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officer using charts for navigation world map based on description given by Herodotus in the 5th century bce mariner's compass card Mercator's 1569 world map cross-staff navigator's cross-staff Hadley's Quadrant determining the course of an aircraft fixing position hyperbolic position lines
For Students
magnetic compass
navigation summary
Quizzes
Sextant. Celestial navigation at sea. Sailor using sextant. Travel and navigation.
Travel and Navigation
Undated portrait engraving of Amerigo Vespucci.
Explorers and Explorations (Part Two) Quiz
Read Next
In Frankfurt, Germany, a driver uses a car GPS infotainment display system to guide them on a German autobahn. lanes; traffic; navigation; travel; map
How Does GPS Work?
Abstract vector hi speed internet technology background
History of Technology Timeline
Discover
Orange basketball on black background and with low key lighting. Homepage 2010, arts and entertainment, history and society
The 10 Greatest Basketball Players of All Time
The Lost Colony of Roanoke, North Carolina, where 115 people mysteriously disappeared c. 1590. John White discovers the word Croatoan carved onto a tree upon his return to the deserted Roanoke Colony in 1590
The Lost Colony of Roanoke
Parsons Weems' Fable, oil on canvas by Grant Wood, 1939; in the Amon Carter Museum of American Art. Catalog entry: The historian Mason Locke Weems, commonly known by his clerical title, Parson Weems, pulls back a curtain to point at 6-year-old George Washington. Bearing an adult head and holding an axe, George gazes blankly up at his father, Augustine, who questions his son while holding a partially cut cherry tree. All of this takes place in front of a 20th-century brick building, which Wood modeled after his own home in Iowa. The scene illustrates the fable of Washington and the cherry tree, which Weems invented in 1806 for the first president's biography. Wood playfully suggests the artifice of the tale here, presenting the story in the manner of a costumed stage play rather than a real event. Amid the action, two Black figures pick cherries in the background, a reference to Washington' slaveholding past and a reminder of of what often gets left out in historical mythmaking.
Did George Washington Really Say, “I Can’t Tell a Lie”?
Secret Service Agent Listens To Earpiece
Secret Service Code Names of 11 U.S. Presidents
pg 229Nazi parade features a banner proclaiming, "Death to Marxism."The possibility of a peaceful Germany after World War I was precluded entirely by the terms of the Versailles Treaty and theintransigent hostility of France and England. Stripped of indu
Were the Nazis Socialists?
Odissi Indian classical female dancer on white background. (Indian dancer; classical dancer; Indian dance)
6 Classical Dances of India
January 21, 2019: Superbowl LIII will be played at Atlanta's Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Sunday, February 3, 2019 against the New England Patriots and the Los Angeles Rams.
What Was the Super Bowl’s First Blockbuster Commercial?

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Photos

officer using charts for navigation
world map based on description given by Herodotus in the 5th century bce
mariner's compass card
Mercator's 1569 world map
cross-staff
navigator's cross-staff
Hadley's Quadrant
determining the course of an aircraft
fixing position
hyperbolic position lines
See All Images →

Related Topics and References

Topics
Dig Deeper: More Articles That Discuss This Topic

Key People

William Adams
English navigator
William P. Lear
American engineer and industrialist
Jean-Charles de Borda
French naval officer and physicist
George Dollond
British optician
Peter Dollond
British optician
Harold Gatty
Australian-born aviator
Edmond Halley
Edmond Halley
British scientist
Bowditch, Nathaniel
Nathaniel Bowditch
American navigator
George Cayley, detail of an oil painting by Henry Perronet Briggs, 1840; in the National Portrait Gallery, London
Sir George Cayley
British inventor and scientist
Nevil Maskelyne, detail from an engraving by E. Scriven after a portrait by Vanderburgh.
Nevil Maskelyne
British astronomer
Sir Robert Dudley
English engineer

Related Quizzes and Features

Quiz
Sextant. Celestial navigation at sea. Sailor using sextant. Travel and navigation.
Travel and Navigation
Undated portrait engraving of Amerigo Vespucci.
Explorers and Explorations (Part Two) Quiz