Complexitatea și ingeniozitatea citirii timpului la 1600: Cadranul solar portabil de la Iași – Centrul de afaceri
Abstract
The diptych ivory sundial found in Iași – Centrul de Afaceri, in 1996, has been the central piece in the exhibition ”Underground Iași – Rediscovered (Hi)stories”, organized at the Palace of Culture in Iași by Moldavia’s History Museum within ”Moldova” National Museum Complex, as its presence in this area is unusual, intriguing and can change the understanding of the perception of time in the epoch when it was in use. The paper includes current state of knowledge in the field in Romania, information on Hans Tröschel, the craftsman who created the sundial, information on Nürnberg, its commercial activities and numerous guilds in early modern times, information on the material (ivory) the sundial of Iași is made of, the evolution of sundials and writings describing their operation, and finally the analysis of the artefact dated 1591, discovered in Iași 25 years ago. Contrary to the common understanding of today among Romanian scholars, our opinion on this sundial is that it could have been used to tell the local real time, while indicating a degree of sophistication at the level of the upper-middle class in Iași.
Keywords
Sundial; Renaissance astronomy; german compass-makers; Nurnberg