No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
The Lizard as a Landfall
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 November 2009
Extract
On the whole global surface of land and sea it falls to the lot of some few places to emerge through time to be of immense importance. Lizard Point is just one such place. Who were the first mariners to realize that it was the most southerly point of the English mainland or to use it for landfall and for caping, we shall probably never know. What is clear, however, is that, by the time Claudius Ptolemy was compiling his Guide to Geography, C. AD 160, it was sufficiently well known to the Roman world for the name by which it was then called, Damnonium or Ocrinum Promontorium, to be included, with its geographical coordinates, in his famous gazetteer. It is of academic interest only for us to query whether those coordinate values were right or wrong, whether they were a good approximation or not: what is important for us, with the benefit of very long hindsight, is to marvel at the sheer brilliance of the conception of a spherical coordinate system, and at the industry and far-sightedness of one or more men who set about compiling lists of known places with assigned coordinates. What, in so doing, they handed down to posterity is of inestimable value.
Information
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © The Royal Institute of Navigation 1982
References
NOTES AND REFERENCES
1 Ptolomaeus, ClaudiusCosmographia (Bologna, 1477)Google Scholar, see in facsimile, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Amsterdam, 1963).
2 2Exon Domesday, ff. 99,226.Google Scholar
3 3The author is indebted to O. Padel, Research Fellow of the Institute of Cornish Studies, for this information from his forthcoming book The Place-name Elements of Cornwall.Google Scholar
4 Sailing Directions for the Circumnavigation of England ed. Gairdner, James Hakluyt Society First Series (London, 1889), No. 79.Google Scholar
5 Leland, JohnThe Itinerary of John Leland 1535–1548 ed. Smith, Lucy Toulmin (London, 1907), P. 320.Google Scholar
6 British Library, Cotton MS. Aug. I. i. 38.Google Scholar
7 British Library, Add. MS. 6115,, f. 9, may be conveniently consulted in David Waters, The Art of Navigation in England in Elizabethan and Early Stuart Times (H.M.S.O., 1978), p. 563.
8 Bourne, WilliamAn almanacke and prognostication for three yeares …1571 and 1572 & 1573 (London 1571)Google Scholar, may be conveniently consulted in A Regiment Jor the Sea and other writings by William Bourne of Gravesend ed. Taylor, E. G. R. Hakluyt Society Second Series (Cambridge, 1963), No. 112, p. 91.Google Scholar
9 William Bourne, Regiment for the Sea, p. 271, see also Waters, D. W.The Rutters of the Sea (New Haven and London, 1967), p. 19.Google Scholar
10 An Acte touchinge Sea Markes and Maryners, 1566, 8 Elizabeth Chapter 13 in Statutes of the Realm Vol. 4 (1819), pp. 496–7.
11 Calendar of State Papers Domestic Series, 1619–1623, ed. Green, Mary Anne Everett (London, 1858), pp. 58, 67.Google Scholar
12 Howard Fox, The Lighthouses, Lizard. Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, No. xxii (Truro, 1880), pp. 322–3, 324Google Scholar. These arguments also quoted some years later by Sir Monson, William. See The Naval Tracts of Sir William Monson, ed. Oppenheim, M. Navy Records Society 43 (1913), Vol. III, Appendix A, pp. 355–62Google Scholar.
13 Campbell, Tony The Drapers' Company and its school of Seventeenth Century Chart-makers in My Head is a Map, eds. Wallis, Helen and Tyacke, Sarah (Francis Edwards, 1973). PP. 81–106.Google Scholar
14 See for example John Burston, Chart of the NE Atlantic and Finisterre, 1664, National Maritime Museum, G. 215 : 1/4.
Nicholas Comberford, Chart of the Atlantic Ocean, 1661, British Library, Add. MS. 5414 (12)
Andrew Welch, Chart of the North Atlantic, 1674, National Maritime Museum, G. 213: 2 (5).
15 Waghenaer, Lucas JanszoonSpieghel Der Zeevaerdt (Leiden, 1584–1585), see in facsimile, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Amsterdam, 1964).Google Scholar
16 Ashley, AnthonyThe Mariners Mirrour (London, 1588), see in facsimile Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Amsterdam, 1966).Google Scholar
17 D. W. Waters, The Art of Navigation, pp. 172–3.
18 Blaeu, William JanzoonThe Light of Navigation (Amsterdam, 1612), see in facsimile, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Amsterdam, 1964).Google Scholar
19 Seller, JohnAtlas Maritimus (London, 1675).Google Scholar
20 Calendar of State Papers Domestic Series, 1680–1681, ed Daniell, F. H. Blackburne (HMSO, 1921), p. 328. See also British Library, Harl. MS. 5946, f. 202.Google Scholar
21 The Diary of John Evelyn, ed. Beer, E. S. de (London, 1959), p. 735.Google Scholar
22 Collins, GreenvileGreat Britains Coasting Pilot (London, 1693), p. 24.Google Scholar
23 Samuel Pepys Naval Minutes, ed. Tanner, J. R. Navy Records Society, 60 (1926), pp. 188–9.Google Scholar
24 Collins, GreenvileGreat Britain's Coasting Pilot (London, 1693), p. 9.Google Scholar
25 Cornwall County Record Office, DDJ 1450.
26 Fox, HowardThe Lizard Lighthouses. Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, No. XXII (Truro, 1880), p. 320.Google Scholar
27 Ravenhill, WilliamJoel Gascoyne, A Pioneer of Large-scale County Mapping, Imago Mundi xxvi (1972), pp. 60–70.Google Scholar
28 Dedication of Joel Gascoyne's Map of Cornwall, 1699.
29 Moll, HermanA New Description of England and Wales (London, 1724), p. 1.Google Scholar
30 Ravenhill, William, Adams, John his map of England, its projection, and his Index Villaris of 1680, Geographical Journal, Vol. 144, Part 3 (November, 1978), pp. 424–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
31 William Ravenhill, Projections for the large general maps of Britain, Imago Mundi, in press.
32 Heath, RobertA Natural and Historical Account of the Islands of Scilly (London, 1750), pp. 15–16.Google Scholar
33 Pickering, DarbyThe Statutes at Large, Vol. XVII (Cambridge, 1765), pp. 466, 467.Google Scholar
34 Letter from William Borlase to Charles Lyttleton, 3 May 1756. British Library, Stowe MS. 752, f. 176. I am much indebted to Peter Pool, FSA, for calling my attention to this and later correspondence and for providing transcripts.
J. Renshaw, Chart of the Channel 1741. British Library, 1068 (11).
35 Heath, RobertAccount of the Islands of Scilly, p. 450.Google Scholar
36 Royal Society of Arts, Guard Books 1, No. 85, 11 February 1756. See also Ravenhill, William Benjamin Bonn A Map of the County of Devon 1765 (Exeter, 1965).Google Scholar
37 Mackenzie, MurdochA Treatise of Maritim Surveying (London, 1774).Google Scholar
38 Hydrographic Office, Taunton, 703 Di.
39 I am indebted to Waters, D. W. for calling my attention to this Preface in the Nautical Almanac for 1769.Google Scholar
40 An Account of t h e Observations made on the Transit of Venus, 6 June 1761 by the Rev, Mr Haydon. In a letter to John Bevis MD dated from Liskeard 9 June 1761. Phil. Trans. Vol. M I, Part i (1761), pp. 202–208.
41 Graeme Spence, A Trigonometrical Plain Chart showing the relative Situations of Scilly, the Landsend and the Lizard, Hydrographic Office, Taunton, 702 Shelf Dc.
42 Mudge, William and Dalby, IsaacAn Account of the Operations carried on for accomplishing A Trigonometrical Survey of England and Wales (London, 1799), Vol. I, p. 363.Google Scholar
43 Ibid., Vol. 1, pp. 403–5 and Vol. II (1801), pp. 130–3.
44 Harley, J. B.Reprint of the first edition of the one inch Ordnance Survey of England and Wales (Newton Abbot, 1968), Sheet Number 96.Google Scholar
45 Seymour, W. A.A History of the Ordnance Survey (Folkstone, 1980), pp. 38–9Google Scholar.