THE PROPERTY OF A LADY
CARY, London
A brass planetarium cum lunarium cum tellurium from ca. 1800, signed "CARY LONDON", with terrestrial globe signed by J. and W. Cary and dated 1791, the ensemble contained in the original mahogany case. Height: 22¾ inches (55.2 cm.)
A fine Martin-type brass planetarium, with tellurium and lunarium attachments - a non-scale model of the solar system as known at the time, intended for display and pedagogic purposes. Mounted on a single brass column with three cabriole-type folding legs. The cylindrical drum, diameter 8½ inches (21.6 cm.), contains the hand-cranked gearing to the concentric drives on the axis. The upper plate of the drum is engraved 'CARY. LONDON'. The brass handle is preserved. There is a calendrical and ecliptic scale (equinox at March 23) around the outside of the top of the drum and at the centre a wind-rose with pointers. There are six brass planetary arms, with planets (and Saturn's ring) in ivory, which together with a 2 3/8 inch diameter sunball, can be used as a planetarium.
By turning a handcrank, the double-cone wheelwork inside the drum rotates each of a set of coaxial tubes assembled on the central (sun) axis. The tubes, in turn, actuate six slender planetary arms which carry their respective ivory planet balls with approximate mean motions around the central brass sun ball. Earth has its moon, Jupiter four satellites, Saturn seven and its ivory ring (cracked). The fact that Uranus is provided with six satellites calls to mind the fact that in 1798 Sir William Herschel nnounced that he had detected four satellites additional to the two he discovered in 1787 and implies that the instrument is slightly later than the date on the globe (see below).
Teeth cut along the outer edge of the drum mesh with each of the two attachments, the separately geared tellurium attachment can replace the planetary arm for the earth and demonstrate the earth's annual motion and its rotation on an inclined axis in a fixed direction. The terrestrial globe, diameter 3 inches (7.6 cm.), then moves around its axis as it moves around the sun. The globe carries coloured gores and bears a printed inscription in a cartouche: CARY's Pocket GLOBE; agreeable to the latest DISCOVERIES. LONDON. Pub(lishe)d by J. & W. Cary Strand April 1791.
Inscriptions on the globe include 'Track of the Lady Penryn', north-east of New Zealand; 'Cook and Furneaux going out in 1773'; 'Owyhee where Cook was killed 1779' by Hawaii; 'Clarke's I(sland)', off Alaska; 'Here the Adventure parted company', below the maker's cartouche; and 'Hearne's Discoveries', in north-west Canada; 'Gore & King's return in 1780', west of West Africa. The Maghrib is called BARBARY', West Africa 'NEGROLAND'; the eastern part of Africa south of the Equator is labelled 'CAFRELLA"; at the centre of Africa are the 'Mts of the Moon' and 'HOTENTOTS' below. Between the Aral Sea and the Pacific stretch 'CALMUC TARTARY' and 'CHINESE TARTARY'. The northern corner of South America is designated'TERRA FIRMA', and the middle of the Western coast of North America is labelled 'NEW ALBION'.
With the tellerium replaced by the separately-geared lunarium attachment, wheelwork under its arm enables demonstration of the moon's orbital motion in 29½ days and its axial rotation, the earth-moon motion around the sun and the motions and positions of the moon' nodes and apsides. Also shown, on an inclined moon-orbit ring, is the moon's lattitude (maximum 5 18'). Ivory balls represent the earth and moon, and the latter carries a hemispherical black cap to cover the half of the moon that is dark and demonstrate the phases of the moon as seen from the earth.
Included in the additional demonstrational devices is a brass ball mounted at the end of a long pivoted and counterbalanced arm, movable manually to represent the position and motion of a comet. When an additional ivory earth ball replaces the sun ball, the planetarium can be used (with the little moon-arm removed) to demonstrate a geocentric system, or what Martin and his contemporaries called the 'Ptolemaic system'.
When dismantled the instrument can be contained in its original mahogany case. The case is provided with fitments for the radial planet arms, while others, located in a drawer, accomodate smaller accessories. Some minor components replaced.
NOTE: William Cary (1759-1825) and John Cary (1754-1835), first at 272 Strand, then at 182 Strand, were at the heart of the English instrument and map business. John Cary "was one of the most prolific, and by many considered to be the finest, of English map-makers" (Tooley). In addition to maps, the firm of George and John Cary, sons of John, produced "Guide and Road Books, Globes, Celestial Charts, Planetariums, Geological Maps, Optical and Mathematical Instruments, Microscopes, Magic Lanterns, Orreries, Air Pumps and Electrical Machines". A precise dating of the various productions of the Carys over several decades awaits a detailed study of the available objects and their inscriptions.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: George Adams, Astronomical and Geographical Essays ..., III: The Description and Use of the Armilary Sphere, Planetarium, tellurium, and Lunarium, 2nd. ed., London, 1790; E.G.R. Taylor, The Mathematical Practitioners of Hanoverian England 1714-1840, Cambridge, 1966, p.306; H.C. King, Geared to the Stars - The Evolution of Planetariums, Orreries and Astronomical Clocks, Toronto, 1978, p.210; R.V. Tooley, Maps and Map-Makers, London, 2nd rev. ed., 1952, p.57; C. Moreland and D. Bannister, Antique Maps - A Collector's Guide, 3rd. ed., Oxford, 1989, p.174; E. Dekker and P van der Krogt, Globes from the Western World, London, 1993, p.172 and index on p.181; G.L'E. Turner, Descriptive Catalogue of Van Marum's Scientific Instruments in Teyler's Museum, Leiden, 1973, pp.200-205 (detailed descriptions of contemporaneous instruments of the same kind by George Adams, 1792).
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