THE COMPASS

- A Short History Made With The Help

Of Dalvey.com And Wikipedia.com
⃝ Prior to the invention of the compass, directions at sea were
determined primarily by the position of celestial bodies. For thousands of
years, navigators had found their way using the sun and the stars. In the
northern hemisphere, seafarers would use Polaris – the North Star – to
work out which direction was north in order to help them navigate across
the seas.

⃝ If they could see Polaris, they knew which way they were heading.
While handy, this technique clearly has substantial limitations, as it is
only of any use at night, with clear skies.
Divination Compasses
 
 
⃝ Naturally magnetized iron ore, or magnetite, also
referred to as lodestone, seems to have been initially
discovered in what is now modern China. If uninhibited by
gravity and friction, this material was observed to orient
itself to a north-south axis. During China’s Han Dynasty,
between 300 and 200 BC, compasses were made but,
ironically, not used for navigation - but rather for
divination.
 
⃝ It is easy to imagine how the lodestone would have
been seen as possessing magical properties, and hence early
compasses functioned as tools of geomancy, used to foretell
the future. The use of compasses was also important for
feng shui, the art of establishing harmony in a room or
building by aligning various features to the cardinal
compass points.
 LIU BANG,
The Emperor of China
at that time

The HAN DYNASTY

Early Navigational Compasses

By the time of the Tang dynasty (7th century), Chinese scholars had devised a way to
magnetize iron needles by rubbing them with magnetite. They had also observed that
needles cooled from red heat and held in the north-south orientation would become
magnetic. These more refined needle compasses could then be floated in water (wet
compass), or placed upon a pointed shaft or suspended from a silk thread (dry
compass). This portability made them much better suited to navigation purposes.

By the 11th century, the Chinese military were using both wet and dry compasses for
navigational and naval orienteering. The so-called “south-pointing fish” was a wooden
fish with a magnetized iron needle within it, that floated in a bowl of water. Later, a dry
compass version evolved in the shape of a turtle. Lodestone was embedded in its
carved wooden body and balanced on a bamboo needle, which allowed it to rotate
freely.