Charting the South Sea

For the 1769 transit, the southern Pacific Ocean was identified as a promising region for observation. European knowledge of the area was patchy, often inaccurate and changing rapidly. The first news of Tahiti had just reached Britain when it was selected as Captain Cook’s destination.
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The Pacific chart shown here was drawn up by the French astronomer Alexandre Guy Pingré as part of his planning for the 1769 transit. This version is a direct copy engraved for inclusion in Benjamin Martin’s The Astronomy and Geography of Transits (1768).

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