The Peregrinus’ Leyden manuscript (Fol. Cod. No. 227) already alluded to, Libri says (“Histoire des Sciences Mathém....” 1838, Vol. I. p. 383, note), is but a poor copy of the manuscript in the Paris Library (No. 7378A), from which latter the words Petri ad Sygerum have been unfortunately transformed into Petri Adsigerii. He adds (Vol. II. pp. 70–71) that Humboldt cites (“Examen Critique,” p. 243) several authors who have alluded to the pretended Adsigerius. Mention is also made of the fact that W. Wenkebach, professor at the Hague Military School, examined the manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, Nos. 1629, 1794 and 2458, containing the treatise of Peregrinus, and that not one of them has the passage alluding to the declination. The Leyden manuscript, by the way, is said to be the only one, besides the Vatican copy, No. 5733, bearing the full date, which latter was first made known by Thévenot in his “Recueil de Voyages.” And it was a passage found in the Leyden manuscript (Q 27) which led to the belief that Peregrinus had first observed the variation or declination of the magnetic needle. The passage is as follows: “Take note that the magnet, as well as the needle that has been touched by it, does not point exactly to the poles, but that the part of it which is supposed to point to the South sometimes declines a little to the West, and that the part which looks towards the North sometimes inclines to the East. The exact quantity of this declination I have ascertained, after numerous experiments, to be five degrees. However, this declination is no obstacle to our guidance, because we make the needle itself decline from the true South by nearly one point and a half towards the West. A point contains five degrees.” This passage is unquestionably a late addition, being written in a different hand in a circle which itself is an incompleted outline of one of the figures of Peregrinus’ primitive compass.
References.—“Encyclopædia Metropolitana,” Vol. III. p. 737 (“Bibliotheca Bibliothecarum,” fol. 11, p. 1400; “Catalogue of the MSS. in the library of Geneva,” by Senebier, p. 207); “Bulletino di bibliographia e di storia delle scienze ...” B. Boncompagni, Vol. I. pp. 1–32, 65–99, 101–139, 319–420; Vol. IV. pp. 257–288, 303–331; “Cat. bibl. publicæ univers. Lug. Bat.,” p. 365; W. Wenkebach, “Sur Petrus Adsigerius ...” Rome, 1865 (taken from Vol. VII. No. 3 of the “Annali Pura ed Applicata”); Brunet, “Manuel du Libraire,” 1863, Vol. IV. p. 493; “Br. Museum Library,” 538, G 17; “Journal des Savants,” for April-May 1848, and September 1870; Walker, “Magnetism,” 1866, p. 6; “English Cyclopædia,” Vol. VIII. p. 160, also Dr. Hutton’s “Phil. and Math. Dictionary”; Thos. Young, “A Course of Lectures on Nat. Phil. and the Mechanical Arts,” London, 1807, Vol. I. pp. 746, 756; “Electro-magnetic Phenomena,” by T. A. Lyons, New York, 1901, Vol. I. pp. 105–106; Vol. II. p. 565 (with translation of a portion of the original manuscript); “Examen Critique,” A. de Humboldt, Paris, 1836, Vol. III. p. 31; “Science and Literature of the Middle Ages,” Paul Lacroix, London, pp. 88–89, 280–282; Silvanus P. Thompson, “Proceedings of the British Academy,” 1905–6, p. 377. It may be added that Houzeau et Lancaster, “Bibl. Générale,” Vol. I. part i. p. 640, allude, at No. 3197, to a manuscript of P. Peregrinus, “Nova compositio astrolabii particularis,” as being in the Library of Geneva and as citing the year 1261 in connection with the astronomical tables of John Campan (Campanus, Italian mathematician, who died about 1300): “Biog. Générale,” Vol. VIII. p. 373.
A.D. 1270.—Riccioli (Giovanni Battista), an Italian astronomer, member of the Society of Jesuits, b. 1598, d. 1671, asserts that at this period under the reign of St. Louis (1226–1270), French navigators were already using the magnetic needle, which they kept floating in a small vase of water, and which was supported by two tubes to prevent its falling to the bottom.
For a detailed account of the work of this well-known scientist consult: “Biographie Générale” Vol. XLII. pp. 147–149; Fabroni, “Vitæ Italorum,” Vol. II; Jean Baptiste Delambre, “Hist. de l’Astron. Mod.,” 1821; Davis, “The Chinese,” Vol. III. p. 11; Venanson, “Boussole,” pp. 70–71; Klaproth, “Boussole,” p. 54; Becquerel, “Résumé,” p. 59; Alex. Chalmers, “Gen. Biog. Dict.,” 1811, Vol. XXVI. pp. 182–183; Fischer, “Geschichte der Physik,” Vol. I; Tiraboschi, “Storia della letter. Ital.,” Vol. VIII; “English Cyclopædia,” Vol. V. pp. 76–77. Riccioli’s “Almagestum Novum,” Bologna, 1651, in two volumes, gives in book nine of the second volume the sentence of Galileo. This is the work which an old savant called “the pandects of astronomical knowledge” (Morhof Polyhistor, Vol. II. p. 347).
A.D. 1271–1295.—Polo (Marco), Paulum Venetum, is reported by many to have brought the compass from China to Italy. This is, however, supported by no evidence, nor is any allusion whatever made to the fact in the account he rendered of his voyage. Before Marco Polo set out on his travels, as Humboldt states, the Catalans had already made voyages “along the northern islands of Scotland as well as along the western shores of tropical Africa, while the Basques had ventured forth in search of the whale, and the Northmen had made their way to the Azores (the Bracir islands of Picignano).”
Polo relates that he set out from Acre in 1271, and returned to Venice “in the year 1295 of Christ’s Incarnation.” His “Travels” (“Il Milione di Messer Marco Polo”) according to the review of Col. Henry Yule, consists of a prologue and four books. It was dictated by him to a fellow prisoner, Rusticiano or Rusticello, of Pisa, and “it would appear now to be definitely settled that the original was ... of just such French as we might expect in the thirteenth century from a Tuscan amanuensis following the oral dictation of an Orientalized Venetian.”
Polo’s journeyings extended “so far to the north that he leaves the North Star behind him, and thence so far to the south that the North Star is never seen.”
References.—Becquerel, “Elec. et Magn.,” Vol. I. p. 70; Sonnini, in Buffon, “Minéraux,” Vol. VI. p. 84; Humboldt, “Cosmos,” 1849, Vol. II. pp. 625, 656, or 1860, pp. 250–251; “The Book of Ser Marco Polo,” by Sir Henry Yule, New York, 1903, which contains a very extensive bibliography at end of the second volume; Libri, “Hist. des Sc. Mathém.,” Paris, 1838, Vol. II. pp. 26, 140, etc.; D. A. Azuni, “Dissertation sur la Boussole,” p. 69; Miller, “Hist. Phil. Ill.,” 1849, Vol. I. pp. 179–180; “Encycl. Brit.,” ninth ed., Vol. XIX. p. 407; “Journal des Savants” for September 1818, also May 1823, and the five articles published January to May 1867; see also “Centennaire de Marco Polo,” par. H. Cordier, Paris, 1896, containing “bibliographie très complète de toutes les éditions de Marco Polo et des ouvrages qui lui sont consacrés.”
A.D. 1282.—Baïlak, native of Kibdjak, wrote this year, in Arabic, his book on “Stones,” wherein he says that he saw during his voyage from Tripoli to Alexandria, in 1242, the captains of the Syrian sea construct a compass in the following manner: “When the night is so dark as to conceal from view the stars which might direct their course according to the position of the four cardinal points, they take a basin full of water, which they shelter from wind by placing it in the interior of the vessel; they then drive a needle into a wooden peg or a corn-stalk, so as to form the shape of a cross, and throw it into the basin of water prepared for the purpose, on the surface of which it floats. They afterwards take a loadstone of sufficient size to fill the palm of the hand, or even smaller; bring it to the surface of the water, give to their hands a rotatory motion towards the right so that the needle turns on the water’s surface; they then suddenly and quickly withdraw their hands, when the two points of the needle face north and south. I have seen them, with my own eyes, do that during my voyage at sea from Tripolis to Alexandria.”
References.—E. Salverte, “Phil. of Magic,” New York, 1847, Vol. II. pp. 221–222, note; “American Journal of Science and Arts,” Vol. XL. p. 247; Davis, “The Chinese,” Vol. III. p. xii; Klaproth, “Lettre à M. de Humboldt,” pp. 59, 60, 67; Knight, “Mech. Dict.,” Vol. II. pp. 1371 and 1397; “Electro-Magn. Phenom.,” by T. A. Lyons, New York, 1901, Vol. II. p. 564.