NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Coordinates on Cook's maps
From: Alexandre Eremenko
Date: 2007 Apr 18, 12:58 -0400
From: Alexandre Eremenko
Date: 2007 Apr 18, 12:58 -0400
Ken, Many thanks for this useful information. Now I have all these almanacs and can compare them with Frank's online almanac on the dates of some Cook's observations. Then I will be able to tell what part of his error was due to the almanacs. Alex. On Wed, 18 Apr 2007, Ken Muldrew wrote: > > > On 18 Apr 2007 at 12:06, Alexandre E Eremenko wrote: > > > I think I have those almanacs > > (downloaded when this collection was still free). > > I just wanted to make sure that he > > used exactly the same published Nautical almanacs > > (rather than some more precise data his > > astronomers-associates could possibly provide). > > One thing which makes me doubt is this: > > Cook's voyages lasted more than one year. > > The ordinary almanac is published just one year ahead, > > even now. Then how did Cook obtain the data for > > more than one year? > > >From the paper "Tabulating the Heavens: Computing the Nautical Almanac in > 18th Century England" by M. Croarken, IEEE Annals of the History of > Computing 25(3): 48-61. 2003: > > "...on his first voyage of exploration (1768-1771), Captain Cook was able > to take with him only the Nautical Almanacs for 1768 and 1769, but on his > second voyage (1772-1775), he was able to take with him the editions for > 1772, 1773, 1774, and the few sheets from 1775 that were ready. By 1783, > the Nautical Almanac was regularly being published four or five years > ahead, and by 1793 the work was being completed up to 10 years ahead, > although publication was never more than five years ahead." > > Ken Muldrew. > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to NavList@fer3.com To , send email to NavList-@fer3.com -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---