the.com/sextant
a brass triangle that lets you find yourself by aiming at the sun
means A navigational instrument that measures the angle between a celestial body and the horizon, letting sailors calculate their latitude and position at sea.
from From the Latin 'sextans,' meaning a sixth part — because the instrument's arc spans 60 degrees, one-sixth of a full circle. It's a cousin of the older 'octant' (an eighth, 45 degrees) and shares its bones with 'sextet' and 'sextuplet.' The name simply describes the geometry: a wedge of brass cut to one-sixth of the heavens.
- named angle
- covers a sixth of a circle, sixty degrees
- sun trick
- mirrors stack starlight onto the horizon line
- apollo backup
- astronauts carried one to navigate by stars
- no power
- works fine when every battery dies
- old guard
- replaced the cruder astrolabe and cross-staff
apollo 11 moon navigation — buzz aldrin used a sextant to navigate from earth to lunar orbit in july 1969
polynesian wayfinding — ancient navigators used star path sextants (tu'u) to cross the pacific ocean without instruments from ~1500 bce