Inventory no. 54673 - Former Display Label
Moorish ASTROLABE-QUADRANT (Prophatius type)
1219 A. H. = 1804 A. D.
Brass. Inscribed, on the back, 'Praise be to God and blessing upon our lord Muhammad and his family - what God wills'. Made for the jurist and noble scribe Sayyid Muhammad, son of the holy and pious Sayyid Hajj 'Abd al-Salâm al-Salâwî [i.e. from Salé] in Rabat. Made by 'Abdallah Ahmad b. 'Alî [?mrsbl] al-Andalusî under the direction of the mu'addil, the jurist Sayyid al-Mu'tî b. al-oayyib, ? of Marînid descent, in the middle of the month Jumâdâ I, year 1219 [A. H. = 1804 A. D.]'.
The front is engraved as an astrolabe-quadrant of the type invented by the Judaeo-Provençal mathematician astronomer, and zoologist, Jacob ben Mahir ibn Tibbon, known in Latin as Prophatius Judaeus (c.1236-c.1304). He called his invention roba' Yisrael (Quadrant of Israel) and it was also known as quadrans novus in opposition to an older instrument called quadrans vetus. The example shown here is inscribed, 'For the region of Meknès : al-Zaitûna [i.e. a name of a mosque and the surrounding district in Meknès] and for the whole town. Latitude 34°', and includes almucantars, azimuths and lines showing the times of Muslim prayer, as well as the ecliptic, the equator and the tropics.
On the back is a quadrant of degrees with a sine and cosine graph (rabî' al-dastûr; quadrans canonis).
The plumb-bob is probably not original.
[56-127]
Purchased in 1956