Anyone coming to the history of the search for a method to accurately determine longitude through Dava Sobel’s Longitude might be forgiven for thinking that the lunar distance method was just some sort of excuse dreamed up by Neville Maskelyne to prevent John Harrison receiving his just deserts. This is far from being the case. The lunar distance method first explicated by Johannes Werner in Nürnberg at the beginning of the 16th century was the method supported by nearly all astronomers since at least Newton as they were of the opinion that it would not be possible to construct a clock sturdy enough to survive a rough sea voyage and extreme changes of temperature and accurate enough to keep its time over several weeks in the foreseeable future. It should be remembered that it was the astronomers, responsible for keeping track of time since the dawn of civilisation, who had invented and developed the mechanical clock and it was the astronomical instrument makers who were the leading clock makers of the period so they really did know what they were talking about. For these highly knowledgeable men the lunar distance method genuinely seemed to offer more hope of a solution to the problem.
The lunar distance method is one of several ‘astronomical clock’ methods of determining longitude. The theory says that if one has a set of tables detailing the position of the moon respective to a given star or group of stars for accurately determined time intervals for a given fixed position then by observing the moon’s distance from said star or stars locally and noting the local time it should be possible to calculate the time difference of the two observations, real and tabular, and thus determine the longitude of the current position relative to the fixed position in the tables. Four minute of time difference equal one degree of longitude difference.
Two lunar observations taken at the same true local times
with the observers separated by 90 degrees of longitude
To make this system viable one needs two things, an instrument capable of accurately determining the lunar distance on a moving ship and accurate lunar distance tables. The first problem was solved by the English mathematician and instrument maker John Hadley who I’ve written about before and the second by the German cartographer and astronomer Tobias Mayer who died two hundred and fifty years ago today on 20th February 1762, aged just 39.
Mayer was born on in 17th February 1723 in Marbach but his family moved to Esslingen less than two years later.
Mayer’s place of birth in Marbach
Now the Mayer Museum
He grew up in comparative poverty and when his father died in 1731 Tobias was placed in an orphanage. He received only very basic schooling and was a mathematical autodidact. However at the age of eighteen he had already published a book on geometry and a town plan of Esslingen. In 1743 he moved to Augsburg where he worked for the Pfeffel publishing house and where he published a Mathematical Atlas and a book on fortification. His publications led to him being appointed to a senior position at the Homanns Erben cartographical publishing house in Nürnberg, one of the leading cartography companies in Europe, in 1745.
Mayer’s workplace in Nürnberg home of the Homanns Erben publishing house
Today the museum of the history of the city of Nürnberg Fembo Haus
In his six years in Nürnberg Mayer published about thirty maps and numerous astronomical papers with a special emphasis on lunar research. It was during his time in Nürnberg that Mayer laid the foundations of his lunar tables for the lunar distance method.
By 1751 Mayer enjoyed a reputation as one of the leading European astronomers and he was offered the chair of mathematics at Göttingen and the directorship of the university observatory. During the next ten years Mayer would publish extensively on astronomy, mathematics, geodetics, mensuration and the design and construction of scientific instruments. He died on 20th February 1762 of typhoid.
Although the moon obeys Kepler’s laws of planetary motion, because it is fairly large and lays between the earth and the sun it gets pulled all over the place by the force of gravity and as a result its orbit is a very ragged and irregular affair. In both the systems of Ptolemaeus and of Copernicus the models for the moon’s orbit are less than successful. Kepler ignored the problem and did not supply a lunar model in his system. This omission was corrected by the young English astronomer Jeremiah Horrocks who proved that the moon also has, at least in theory, an elliptical Keplerian orbit and delivered the best lunar model up till that time. Even the great Newton had immense difficulties with the moon and although he based his efforts on Horrocks’ work he was unable to show that the moon really conforms to his gravitation theory. It would have to wait for Simon Laplace to tame the moons orbit at the end of the eighteenth century. Before Laplace none of the mathematical models of the moons orbit was accurate enough to deliver tables that could be used for the lunar distance method.
Mayer took a novel approach, he argued that what was needed was not a new model but more accurate observations and more accurate calculations based on those observations and set to work to deliver and deliver he did. Over several years Mayer made very exact observations of the moons positions and very accurate calculations for his tables and thus he succeeded where others had failed. In 1752 he published his first set of lunar tables and in 1755 he submitted them to the Board of Longitude in London. With his tables it was possible to determine the position of the moon within five seconds of arc making it possible to determine longitude to within half a degree.
I am the more unwilling my tables should lie any longer concealed; especially as the most celebrated astronomers of almost every age have ardently wished for a perfect theory of the Moon … on account of its singular use in navigation. I have constructed theses tables … with respect to the inequalities of motions, from that famous theory of the great Newton, which that eminent mathematician Eulerus first elegantly reduced to general analytic equations.
Mayer’s preface to the 1760 edition of his tables.
Combined with Hadley’s quadrant now modified to a sextant the problem of longitude was effectively solved, although only for days when the moon was visible. After trials and a new improved set of tables, published posthumously, the Board awarded Mayer’s widow a prize of £3000 a very large sum of money in the eighteenth century although only a fraction of the sum awarded to Harrison. The calculations necessary to determine longitude having measured the lunar distance proved to be too complex and too time consuming for seamen and so Neville Maskelyne produced the Nautical Almanac containing the results pre-calculated in the form of tables and published for the first time in 1766.
The Tables of the Moon had been brought by the late Professor Mayer of Göttingen to a sufficient exactness to determine the Longitude at Sea to within a Degree, as appeared by the Trials of several Persons who made use of them. The Difficulty and Length of the necessary Calculations seemed the only Obstacles to hinder them from becoming of general Use.
Maskelyne’s preface to the first edition of the Nautical Almanac
Contrary to the impression created by Sobel the two methods, lunar distance and marine chronometer, were not rivals but were employed together as a double safety system. Thanks to Sobel’s highly biased book John Harrison’s efforts have become well known and Harrison has become a household name. Mayer however whose services to navigation are just as important remains largely unknown, an anonymity that he does not deserve.