Got a little garden gift today without instruction. Can anyone advise how to set it up. Do I point the arrow North? And then what? There is N S E W indications on the base.
How do you set up a sundial?
Jo your garden sundial won't keep accurate time but this will help.
Title:SUNDIALS.
Author(s):MICHAEL WEISHAN.
Source:Country Living 23.10 (Oct 2000): p63. (1088 words)
Document Type:Magazine/Journal
Bookmark:Bookmark this Document
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Full Text :COPYRIGHT 2000 The Hearst Corporation
Not just garden ornaments, these relics of ancient engineering were once the only way of marking the passage of time objectively
Each morning in late autumn, as the leaves drift down and fall's last flowers fade away, I pause for a moment to look our at the sundial in the upper garden. The dial now takes on a special significance. There's something intrinsically satisfying about looking out over the cold and barren landscape from the warmth of the library, watching the rimy dial patiently mark the progression of the hours. Although the season's light is weak and far from warm, as long as the sun shines even faintly, the pointer's shadow still moves across the dial, silently reassuring me that all is well: The passage of the seasons continues, and spring shall indeed return.
The sundial didn't start our as garden decoration, of course. In ancient Greece and Egypt sundials supplied the only form of accurate timekeeping, and, for thousands of years, the best efforts of engineering and science went into producing accurate ones. In fact, large sundials were often set up in public places to mark the official hours of the business day. One of the most spectacular examples was erected in A.D. 10 by Roman Emperor Augustus, who imported a 71 1/2-foot 230-ton obelisk from Egypt to use as a pointer. This massive "Horologium" cast its shadow over gilt numerals inscribed in marble payers implanted in the Field of Mars. (While the more delicate markings of the dial were destroyed long ago, the huge obelisk proved far more durable: Late in the 1700s it was excavated and laboriously re-erected in the Piazza di Montecitorio, where it stands to this day.)
Roman statesman Cicero wrote to his friend and secretary Tiro as early as 42 B.C. that he wanted to set up a dial in the grounds of his Tuscan villa. Small dials became common in the Roman Empire, and their need for unobstructed sunlight and easy viewing relegated them to outdoor spaces. Sundials continued to be created right through the Middle Ages, the Enlightenment, and into the 20th century. Most could tell time only by the sun; others used moonlight as well, and could accurately predict the rising and setting of various stars and planets.
The sundial's demise as the timekeeper of choice was surprisingly recent. While mechanical clocks and watches have been around for hundreds of years, they were until the middle of the 1800s quite inaccurate, and had to be reset by consulting a sundial. It was the advent of the railroads that did in the dials. Because of the movement of the sun around the earth, your noon arrives slightly sooner than your western neighbors', and slightly later than your eastern ones'. When people traveled slowly, it wasn't a problem that each town had its own time, but with the advent of the rapid train travel, something needed to be done. In 1884, in order to synchronize arrival and departure schedules, the United States was divided into four time zones, each consisting of 15 degrees of longitude. All localities within each zone would follow the same time. The 3,000-year reign of the sundial was suddenly over, replaced by, of all things, the whistle of a train.
None of this affected the popularity of the sundial in the garden, however, and in some ways the loss of the dial's utility as a timepiece only enhanced its aesthetic appeal. In fact, the zenith of sundial popularity as a garden ornament was reached just before the First World War, when a boom of industrialization bred nostalgia for all things old and simple. During this period, many long-forgotten dials were resurrected, thousands of new ones were created, and entire books dedicated to sundials were published.
These days the pleasure of "sun time" is only a keystroke or two away. You can find sundials from numerous vendors in almost any style and shape imaginable, and for almost any budget. If you want your sundial to keep somewhat accurate time, though, you need to keep a few things in mind. Sundials must be positioned carefully: The gnomon, the part that sticks up off the face, must point directly north. That's easily accomplished with a compass-but that's not all. Sundials are actually place specific in that the angle of the gnomon must be parallel to the polar axis, so the gnomon's angle will vary by latitude. (An accurately angled gnomon, for instance, would stand straight up on the North Pole and lie flat at the equator.) Some manufacturers will custom-make dials specifically created to your locality, and if you are lucky enough to get one of these, or if a store-bought one works for you, all you need to do is to set the sundial completely level. For most generic types, though, if you want the dial to tell the right time, you'll have to tilt it slightly off level to make up for the difference in latitude, which takes only a few minutes with the help of a guidebook or fact sheet. But if you don't care about telling time, you don't have to worry about precise positioning, though given the marvelous history and lore behind the sundial, it would seem a shame not to share in this age-old ritual of sun time.
Gardening Editor Michael Weishan is the host of "The Cultivated Gardener," which airs on Public Radio.
TIME WILL TELL
Sundials often bear poignant mottoes, with themes varying from
morbid to cheerful. Here are some favorites from pre-1900 dials
MOTTOES TRANSLATION
LAS KLEIN STUND FURUBER GHAN Of the hours let there be none,
DU HABST DEN ETWAS GUT GETHAN In which by you no good is done.
DISCE TUOS NUMERARE DIES Learn to number thy days.
EHEU FUGACES LABUNTUR ANNI Alas the fleeting years slip by.
TEMPUS FUGIT and variations Time flies.
L'HEURE PASSE, L'AMITE RESTE Time passes, friendship remains.
SILENS LOQUOR Though silent, I speak.
NIHIL VELOCIUS ANNIS Nothing is swifter than time.
SOL SPLENDIT OMNIBUS The sun shines for all.
MORA TRAHIT PERICULUM Delay is dangerous.
NIT DAT QUOD NON HABET Nothing comes of nothing.
MORS OMNIA VINCIT Death conquers all.
NEQUE LUX SINE UMBRA There is no light without shade.
ENGLISH MOTTOES:
The idle who would be counted wise think all delight in pastime lies nor heed they what the wise condemn: as they pass time, time passes them.
* A clock the time may wrongly tell, I never if the sun shines well.
* With my shadow moves the world.
* Lead kindly light.
Source Citation:WEISHAN, MICHAEL. "SUNDIALS." Country Living 23.10 (Oct 2000): 63. General Reference Center Gold. Gale. SASKATCHEWAN PROVINCIAL LIBRARY. 30 July 2008
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This message was edited Jul 30, 2008 9:05 PM
Thank you very much. Great info.
Holy Hannah!!
doncha just loooooooooove cut/paste?
Great info, Lilypon!!
I have a tabletop sundial, and I just position it @ noon (no shadow, when pointed straight north, I think...........................)