Sea Compasses:; This refers to a magnetic compass carried by most mariners to determine direction. It was likely a dry compass (as opposed to wet compass for which the compass bowl was filled with liquid and the needle floated) with a compass needle of iron set on a vertical axis in wooden bowl, inside a round box with a glass top and detachable bottom by which the needle could be taken out to be remagnetized by means of a lodestone. By the late 16th century the compass was likely encased in a binnacle, or portable wooden chest from which the front could be removed to keep the compass in constant view of the helmsman for navigational purposes.;
Works Cited:; May, Commander W.E. A History of Marine Navigation. New York: Norton, 1973.; Waters, D.W. The Art of Navigation in England in Elizabethan and Early Stuart Times. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1958.;