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Knight's Mechanical Encyclopedia (ed. Knight), G. (search)
el of the world, representing the land and sea, and usually the political divisions. A terrestrial globe. A celestial globe was taken from Egypt to Greece, 368 B. C. A terrestrial globe is said to have been made in the time of Anaximander of Miletus, about 550 B. C. This is highly improbable. The determination of the latitude and longitude of places was of a later date, and is a necessary incident of a terrestrial globe. The celestial globe of Billarus was taken away from Sinope by Lucullus (Strabo). The same writer mentions the sphere of Crates; Cicero that of Archimedes. Perhaps this was a planetarium. The planisphere of Dendera in Egypt is a circular diagram of the zodiacal signs, and the most ancient and interesting of all representations of celestial scenery. Gerbert, who studied astronomy among the Saracens in Spain, and was afterwards Pope Sylvester II., A. D. 1000, used in his school at Rheims a terrestrial globe brought from Cordova. While Rome was asserting
Knight's Mechanical Encyclopedia (ed. Knight), P. (search)
more than 2,000 years ago. Pliny says: A bituminous oil is found on a spring at Agrigentina in Sicily, the waters of which were tainted by it. The inhabitants of the spot collect it on the panicles of reeds, to which it very readily adheres, and make use of it for burning in lamps as a substitute for oil; as also for the cure of itchscab on beasts of burden. He remarks that the inflammable material found at Samosata was used by the inhabitants to defend themselves against the army of Lucullus: that it would burn on water, and is only extinguished by earth. In Crawford's Embassy to Ava, published about 1826, appears the following: Petroleum wells supply the whole Burman Empire with oil for lamps and also for smearing wood, to protect it against insects and particularly against the white ant. Its consumption for burning is said to be universal, until its price reaches that of the Sesamun oil, the only other kind used for lamps. The wells, which occupy a space of 16 square mile