Skip to main content

Astronomy and Navigation

  • Reference work entry
  • First Online:
Handbook of Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy

Abstract

Different people, seafaring in different parts of the world, used strategies well adapted to their environment with the purpose of safely reaching their destination. Astronomical elements, present in their navigation “toolkit” for orientation, calendar purposes, and time reckoning, contributed to their conceptualization of space and time and were eventually integrated in their ritual, social organization, and social power structure.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 1,099.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 1,399.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Akerblom K (1968) Astronomy and navigation in Polynesia and Micronesia. Ethnogratiska Museet, Stockholm

    Google Scholar 

  • Albuquerque L (1975) Estudos de História, vol III. Universidade de Coimbra, Coimbra, pp 277–299.

    Google Scholar 

  • Albuquerque L (1991) Guia Náutico de Munique e Guia Náutico de Évora – facsimile edition with an introduction of Luís de Albuquerque. Comissão Nacional para as Comemorações dos Descobrimentos

    Google Scholar 

  • Ammarell G (1988) Sky calendars of the Indo-Malay archipelago – regional diversity/local knowledge. Indones 45:84–104, Southeast Asia Program Publications at Cornell University

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ammarell G (1999) Bugis navigation. Yale University Southeast Asia Studies, New Haven, Connecticut

    Google Scholar 

  • Ammerman AJ (2010) The first Argonauts: towards the study of the earliest seafaring in the Mediterranean. In: Anderson A, Barret JH, Boyle KV (eds) The global origins and development of seafaring. McDonald Institute monographs. Oxbow Books

    Google Scholar 

  • Aratus (1921) Phaenomena, Northern Constellations. Callimachus, Hymns and Epigrams. Lycophron. Aratus (trans: Mair AW, Loeb GR). Classical Library, vol 129. William Heinemann, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Bowler JM, Johnston H, Olley JM, Prescott JR, Roberts RG, Shawcross W, Spooner NA (2003) New ages for human occupation and climatic change at Lake Mungo, Australia. Nature 421:837–840

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  • Broodbank C (2000) An island archaeology of the early Cyclades. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Broodbank C (2006) The origins and early development of Mediterranean maritime activity. Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 19(2):199–230

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Broodbank C (2010) “Ships a-sail from over the rim of sea”: voyaging, sailing and the making of Mediterranean societies c. 3500–800 BC. In: Anderson A, Barret JH, Boyle KV (eds) The global origins and development of seafaring. McDonald Institute monographs. Oxbow Books

    Google Scholar 

  • Callimachus (1793) Epigram XIX in the Works of Callimachus (trans: Tytler HW). T. Davison, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Callimachus (1873) Epigrams XIX in the works of Hesiod, Callimachus and Theogonis (trans: Banks J). Bell & Daldy, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Chilardi S, Frayer DW, Gioia P, Macchiarelli R, Mussi M (1996) Fontana Nuova di Ragusa (Sicily, Italy): southernmost Aurignacian site in Europe. Antiquity 70:553–563

    Google Scholar 

  • Davis DL (2001) Navigation in the ancient Eastern Mediterranean. University of Iowa, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas

    Google Scholar 

  • Ferrand G (1923) Instructions nautiques et routiers Arabes et Portugais des XVe et XVIe siècle : reproduits, traduits et annotés

    Google Scholar 

  • Frake CO (1985) Cognitive maps of time and tide among medieval seafarers. Man 20:254–270

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Frake CO (1994) Dials: a study in the physical representation of cognitive systems. In: Renfrew C, Zubrow EBW (eds) The ancient mind: elements of cognitive archaeology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp 119–132

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Goodenough WH (1953) Native astronomy in the central Carolines. University Museum, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia

    Google Scholar 

  • Goodenough WH, Thomas S (1987) Traditional navigation in the Western Pacific – a search for a pattern. Exped 29(3):3–14, University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology

    Google Scholar 

  • Grimble A (1931) Gilbertese astronomy and astronomical observances. Journal of the Polynesian Society 40(160):197–224

    Google Scholar 

  • Halpern MD (1985) Thesis: The origins of the Carolinian sidereal compass. University of California, Santa Cruz

    Google Scholar 

  • Held SO (1993) Insularity as a modifier of culture change: the case of prehistoric Cyprus. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 292:25–33

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Homer (1919) Odyssey, Book V, 262 (trans: Murray AT). Loeb Classical Library Volumes. Harvard University Press, Cambridge; William Heinemann, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Hose C, McDougall W (2002) The pagan tribes of Borneo, Project Gutenberg. Literary Archive Foundation University Ave, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Hunt TL, Lipo CP (2006) Late colonization of Easter Island. Science 311(5767):1603–1606

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  • Indruszewski G, Godal J (2006) Maritime skills and astronomic knowledge in the Viking Baltic Sea. Studia Mythol Slav 9(2006):15–39

    Google Scholar 

  • Jun ZY (1988) As técnicas de navegação nas Armadas de Zheng He e a sua contribuição para a Ciência Náutica. Actas do Seminário Ciência Náutica e Técnicas de Navegação nos séc. XV e XVI. Instituto Cultural de Macau, Centro de Estudos Marítimos de Macau, pp 75–98

    Google Scholar 

  • Leavesley M (2006) Late Pleistocene complexities in the bismarck archipelago. In: Lilley I (ed) Archaeology in Oceania: themes and issues. Blackwell, Oxford, pp 189–204

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis D (1972) We, the navigators. University of Hawai’i Press, Honolulu

    Google Scholar 

  • Lucan (1928) The Civil War (Pharsalia), Book VIII, 446 (trans: Duff J). William Heinemann, London

    Google Scholar 

  • McGrail S (2010) The global origins of seagoing water transport. In: Anderson A, Barret JH, Boyle KV (eds) The global origins and development of seafaring. McDonald Institute monographs. Oxbow Books

    Google Scholar 

  • Manilius M (1977) Astronomica (trans: Goold GP). Loeb Classical Library. Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA

    Google Scholar 

  • Mijares AS, Détroit F, Piper P, Grün R, Belwood P, Aubert M, Champion G, Cuevas N, De Leon A, Dizon E (2010) New evidence for a 67,000-year-old human presence at Callao Cave, Luzon, Philippines. J Hum Evol 59:123–132

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Morwood M (2001) Early hominid occupation of Flores, East Indonesia, and its wider significance. In: Metcalfe I, Smith J, Morwood M, Davidson I (eds) Faunal and floral migrations and evolution in SE Asia – Australia. A. A. Balkema Publishers, Lisse, pp 387–398

    Google Scholar 

  • Morwood M, O’Sullivan P, Aziz F, Raza A (1998) Fission-track ages of stone tools and fossils on the East Indonesian island of Flores. Nature 392:173–176

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  • Müller-Wille M (1971) Bestattung im Boot: Studien zu einer nordeuropäischen Grabsitte. Offa 25–6, 1968–9 (1971): 5–203

    Google Scholar 

  • Pereira JMM (2000) Experiências com Instrumentos e Métodos Antigos de Navegação. Academia de Marinha, Lisbon

    Google Scholar 

  • Pereira JMM (2002) East and West encounter at the sea. Academia de Marinha, Lisbon

    Google Scholar 

  • Pereira JMM (2003) The stellar compass and the Kamal, an interpretation of its practical use. Academia de Marinha, Lisboa

    Google Scholar 

  • Pereira JMM (2005) Aspectos náuticos das viagens de Zheng He. Academia de Marinha, Lisbon

    Google Scholar 

  • Renfrew C, Aspinall A (1990) Aegean obsidian and Franchthi Cave. In C. Perlès, Excavations at Franchthi Cave, Greece, Fascicle 5: Les industries lithiques taillées de Franchthi (Argolide, Grèce) II. Les industries du Mésolithique et du Néolithique initial. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, pp 257–270

    Google Scholar 

  • Sathiamurthy E, Voris HK (2006) Maps of Holocene sea level transgression and submerged lakes on the Sunda Shelf. Nat Hist J Chulalongkorn Univ 2(suppl 2):1–44

    Google Scholar 

  • Schaefer BE (1987) Heliacal rise phenomena. Archaeoastronomy 11(Supplement to the Journal for the History for Astronomy 18):S19–S33

    Google Scholar 

  • Spriggs M (1997) The island Melanesians. Blackwell, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  • Stanislawski B (2000) Dysk drewniany z Wolina jako kompas słoneczny – następny krok w badaniach nad wczesnośrednioiweczną nawigacją? Mater Zachodniopom 46:157–176

    Google Scholar 

  • Stanislawski B (2002) The wooden disc from Wolin – as the next sun-compass? Viking Heritage Magazine, 2\02: 10–11

    Google Scholar 

  • Strasser TF, Thompson N, Panagopoulou E, Karkanas P, Runnels C, McCoy F, Murrey P, Wegmann K (2010) Stone age seafaring in the Mediterranean: Evidence from the Plakias region for Lower Palaeolithic and Mesolithic habitation of crete. Hesperia 79:145–190

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tibbetts GR (1981) Arab Navigation in the Indian Ocean Before the Coming of the Portuguese. The Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, London. Tibbetts follows Léopold Saussure, in the work of Gabriel Ferrand, (Instruction Nautiques et Routiers Arabes et Portugais des XV ème et XVI ème Siècles, Tome III, Paris, Librairie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner, 1928), pp 92–124

    Google Scholar 

  • Torrence R, Neall V, Doelman T, Rhodes E, McKee C, Davies H, Bonetti R, Guglielmetti A, Manzoni A, Oddone M, Parr JF, Wallace C (2004) Pleistocene colonisation of the Bismarck Archipelago: new evidence from West New Britain. Archaeol Oceania 39(3):101–130

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Widlok T (1997) Orientation in the wild: the shared cognition of Haillom Bushpeople. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 3(2):317–332

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Fernando Pimenta .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2015 Springer Science+Business Media New York

About this entry

Cite this entry

Pimenta, F. (2015). Astronomy and Navigation. In: Ruggles, C. (eds) Handbook of Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-6141-8_7

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics