Pilot Books Research Articles

Pomorske karte i plovidbeni priručnici istočnog Jadrana tijekom povijesti

This article deals with the most important characteristics of historical mapping of the Adriatic region, particularly its eastern part and genesis of the pilot books. Both is observed in the context of the fact that the sea was the shortest, easiest and cheapest transport route which connected Europe with Asia and Africa.

Geografska osnova navigacije Velebitskim kanalom prema Senjskom peljaru iz 1639. godine

U radu se analizira Senjski peljar iz 1639. To je prvi plovidbeni priručnik sastavljen na hrvatskom jeziku, a ujedno i prvi pomorsko-geografski opis podvelebitskoga obalnog područja od Senja do Novskog ždrila. U Senjskom peljaru pomorcima je jezgrovito dan pregled osnovnih geografskih značajki relevantnih za planiranje terestričke navigacije uz obalu Velebitskog podgorja. Istraživanjem izvornika toga plovidbenog priručnika, komparativnom analizom s opisima Velebitskog kanala u drugim starim peljarima te sa starim kartografskim prikazima Velebitskog kanala utvrđeno je značenje pojedinih podvelebitskih uvala koje su omogućavale sigurno zaklonište te važnost koja se u vrijeme nastanka Senjskog peljara pridavala pojedinim prirodnim resursima u opskrbi i pomorsko-trgovinskoj razmjeni.

EPDIS: The Electronic Pilot Book Display System

The Electronic Pilot Display and Information System (EPDIS) is a new technology that present the traditional Pilot Book in electronic format by means of the current and latest information and visual representation developments. EPDIS is a project co-funded by the European Commission, DG IST and Fifth Framework Program, incorporating six partners from four different EU countries (Germany, Estonia, Spain and Portugal) forming a consortium. The idea is to provide a system that integrates a 3D view of the coastline as seen from the ship’s bridge connected to an information system which is basically a compendium of the data contained in the traditional Pilot Book and other complementary texts like guides to port entry, radio signals and lights books. The 3D visualization of landscapes and shorelines is built by means of digital elevation models (DEM) and a basic electronic charting system based on the Standard S-57. This 3D view is complemented with architectural models of the relevant buildings and marks which are sued for navigation in order to recognize difficult sailing areas. In this way a 3D viewer has been designed as a result of this research and development. The pilot book information is integrated into another database system. The Electronic Pilot Book, as it is called, is a system that organizes the textual information and images from paper pilot books in geo-referenced blocks, this structure of data could be accessed or queried for the electronic chart system when a zone or conspicuous point in the 3D viewer needs explanation. By means of an SML protocol many problems of connectivity and data transfer can be eliminated, mainly all those related to the data formats because of the different kinds of information blocks (text, images, mail addresses, telephone numbers, etc). This paper describes the most relevant aspects for the development of the EPDIS system and the results obtained from the work done on the trial areas of the Baltic Sea, the Portuguese Coast and the Spanish Mediterranean.

U.S. Children's Books about the World War II Period: From Isolationism to Internationalism, 1940-1990

Children's books published during the early 1940s in the United States rarely mention the war that the country finally entered in December 1941. These books do not simply omit war-related plots and overseas settings; in most of them, people go about their business as if there were no war on at all. At first, this statement may seem exaggerated, even wrong. Surely there are dozens, even hundreds of stories about the home front, as well as Nazi books, spy books, army nurse books, and bomber pilot books. And what about books that show the horror of the Holocaust? On closer analysis, though, nearly the whole corpus of nonpulp World War II books for juvenile readers in the United States turns out to have been written considerably later. In the juvenile fiction of the 1940s (or any other decade of this century) in the United States, the war is rarely treated as what it actually was for most children—an ever-present background to daily life. Real children in the war years felt the effects of rationing, helped with victory gardens, and collected metal scrap. Their fathers and older brothers, and perhaps some of their young aunts, were in uniform. If they lived on the East Coast, they had blackouts and air raid drills; on the West Coast, they knew of classmates or former neighbors in Japanese-American internment centers. Though spared the experiences of bombings, occupation, and extermination camps, U.S. children in the war years lived in an atmosphere radically different from that of peacetime. Little of this found its way into the books they read until many years later. The treatment of World War I in U.S. children's books mirrors the change in the popular view of the war over the past fifty years very accurately. An examination of five significant juvenile titles in the early

Pilot Books, Sailing Guides and Charts for Yachtsmen

This paper was presented on 20 February 1991 at a half-day meeting on haven charts for yachtsmen. The meeting was organized by the RIN in association with the Honourable Company of Master Mariners, the Royal Cruising Club and the Cruising Association. Adam Kerr is a Director of the International Hydrographic Bureau, but the opinions provided in this paper are his own and should not necessarily be construed to be those of his organization.

A Brief History of Sailing Directions

Sailing Directions nowadays implies ‘Pilots’, with which all mariners are familiar. However, the term in a broader sense embraces a wide range of printed and descriptive material of help to the seaman. In his paper, which was presented at a meeting of the Solent Branch of the Institute in December 1979, Dr Cotter traces the origins of the publications – pilot books, light lists, tide tables, and indeed charts – which are now available to the navigator. The paper has been abridged.

The Still Undiscovered Origin of Portolan Charts

The term ‘portolan chart’ first occurs in Italy in the thirteenth century, not long after this aid to navigation came into general use on board ship. The Italian word portolano, however, can best be translated as ‘pilot book’ or ‘sailing directions’, a different aid to navigation of which one example survives from the fourth century b.c., and pilot books are indeed still published in modern form by all seafaring nations. References by Herodotus in the History make it probable that such documents already existed in his time, and under the name of periplus they continued up to the sixth century a.d.; after which they do not appear again until the golden age of navigation in Italy and Catalonia in the late Middle Ages, apart from some much simpler early medieval types. The portolano or periplus is a description of ports, with information required by the navigator concerning anchorages, dangers threatening landfall and the winds and weather over wider areas. Commercial information was sometimes included, obviously also a matter of interest to the mariner who could read, though it may be doubted if many of them then could.Italian portolan charts exist from almost the same period as the portolani, both of them denoted by the same word compasso, but while the pilot books have their modern successors the charts were only produced up to the beginning of the seventeenth century and are not really the forerunners of the modern sea chart.

A Brief History of Sailing Directions

Sailing Directions nowadays implies ‘Pilots’, with which all mariners are familiar. However, the term in a broader sense embraces a wide range of printed and descriptive material of help to the seaman. In this paper, which was presented at a meeting of the Solent Branch of the Institute in December 1979, Dr Cotter traces the origins of the publications – pilot books, light lists, tide tables, and indeed charts – which are now available to the navigator. The paper has been abridged.Men sailed the seas and made extended voyages, without benefit of instruments now considered vitally necessary, thousands of years before the invention of chart and compass, the pre-eminent instruments of navigation. To the question: ‘How did an ancient sea-trader shape his course in the confident expectation of reaching his destination safely?’ there is no complete answer. But we can be fairly certain that early seafarers learnt the techniques of their craft through observation and experience supplemented by verbal instruction and advice from their more-experienced contemporaries.

Atlantes Neerlandici: Bibliography of Terrestrial, Maritime and Celestial Atlases and Pilot Books, Published in the Netherlands up to 1880. Vol. 1: Van de Aa-Blaeu

Atlantes Neerlandici: Bibliography of Terrestrial, Maritime and Celestial Atlases and Pilot Books, Published in the Netherlands up to 1880. Vol. 1: Van de Aa-Blaeu

Book Reviews : How to Stop Pilferage in Business and Industry, Charles P. Rudnitsky and Leslie M. Wolff. Pp. 74. New York, Pilot Books, 1961, $3

Book Reviews : How to Stop Pilferage in Business and Industry, Charles P. Rudnitsky and Leslie M. Wolff. Pp. 74. New York, Pilot Books, 1961, $3

A STUDY OF THE NAVIGATION-ROUTES NEAR THE COAST OF SUMATRA IN THE EARLY 17TH CENTURY

Tong-si-yang-Kao which was compiled in the Ming-dynasty (the latter part of the 16 th Cent.) is a landmark of great importance in the history of traffic and communications of the South Seas. It has, from time to time, been referred to by students of Oriental History both in the East and West and the navigation-routes and plate-names appearing in this document have been variously studied and discussed by them, but there are many questions to be solved, For instance, almost no geographic interpretation has been advanced as to why such and such a course was taken at such and such a period of time. Again the study of the place-names in the past are still controversial in many respects. From the standpoint of Historical Geography, I have re-examined the navigation routes by taking the geographical factors into consideration, on the basis of many large scale charts and the Pilot books which are indispensable to the study of navigation-routes. The navigation-routes which I have treated here are those in the western part of Malaysia recorded in the “Western route” (_??_) of this document. In this thesis, I have tried to give the results of the study on the following three courses only. (1) From eastern coast of Malay Peninsula to the ports of Eastern Sumatra. (2) From Bangka Strait to West Java. (3) From Malacca to northern Sumatra. Studies on other routes in Malaysia were already published in my 1st report. (See “Shien” -the journal of historical Studies, St. Paul's University- Vol. 16. No. 2. 1955) Also a short report about the general characteristics of navigation technique recorded in this document, namely uses of wind, observation of weather and islets, means of soundings, or uses of scientific instruments is added here.