3 ms·
Huh, what was their competing Prime Meridian?
by EdwardDiego 5y ago
Huh, what was their competing Prime Meridian?
- adrian_b 5y agoObviously, the meridian of Paris. The importance of the meridians was determined by the publications, e.g. nautical almanacs, which were issued by the astronomical observatories located on those meridians. Prior to the establishment of a unique origin for meridians, the navigators were divided in those who used nautical almanacs from the Royal Observatory of Greenwich, those who used nautical almanacs from the "Observatoire de Paris" and so on, for almanacs from other less important observatories. All observatories published coordinates based on their own meridian (which was precisely where their meridian telescope was located).
- EdwardDiego 5y agoHaha, I guess it is obvious in hindsight. So New Zealand could've been UTC+11 instead of UTC+12 if the French had won that argument.