I didn't know that there are 32 compass points, each marking off 11.25 degrees of our happy planetary sphere and each with its official title as depicted in the 'compass rose' diagram below. Well blow me, where does that leave the classic 1959 spy movie North by Northwest ?
Seriously, who hasn't either owned or used a compass? Perhaps to orient yourself when Scouting For Girls, navigating Secret Water, possibly pursuing on a Journey To The East, maybe a Flight To Arras, or even while Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy.
It would appear there were seven legitimate options to choose from in the quadrant between north and west...and north by northwest is not one of them. Poor form that, Alfred Hitchcock, MGM and all. 😂
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| 32 point compass rose |
Prior to the development of the compass you'd have had to attempt all such feats by reading celestial bodies, observing well-known landmarks or trusting in the flightpaths of migrant birds. However, the invention of the compass made it possible to determine a heading when the sky was obscured, no landmarks were in sight and migrating birds were out of season.
The first primitive compasses were created in China some 2000 years ago using lodestone (a naturally magnetised mineral) which was observed both to attract iron and, when suspended in water or oil (as was the common design at the time) would align itself with the earth's magnetic field. On account of this latter property, it was given the charmingly descriptive name 'south facing fish ' I paused momentarily to query why not north facing fish? But I suppose it's just a convention of heads and tails.
Interestingly, although the Chinese led the way in the understanding of magnetism, those early compasses were used not so much for navigation as for geomancy (my word of the week), for assisting in the art of Feng Shui to literally ensure a house was favourably oriented (and why not occidented?) in relation to ley lines or the flow of powerful magic forces. And it was Arab travellers to China who first brought compass technology to the west (or occident) approximately 1000 years ago.
Compass needles by now were little strips of iron that had been magnetised by being stroked by lodestone, often still suspended in a liquid within a circular container marked with the four cardinal points N, S, E, W and used primarily on board ships for navigation.
500 years further along the timeline came the development of the dry compass with its three key components of a freely turning magnetised needle mounted on a pin above a calibrated 'rose', all enclosed in a small box with a flat base and a glass lid, the essence of the compasses we know and use today for taking bearings and orienteering, though plastic casings are the norm.
As for the sophistication of those 32 points on the rose, that was the work of maritime engineers in the Mediterranean some time in the 16th century and the points were all named after winds (see below).
And there you have it. The only bit I've skipped is about magnetic north, which is a shifty blighter and best left for another day. Before I get to the poem however, here's an on theme musical bonus from talented American guitarist and singer/ songwriter Molly Tuttle: Take The Journey Enjoy.
Given that it is Armistice Day today and Remembrance Sunday tomorrow I've written something harking back to the First World War and imagined one of the thousands of lost and lonely deaths of young soldiers. In this case, specifically Americans, many still in their teens, who when the USA joined late in the war were dispatched up to the front lines in the summer of 1918 in northern France as part of the last great tactical gamble to repulse the Germans who had gained vast swathes of land in their spring offensive and to drive the enemy away from the outskirts of Paris and back to the east. There were 10,000 American casualties alone in the Battle of Belleau Wood.
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| lost forever in Belleau Wood (June 1918) |
A Private Dying
The rain, the constant stumbling pain,
sound of sustained firing, friend or foe?
He'd taken some hits, he knew, compass
shot to bits, unsteady groping from tree
to sodden tree and tears too now. Why
did he think of Babes in the Wood?
Murder in the Dark more like, though
he'd never imagined this as a child
an ocean and a short lifetime away
when he'd played out with his pals
in the walnut orchard at twilight till
his mother called him in. Blood
rose in his throat, bubbling on his lips
tasty as copper, and shaken by a palsy
of shivering his legs gave way. All lost,
he thought, where did I go wrong? Some
son I've turned out to be. Forgive me
mother, father. Remember me at home.
No sooner had he kissed the earth goodbye
than his spirit slipped through patchy skies,
a sliver rippling into the circling shoal
of departed souls, south pointing fish all
twisting like an unruly silver tide at
the bidding of some wanton bloody moon.
Thanks for reading, S ;-)