Orientation of churches by magnetic compasses?

Abstract

SUMMARY In Christian religion the sunrise is of great symbolic importance. Therefore, many churches constructed in the Middle Ages point towards geographic East. Although ‘easting’ of churches actually refers to the alignment towards the azimuth of sunrise on the individual churches’ patron’s day, deviation of nave alignment from the geographic East direction is often assumed to be caused by the use of magnetic compasses. Therefore, the church alignment could provide information about historical magnetic declination. We investigate 124 churches in Lower Austria and 68 in northern Germany to clarify this question as well as the ‘easting’ hypothesis. Church orientations are determined from georeferenced satellite images. Metadata such as the construction year, possible reconstructions and the church patron are gathered to determine the date when current church direction was appointed, and to perform sunrise calculations. However, due to uncertainties of construction years and the declining importance of orientation tradition after the 15th century several churches are excluded from the study. Thus, 32 churches with reliable metadata remain for evaluation in each region. The analysis reveals a preferred alignment of naves towards geographic East in Lower Austria and northern Germany. The construction and alignment of churches was often affected by the pre-existing buildings and streets or topography and natural surroundings. Therefore, deviations from geographic East are more likely caused by town or landscape. The mean deviations from magnetic East in both regions are large compared to the mean deviations from geographic East and sunrise azimuths. Hence, the use of compasses cannot be confirmed. Despite a few churches indicating orientation according to their patron’s day, a general trend cannot be observed in the data reviewed.