote a tract on the construction and use of the astrolabe and there is an extant instrument from 1462 dedicated to Cardinal Bessarion and signed IOHANNES, which is assumed to have been made by him. At least eleven other Regiomontanus style astrolabes from the fifteenth century are known.

Regiomontanus style astrolabe Source: Wikimedia Commons

Elements of his design were adopted by both Johannes Stöffler (1452–1531), the first professor of astronomy at the University of Tübingen, and by the Nürnberger mathematicus Georg Hartmann (1489–1564).

Stöffler also made celestial globes and an astronomical clock.

Celestial Globe, Johannes Stöffler, 1493; Landesmuseum Württemberg Source: Wikimedia Commons

Mechanical astronomical clocks began to emerge in Europe in the fourteenth century, but it would not be until the end of the sixteenth century that mechanical clocks became accurate enough to be used as scientific instruments. The earliest clockmaker, who reached this level of accuracy being the Swiss instrument maker, Jost Bürgi (1552–1632)

Bürgi made numerous highly elaborate and very decorative mechanical clocks, mechanised globes and mechanised armillary spheres that were more collectors items for rich patrons rather than practical instruments.

Bürgi Quartz Clock 1622-27
Source: Swiss Physical Society

This illustrates another driving force behind the Renaissance scientific instrument culture. The Renaissance mathematicus rated fairly low in the academical hierarchy, actually viewed as a craftsman rather than an academic. This made finding paid work difficult and they were dependent of rich patrons amongst the European aristocracy. It became a standard method of winning the favour of a patron to design a new instrument, usually a modification of an existing one, making an elaborate example of it and presenting it to the potential patron. The birth of the curiosity cabinets, which often also included collections of high-end instruments was also a driving force behind the trend. Many leading instrument makers produced elaborate, high-class instruments for such collections. Imperial courts in Vienna, Prague, and Budapest employed court instrument makers. For example, Erasmus Habermel (c. 1538–1606) was an incredibly prolific instrument maker, who became instrument maker to Rudolf II. A probable relative Josua Habermel (fl. 1570) worked as an instrument maker in southern Germany, eventually moving to Prague, where he probably worked in the workshop of Erasmus.

 1594 armillary sphere by Erasmus Habermel of Prague.

Whereas from Theon onwards, astrolabes were unique, individual, instruments, very often beautiful ornaments as well as functioning instruments, Georg Hartmann was the first instrument maker go into serial production of astrolabes. Also, Hartmann, although he didn’t invent them, was a major producer of printed paper instruments. These could be cut out and mounted on wood to produce cheap, functional instruments for those who couldn’t afford the expensive metal ones. 

Hartmann astrolabe front
Hartmann astrolabe rear
Paper and Wood Astrolabe Hartmann Source: HSM Oxford

Hartmann lived and worked in Nürnberg, which as I have sketched in an earlier post, was for more than a century the scientific instrument capital of Europe with a massive produce of instruments of all sorts.

One of the most beautiful sets on instruments manufactured in Nürnberg late 16th century. Designed by Johannes Pretorius (1537–1616), professor for astronomy at the Nürnberger University of Altdorf and manufactured by the goldsmith Hans Epischofer (c. 1530–1585) Germanische National Museum

As well as astrolabes and his paper instruments Hartmann also produced printed globes, none of which have survived. Another Nürnberger mathematicus, Johannes Schöner (1477–1547) launched the printed pairs of terrestrial and celestial globes onto the market.

Celestial Globe by Johannes Schöner c. 1534 Source

His innovation was copied by Gemma Frisius (1508–1555), whose student Gerard Mercator (1512–1594) took up globe making on a large scale, launching the seventeenth century Dutch globe making industry. 

Gemma Frisius set up a workshop producing a range of scientific instruments together with his nephew (?) Gualterus Arsenius (c. 1530–c. 1580).  

Astronomical ring dial Gualterus Arsenius Source

In France, Oronce Fine (1494–1555), a rough contemporary, who was appointed professor at the Collège Royal, was also influenced by Schöner in his cartography and like the Nürnberger was a major instrument maker. In Italy, Egnatio Danti (1536–1586) the leading cosmographer was also the leading instrument maker. 

Egnation Danti, Astrolabe, ca. 1568, brass and wood. Florence, Museo di Storia della Scienza Source: Fiorani The Marvel of Maps p. 49

A major change during the Renaissance was the emergence, for the first time in Early Modern Europe, of large-scale astronomical observatories, Wilhelm IV (1532–1592) in Hessen-Kassel beginning in about 1560 and Tycho Brahe (1546–1601) on the Island of Hven beginning in 1575. Both men commissioned new instruments, many of which were substantially improved in comparison with their predecessors from antiquity.

Sternwarte im Astronomisch-Physikalischen Kabinett, Foto: MHK, Arno Hensmanns Reconstruction of Wilhelm’s observatory
Tycho Brahe, Armillary Sphere, 1581 Source
Tycho Brahe quadrant

Their lead was followed by others, the first Vatican observatory was established in the Gregorian Tower in 1580.

View on the Tower of Winds (Gregorian tower) in Vatican City (with the dome of Saint Peter’s Basilica in the background). Source: Wikimedia Commons

In the early seventeenth century, Leiden University in Holland established the first European university observatory and Christian Longomontanus (1562–1647), who had been Tycho’s chief assistant, established a university observatory in Copenhagen 

Drawing of Leiden Observatory in 1670, seen on top of the university building. Source: Wikimedia Commons
Copenhagen University Observatory Source: Wikimedia Commons

As in all things mathematical England lagged behind the continent but partial filled the deficit by importing instrument makers from the continent, the German Nicolas Kratzer (c. 1487–1550) and the Netherlander Thomas Gemini (c. 1510–1562). The first home grown instrument maker was Humfrey Cole (c. 1530­–1591). By the end of the sixteenth century, led by John Dee (1527–c. 1608), who studied in Louven with Frisius and Mercator, and Leonard Digges (c. 1515–c. 1559), a new generation of English instrument makers began to dominate the home market. These include Leonard’s son Thomas Digges (c. 1546–1595), William Bourne (c. 1535–1582), John Blagrave (d. 1611), Thomas Blundeville (c. 1522–c. 1606), Edward Wright (1561–1615), Emery Molyneux (d. 1598), Thomas Hood (1556–1620), Edmund Gunter (1581–1626) Benjamin Cole (1695–1766), William Oughtred (1574–1660), and others.

The Renaissance also saw a large amount of innovation in scientific instruments. The Greek and Chinese armillary spheres were large observational instruments, but the Renaissance armillary sphere was a table top instrument conceived to teach the basic of astronomy.

Armillary Sphere by Carlo Plato, Rome, 1588 Museum of the History of Science

In navigation the Renaissance saw the invention various variations of the backstaff, to determine solar altitudes.

Davis quadrant (backstaff), made in 1765 by Johannes Van Keulen. On display at the Musée national de la Marine in Paris. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Also new for the same purpose was the mariner’s astrolabe.

Mariner’s Astrolabe c. 1600 Source: Wikimedia Commons

Edmund Gunter (1581–1626) invented the Gunter scale or rule a multiple scale (logarithmic, trigonometrical) used to solve navigation calculation just using dividers.

Gunter scale front
Gunter scale back Source

William Oughtred (1574–1660) combined two Gunter scales to produce the slide rule.

New in surveying were the surveyor’s chain,

A Gunter chain photographed at Campus Martius Museum. Source: Wikimedia Commons

the plane table,

Surveying with plane table and surveyor’s chain

the theodolite

Theodolite 1590 Source:

and the circumferentor.

18th century circumferentor

All of which were of course also used in cartography. Another Renaissance innovation was sets of drawing instruments for the cartographical, navigational etc draughtsmen.

Drawing instruments Bartholomew Newsum, London c. 1570 Source

The biggest innovation in instruments in the Renaissance, and within its context one of the biggest instrument innovation in history, were of course the telescope and the microscope, the first scientific instruments that not only aided observations but increased human perception enabling researchers to perceive things that were previously hidden from sight. Here is a blog post over the complex story of the origins of the telescope and one over the unclear origins of the microscope.

The Renaissance can be viewed as the period when instrumental science began to come of age. 

[1] The information on Ptolemaios’ instruments and the diagrams are taken from Ptolemy’s Almagest, translated and annotated by G. J. Toomer, Princeton Paperbacks, 1998