NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: David Pike
Date: 2025 Jul 29, 15:06 -0700
First Thoughts.
It’s a map of the stars.
It’s apparently written in French (Mouchez and Gill, Catalogue Astrographique connection??)
The thick line drawn is the Ecliptic not the Celestial Equator (CE)
The dates are close to the Equinoxes but not exactly,
Perhaps they’ve changed. Historic??
To get latitude
If at the Poles, the CE would be a circle round the circumference.
If at the Equator, the CE would be a line running from east to west.
If the CE is the fine line passing through Orion’s Belt (Mintaka). This might help locate the North Celestial Pole and probably hour angle. Somewhere amongst this it must be possible to estimate latitude. Possibly tracking up the celestial meridian from the centre of the photographs to the CE. Grid scale from Mintaka to Rigel = approximately 10 degrees
It's time to play with a planisphere, or draw some lines on prints but not one hour after bedtime.
To be continued. (DaveP)
