Roman Sundial - Horniman Gardens, London Road, Forest Hill, London, UK
N 51° 26.525 W 000° 03.677
30U E 704222 N 5703085
Within Horniman Gardens, at Forest Hill in south London, there is a trail of sundials. These are of a variety of types that demonstrate how the sun is used to indicate the time. There are 12 sundials in all but only 11 are easily accessible.
Waymark Code: WMM6NP
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 07/31/2014
Views: 2
Close to the first sundial in the trail, the scaphe sundial, there is a map showing the location of the others. As a suggestion, and to easily locate the others, pop in to the museum reception and ask for a (free) map of the museum and grounds. Return to the map and transfer the locations - it makes finding them a lot easier!
The Horniman Museum website tells us about this sundial:
Roman Sundial
Design and construction: David Brown, 2004
In Roman times, days were divided into 12 hours between sunrise and sunset. The length of an hour could therefore change, depending on the length of daylight throughout the seasons.
This particular dial has been designed in the style of a Roman timepiece, but has been specially delineated to read hours of equal length, which we use today.
As well as indicating the hours of the day, the Roman sundial marks seasonal equinoxes and solstices. The tip of the shadow touches the central green line on the equinoxes, the lower red line on the Summer Solstice and the upper blue line on Winter Solstice.
Reading the dial
The tip of the gnomon's shadow indicates solar time.
Correcting the "reading" |
Map of the sundials |