Equatorial Sundial - Horniman Gardens, London Road, Forest Hill, London, UK
N 51° 26.552 W 000° 03.672
30U E 704226 N 5703135
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: WMM6NY
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:
Equatorial Dial
Design and construction: Silas Higgon,1994
Equatorial dials have their gnomons aligned to the earth's Polar North-South axis and the hour scales (delineated as circles) are parallel to the plane of the equator.
The gnomon's shadow progresses at the same rate as the Earth's rotation – 15 degrees per hour. A graph depicting the Equation of Time is engraved on the sundial’s base plate.
Reading the dial
The rod gnomon crossing the centre casts a sharp line of shadow across the circular hour scale giving Solar Time.
Correcting the "reading" |
Map of the sundials |