Jim Bennett

Museum of the History of Science, University of Oxford

Keynote Lecture

Abstract

The Cosmographical Role of Renaissance and Early-Modern Sundials

Today we think of sundials firstly as decorative objects and secondly as functional devices for telling the time, but during the 'long' sixteenth century they were also - perhaps principally - instruments for the practice of cosmography, the science of the relationship between the heaven and the earth for which time was an important variable.  This lecture will seek to take dials out of simple, here-and-now time-telling and present them as tools for mediating our engagement with the heavens.

Biographical Details

Jim Bennett is Director of the Museum of the History of Science at the University of Oxford.  He has previously worked at the Whipple Museum in Cambridge, the Old Royal Observatory (National Maritime Museum) in Greenwich, and the Royal Astronomical Society.