October 14th, 2009
Astrolabe
An astrolabe is a historical astronomical instrument used by classical astronomers, navigators, and astrologers. Its many uses include locating and predicting the positions of the Sun, Moon, planets, and stars; determining local time given local latitude and vice-versa; surveying; and triangulation.
In the medieval Islamic world, they were used primarily for astronomical studies, as well as in other areas as diverse as astrology, navigation, surveying, timekeeping, Salah prayers, and Qibla. Astrologers of the European nations used astrolabes to construct horoscopes.
There is often confusion between the astrolabe and the mariner’s astrolabe. While the astrolabe could be useful for determining latitude on land, it was an awkward instrument for use on the heaving deck of a ship or in wind. The mariner’s astrolabe was developed to address these issues.
An early rudimentary astrolabe was invented in the Hellenistic world in either the first or second centuries BC and is often attributed to Hipparchus. A marriage of the planisphere and dioptra, the astrolabe was effectively an analog calculator capable of working out several different kinds of problems in spherical astronomy. Theon of Alexandria wrote a detailed treatise on the astrolabe, and Lewis (2001) argues that Ptolemy used an astrolabe to make the astronomical observations recorded in the Tetrabiblos.
The word cryptex is a neologism coined by the author Dan Brown for his 2003 novel The Da Vinci Code, denoting a portable vault used to hide secret messages. It is a combination of the words cryptology and codex; “an apt title for this device” since it uses “the science of cryptology to protect information written on the contained scroll or codex” (p. 199 of the novel). Brown implies that a scroll and a codex are the same thing; however a scroll is a book that is unrolled a page at a time; and a codex is a book that can be opened to any page at will, two very different things.
Esotericism or Esoterism is a term with two basic meanings. In the dictionary sense of the term, it signifies the holding of esoteric opinions, and derives from the Greek (esoterikos), a compound of (eso): “within”, thus “pertaining to the more inward”, mystic. Its antonym is exoteric.
Jacques de Molay (est. 1244–5/1249–50 – 18 March 1314) was the 23rd and officially last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, leading the Order from approximately 1292 until the Order was dissolved by order of the Pope in 1312. He is probably the best known Templar, along with the Order’s founder and first Grand Master, Hugues de Payens (1070-1136).
Solomon’s Temple, also known as the First Temple, was, according to the Bible, the first temple of the ancient religion of the biblical Israelites in Jerusalem.
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci , April 15, 1452 – May 2, 1519) was an Italian polymath, scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, painter, sculptor, architect, botanist, musician and writer. Leonardo has often been described as the archetype of the renaissance man, a man whose unquenchable curiosity was equaled only by his powers of invention. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest painters of all time and perhaps the most diversely talented person ever to have lived.
Liberté chérie was a Masonic Lodge founded in a Nazi concentration camp during the Second World War. Together with the lodge L’Obstinée it was one of only two lodges to be founded within a Nazi concentration camp.
Pythagoras of Samos : “Pythagoras the Samian”, (born between 580 and 572 BC, died between 500 and 490 BC) was an Ionian Greek mathematician and founder of the religious movement called Pythagoreanism. He is often revered as a great mathematician, mystic and scientist; however some have questioned the scope of his contributions to mathematics and natural philosophy. Herodotus referred to him as “the most able philosopher among the Greeks”. His name led him to be associated with Pythian Apollo; Aristippus explained his name by saying, “He spoke (agor-) the truth no less than did the Pythian (Pyth-),” and Iamblichus tells the story that the Pythia prophesied that his pregnant mother would give birth to a man supremely beautiful, wise, and beneficial to humankind.
The Knights Templar round church was built on a magnificent scale to match the growing importance and wealth of the order in England. Linked to the church as a range of grand buildings, complete with great hall, to accommodate the Master and his knights, their chaplains and retainers, while kitchens, fishponds and stables met their other needs. Spacious grounds stretched down to the Thames, providing areas for training and recreation.
The Halliwell Manuscript, also known as the Regius Poem, is the first known Masonic text. It consists of 64 written pages in poetic form. The poem begins by evoking Euclid and his invention of geometry in ancient Egypt and then the spreading of the art of geometry in “divers lands.”
John Coustos, a jeweller and dealer in precious stones, was born in Berne, Switzerland, relocating to England as a child and becoming a naturalized citizen. His masonic career is noteworthy for two events. His initiation in 1730 is the first recorded instance of the presentation of a pair of white gloves to a new initiate, and his persecution by the Catholic Inquisition is the first, if not only, instance of an attack by that Holy Office on an English freemason.