Deuterium leads, CO2 lags, Cape Horn goes North, and Iceland goes South.
It’s very difficult to escape the conclusion the Antarctic is special.
Antarctic Special #1
Somehow or other [after being “mostly covered with ice” for 15 million years] an ice-free map of the Antarctic was published in 1531 i.e. 289 years before Antarctica was officially discovered.
There is no official mainstream historical narrative for Antarctica during the 1st millennium because [so we are told] Antarctica was only discovered in 1820.
Malaga Bay – Antarctic Guide to the First Millennium
https://malagabay.wordpress.com/2016/04/14/antarctic-guide-to-the-first-millennium/In some way or other which is still not, and may never be, entirely clear, this extraordinary deglacial map of Antarctica has come down to us. … it was discovered and published in 1531 by the French geographer Oronce Fine, and is part of his Map of the World.
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In several years of research, the projection of this ancient map was worked out. It was found to have been drawn on a sophisticated map projection, with the use of spherical trigonometry, and to be so scientific that over fifty locations on the Antarctic continent have been found to be located on it with an accuracy that was not attained by modern cartographic science until the nineteenth century.Path of the Pole – Charles Hapgood – 1970
https://archive.org/details/the-path-of-the-pole-by-charles-h.-hapgood-z-lib.org_202012/page/n165/mode/1upOronce Finé (or Fine; Latin: Orontius Finnaeus or Finaeus; Italian: Oronzio Fineo; 1494-1555) was a French mathematician and cartographer.
Wikipedia – Oronce Finé
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orontius_FinnaeusSince about 15 Ma, the continent has been mostly covered with ice.
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Antarctica is the coldest of Earth’s continents. It was ice-free until about 34 million years ago, when it became covered with ice.Wikipedia – Antarctica
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antartica
Antarctic Special #2
The Antarctic has no Permafrost.
Malaga Bay – Alaskan Muck: The Canning River Region
https://malagabay.wordpress.com/2019/08/07/alaskan-muck-the-canning-river-region/Permafrost is ground that continuously remains below 0°C (32°F) for two or more years, located on land or under the ocean. Permafrost does not have to be the first layer that is on the ground. It can be from an inch to several miles deep under the Earth’s surface.
Some of the most common permafrost locations are in the Northern Hemisphere. Almost a quarter of the Northern Hemisphere is underlain by permafrost, including 85% of Alaska, Greenland, Canada and Siberia.
It can also be located on mountaintops in the Southern Hemisphere.
Wikipedia – Permafrost
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permafrost
Antarctic Special #3
The Antarctic has no malodorous Yedoma with frozen animals.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277379111000680
These strange stories had a basis of fact in them, for they were founded on the undoubted truth that from time to time perfect bodies of the Mammoth and rhinoceros had been discovered in the frozen soil of Siberia.
Malaga Bay – Alaskan Muck: Buried Elephants in the Arctic
https://malagabay.wordpress.com/2019/07/14/alaskan-muck-buried-elephants-in-the-arctic/The woolly rhinoceros is an extinct species of rhinoceros that was common throughout Europe and northern Asia during the Pleistocene epoch and survived until the end of the last glacial period.
Wikipedia – Woolly Rhinoceros
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woolly_rhinocerosYedoma is an organic-rich (about 2% carbon by mass) Pleistocene-age permafrost with ice content of 50–90% by volume. Yedoma are abundant in the cold regions of eastern Siberia, such as northern Yakutia, as well as in Alaska and the Yukon.
Wikipedia – Yedoma
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YedomaA melting permafrost formation exposed along the Itkillik River is the largest known yedoma in Alaska. The formation, deposited between 50,000 and 10,000 years ago, contains remains of bison, muskoxen, mammoths, and other animals embedded in an ice cliff that is 100 feet (30 m) high and 1,200 feet (370 m) long. The ice is rich in methane. Odors emitted by the gasses released when the ice thaws have led to the site’s nickname, the Stinking Hills or Stinky Bluffs.
Wikipedia – Itkillik River
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Itkillik_River
Antarctic Special #4
The Antarctic has no quadrupeds.
Antarctic Penguins – George Murray Levick – 1914
https://archive.org/details/antarcticpenguin00levi/mode/1upMalaga Bay – Alaskan Muck: Indelicate Details
https://malagabay.wordpress.com/2019/08/26/alaskan-muck-indelicate-details/The great severity of climate in South Polar regions, the lack of vegetation, the desolation of unpeopled lands upon which no quadrupeds are to be found, – lands that are mere barren wastes of snow and ice, so different from, the more hospitable coasts and valleys of the Arctic, where at equal distances from the equator are found lands green with vegetation, abounding with animal life and the habitat of the hardy Esquimaux, – is accounted for by the predominance of sea in the South Polar regions.
The Seventh Continent – Helen Saunders Wright – 1918
https://archive.org/details/seventhcontinen00wriggoog/page/n114/mode/1upGeologically, West Antarctica closely resembles the Andes mountain range of South America. The Antarctic Peninsula was formed by uplift and metamorphism of sea bed sediments.
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Few terrestrial vertebrates live in Antarctica, and those that do are limited to the sub-Antarctic islands. … Antarctic sea life includes penguins, blue whales, orcas, colossal squids and fur seals.Wikipedia – Antarctica
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antarctica
Antarctic Special #5
Somehow or other [after being “mostly covered with ice” for 15 million years] the Vostok Ice Core currently only contains about 420,000 years worth of climate proxy data.
Although the Vostok core reached a depth of 3623 m the usable climatic information does not extend down this far. The very bottom of the core is ice refrozen from the waters of Lake Vostok and contains no climate information.
Wikipedia – Vostok Station
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vostok_Station
The “Ice Age” of the Vostok ice is a moveable feast with Earth Scientists giving the impression they’ve been playing Pin The Tail On The Donkey.
Pin the tail on the donkey is a game played by groups of children.
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A picture of a donkey with a missing tail is tacked to a wall within easy reach of children.One at a time, each child is blindfolded and handed a paper “tail” with a push pin or thumbtack poked through it.
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The child gropes around and tries to pin the tail on the donkey.Wikipedia – Pin the tail on the donkey
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pin_The_Tail_On_The_Donkey
Source data and descriptions:
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/vostok_time.txt
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/deutnat.txt
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/co2nat.txt
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/dustnat.txt
Vostok Special #1
The weight of the overlying layers gradually transforms snow into ice.
At a depth of about 80 metres “all air passages between the crystals are sealed off” and at 160 metres the Ice Density Curve has almost become vertical.
New snow deposited on the Greenland ice sheet has a density of 50-70 kg/m3, just 5-7% of the density of water which is 1000 kg/m3.
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The weight of the overlying snow gradually compresses the layers below it, and the density increases. When a density of 830 kg/m3 is reached at a depth of approx. 80 m, all air passages between the crystals are sealed off so that air only exists in closed bubbles. This defines the transition from firn to ice.With increasing depth, the air in the bubbles is compressed and the density approaches 917 kg/m3 which is the density of glacier ice.
It is impossible to compress the ice any further, and at greater depths, the thinning of the layers only happens through deformation of ice by ice flow.
University of Copenhagen – Centre for Ice and Climate – Densification
https://www.iceandclimate.nbi.ku.dk/research/flowofice/densification/
The inevitable result of the Ice Density Curve is that Ice Cores begin at a depth of about 80 metres.
DYE 3 Ice Core 1981
C C Langway Jr, H Oeschger, and W Dansgaard – 1985
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/greenland/gisp/dye3/dye3.txt
The 2001 Vostok Ice Core is special because it begins at a depth of zero metres.
Vostok Special #2
The rate of surface snow accumulation determines the age of the first metre of an Ice Core.
The age of the first metre of an Ice Core can be contentious.
The figures here show measurements of CO2 in pre-industrial ice (open squares) and CO2 as measured in the atmosphere at Mauna Loa, Hawaii (solid line).
The original data are shown in (a).
The same data appear in (b) after an arbitrary “correction” of 83 years in the age of the air, to make the data accord with the global warming theory.
Using the real age of the air, could indicate that the CO2 concentrations in the latter 19th century were the same as those in the 1970s.
Ice Core Data Show No Carbon Dioxide Increase
Zbigniew Jaworowski – 21st Century – Spring 1997
http://21sci-tech.com/2006_articles/IceCoreSprg97.pdf
Snow accumulates at Vostok Station at an average rate of 21.5 millimetres annually.
The mean annual sum of precipitation from the atmosphere is 37.9 mm while that of accumulating on the sow surface comprises 21.5 mm.
Station Vostok – Precipitation
http://www.aari.aq/stations/vostok/vostok_en.htmlVostok Station has an ice cap climate (EF), with subzero temperatures year round, typical as with much of Antarctica. Annual precipitation is only 22 millimetres (0.87 in) (all occurring as snow), making it one of the driest places on Earth. On average, Vostok station receives 26 days of snow per year.
Wikipedia – Vostok Station
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vostok_Station#Climate
The 2001 Vostok Ice Core is very special because the first metre of ice is said to have accumulated [on average] at the rate of [1000 mm / 17 =] 58.82 millimetres annually.
Vostok Special #3
The 2001 Vostok Ice Core then becomes extra special because the rate of ice accumulation [somehow or other] equals the rate of snow accumulation after 2,760 years at 85 metres.
Vostok Special #4
Beyond 85 metres the 2001 Vostok Ice Core can be described as fantastically special.
The vertical line artefacts in the millimetres per year graph represent repeating patterns of accumulation that are suggestive of spreadsheet cut and paste operations.
Overall, the millimetres per year shrink from the fantastically large 58.82 down to the fantastically small 1.51.
Confidence in the Vostok data isn’t improved by the conflicting dust data.
Ice age Dust Conc Ice age Dust Conc (GT4) (ppm) (GT4) (ppm) 180546 0.202 216003 0.036 180546 0.067 216003 0.054 232206 0.036 233146 0.033 232206 0.043 233146 0.055 241118 0.06 244424 0.131 241118 0.067 244424 0.052Petit, J.R., et al., 2001,
Vostok Ice Core Data for 420,000 Years, IGBP PAGES/World Data Center
for Paleoclimatology Data Contribution Series #2001-076.
NOAA/NGDC Paleoclimatology Program, Boulder CO, USA.
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/dustnat.txt
Vostok Special #5
The 2001 Vostok Ice Core is particularly special because the sampling regimes for Deuterium, Dust, and CO2 are all different and the CO2 data is especially sparse with gaps ranging from 43 to 5,996 “Gas Age” years.
Deuterium 3,311 data points by Ice Age - every metre Dust 522 data points by Ice Age - no obvious pattern CO2 283 data points by Gas Age - no obvious pattern
A saving grace is that “Age” can be used to reconstruct [via the Deuterium data] the metre of ice theoretically associated with each of the CO2 and Dust data points.
Although the metre accuracy of the reconstruction may appear crude it has to be emphasised the reconstruction simply reflects the incongruities and coarseness of the supplied data.
Vostok Special #6
The GT4 “Ice Age” chronology used with the 2001 Vostok Ice Core significantly transforms the appearance of the Vostok Data.
The GT4 “Ice Age” chronology used with the 2001 Vostok Ice Core appears to align fairly well with “orbitally derived information” such as the “maximum 65° N mid-June insolation”.
Unfortunately, the GT4 “Ice Age” chronology ensures the 2001 Vostok Ice Core is very special because 420,000 year hindcasts are a very special class of conceptual clairvoyancy when [for example] the Inflating Earth has altered insolation in the polar regions [see #10 below].
Milankovitch Cycles describe the collective effects of changes in the Earth’s movements on its climate over thousands of years.
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Milankovitch emphasized the changes experienced at 65° north due to the great amount of land at that latitude. Land masses change temperature more quickly than oceans, because of the mixing of surface and deep water and the fact that soil has a lower volumetric heat capacity than water.Wikipedia – Milankovitch Cycles
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles
Similarly, the observational data falsifies another mathematical manifestation of Delusional Dating known as the Milankovitch Cycles that rely upon a totally imaginary [aka unobserved] Obliquity Curve with a smooth 41,000 year cycle.
In more rational times Milankovitch Cycles were “no longer recognized” by “most of the scientific community”.
Malaga Bay – The Dodwell Dead End
https://malagabay.wordpress.com/2019/09/23/the-dodwell-dead-end/
Vostok Special #7
The Vostok Ice Core reconstruction reveals a relationship between Deuterium and Dust.
Increased levels of Dust are associated with lower Deuterium levels.
Lower Deuterium levels are associated with lower Temperatures.
But [somehow or other]:
The very special Vostok dust record “is not well correlated with temperature”.
Unlike sodium concentration, the dust record is not well correlated with temperature and shows large concentrations of variance in the 100- and 41-kyr spectral bands.
The Vostok dust record is, in this respect, similar to the tropical Atlantic dust record of de Menocal who attributes these spectral characteristics to the progressive glaciation of the Northern Hemisphere and the greater involvement of the deep ocean circulation.
Climate and Atmospheric History of the Past 420,000 Years from the Vostok Ice Core
Jean-Robert Petit et al – Nature 399:429 – January 1999
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/200033381
Vostok Special #8
The Vostok Ice Core reconstruction reveals a relationship between Deuterium and CO2.
Increased levels of CO2 are flexibly associated with increased levels of Deuterium.
And more importantly:
The reconstruction shows CO2 is a trailing asynchronous indicator with the lag being more pronounced when Deuterium levels [and thereby temperatures] are falling.
But that isn’t news to the followers of the GT4 “Ice Age” chronology.
Vostok Special #9
The Vostok Ice Core reconstruction contains six Dust spikes.
Curiously enough, Wikipedia lists six significantly large volcanic eruptions in the Southern Hemisphere after the termination of the Earth’s Sol Invictus Orbit in [about] 1350 CE.
Wikipedia – List of Large Volcanic Eruptions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_large_volcanic_eruptions
And, strangely enough, after assuming a uniform rate of Vostok ice accumulation:
○ Volcanic eruptions precede Dust spikes.
plus
○ There is an unknown dust source at about 1500 CE.
Therefore, the Vostok Ice Core is very special because it’s a proxy for significantly large volcanic eruptions in the Southern Hemisphere since 1370 CE.
Vostok Special #10
When visually comparing the Southern hemisphere 2001 Vostok Ice Core Deuterium data [by depth] with Leona Libby’s Northern Hemisphere Old Japanese Cedar Tree Chronology it’s far easier to reconcile the hemispheres after 1625.
The 1625 regime change may [or may not] be associated with the opening of the Drake Passage and the establishment of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current.
Either way:
Records reveal Cape Horn has moved North by almost two degrees in the last 405 years.
Coordinates: 55°58′48″S 67°17′21″W
Cape Horn was discovered and first rounded in 1616 by the Dutchman Willem Schouten, who named it Kaap Hoorn after the city of Hoorn in the Netherlands.
Wikipedia – Cape Horn
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Horn
Willem Cornelisz Schouten (c. 1567-1625) was a Dutch navigator for the Dutch East India Company.
Wikipedia – Willem Schouten
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willem_Schouten
The Relation of a Wonderfull Voiage – William Cornelison Schouten of Horne – 1619
https://archive.org/details/relationofwonder00unse/page/23/mode/1upThe Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) is an ocean current that flows clockwise (as seen from the South Pole) from west to east around Antarctica. … The ACC has been known to sailors for centuries; it greatly speeds up any travel from west to east, but makes sailing extremely difficult from east to west, although this is mostly due to the prevailing westerly winds.
Wikipedia – Antarctic Circumpolar Current
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antarctic_Circumpolar_CurrentThe Drake Passage is the body of water between South America’s Cape Horn, Chile and the South Shetland Islands of Antarctica.
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The Drake Passage is considered one of the most treacherous voyages for ships to make. Currents at its latitude meet no resistance from any landmass, and waves top 40 feet, hence its reputation as “the most powerful convergence of seas”.Wikipedia – Drake Passage
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_Passage
Overall, the evidence indicates the Inflating Earth caused the polar regions to experience similar rates of inflation and [therefore] similar insolation changes.
And [overall] the cartographic evidence suggests Iceland Went South by [about] one and a half degrees between 1606 and 1906.
Malaga Bay – Iceland Goes South
https://malagabay.wordpress.com/2017/02/04/iceland-goes-south/
Evaluate the evidence and decide for yourself whether Antarctica is special.
Footnote
The aligned Vostok data suggests the CO2 lag never exceeds 40 years.
The outlier 40 year lag in declining atmospheric CO2 levels echoes the 14CO2 decline following the 1963 treaty banning atmospheric nuclear weapon tests.
Wikipedia – Nuclear Fallout
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallout
The reported [on average] “800 year lag in CO2” [derived from the published chronology] provides further evidence that [amongst other things] the official Vostok chronology is incredibly special.
In the 1990’s the classic Vostok ice core graph showed temperature and carbon in lock step moving at the same time. It made sense to worry that carbon dioxide did influence temperature. But by 2003 new data came in and it was clear that carbon lagged behind temperature. The link was back to front.Temperatures appear to control carbon, and while it’s possible that carbon also influences temperature these ice cores don’t show much evidence of that. After temperatures rise, on average it takes 800 years before carbon starts to move.
The 800 year lag in CO2 after temperature – graphed
JoNova – Last Update: Oct 18 2020
https://joannenova.com.au/global-warming-2/ice-core-graph/
MalagaBay 
Reblogged this on Druid Reborn.
A quick post for now. Milankovitch based his theory on the assumption that the Stockwell/Newcomb assertion that obliquity does not change beyond 21.1 and 24.5 degrees. Dodwell said otherwise, and had the data to show for it. (AFAIK those who proposed formulae made it clear the formulae only hold for some kyrs, before the rest of the higher power terms that were ignored become more effective). Archaeological evidence proves Dodwell correct.
The shoreline of Antarctica may have been ice free at the end of the YD due to high obliquity, which would also explain the fast deglaciation (melt-water pulse) and the source of the heat energy to do it. The latent heat of fusion of ice is substantial, and the source needs to be large, direct and sustained (ie no momentary impacts).
Obliquity change means geologic disturbances. The abruptly frozen mammals -with food still in their mouths- cry out for understanding (besides poor Otzi).
Tim,
Ptolemy’s impassable boundary is due to the oceans moving north as the earth was not rotating and in tidal lock with his ancient star, with Ethiopia being the central point pointed to it. As the earth was ejected from this star and started rotating the oceans invaded the equator and submerged the bridge islands and continents on it. Does this make sense to you?
No. But it doesn’t have to.
Better you check this out. https://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-07/what-would-earth-look-if-it-stopped-spinning/
On leaving the star, the matter would have expanded as a release from a Z pinch. Aluminium can crushed by z pinch video refers.
That is why the witnesses said the oceans were created in a day. The basins were at that time empty, and hot magma, slowly cooling. Another process was the release of gases and liquids in jets through the crust, what we now call the continental crust. That is the source of most of the water and salts in the oceans.
The Ptolomaic descriptions may have referred to the times before the release from the star? A polar static orbit may have existed, with one side away from the star focus and the other pole always exposed to it?
The lamestream science controllers have already published one version of what happens when the poles reverse: the waters only slowly alter momentum, supposedly meaning massive tsunami… I think their resoning is false. The sea water is electrolyte and gravity is not as important to their levels as is Electromagnetism, but the idea that what was once west is thereafter east does gel with grave position changes.
An interesting paper, in the sense that it provides a second-hand view of a ‘burning zone’ that is equatorial providing high evaporation. That seems to point to a low obliquity situation. Dynamic instability result in an oscillation, the 1000yr cycle.
https://phys.org/news/2021-03-ice-age-precipitation-maximum-advance.html
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-22090-7
Re – Willem Cornelisz Schouten’s notes on the latitude of Cape Horn, as measured by him in 1616. Perhaps we need to also factor in the following:
The sextant was not invented then (as per available records) and the mariners then were probably relying on more older instruments such as the cross-staff. As far as I can make out, the cross-staff’s measurement appears to be far cruder than that of a sextant. We obviously assume that the ship’s navigators were familiar and extremely hands-on and would obviously have recognised star constellations and knew how to use their instruments.
Notwithstanding the above, its a fact that we have only one single data point (measurement). An error of two degrees latitude (amounting to about 120 nm distance along the arc of longitude) may not really have been a big deal back then. This is especially so, given the type of instrument, possible sea state (usually rough in those parts of the world), etc.
So, it may be a bit premature to conclude that Cape Horn has shifted by two degrees latitude.
“its a fact that we have only one single data point (measurement).”
Provided you discount all the measurements they made before and after they reached Cape Horn.
The mariner’s astrolabe, also called sea astrolabe, was an inclinometer used to determine the latitude of a ship at sea by measuring the sun’s noon altitude (declination) or the meridian altitude of a star of known declination. Not an astrolabe proper, the mariner’s astrolabe was rather a graduated circle with an alidade used to measure vertical angles. They were designed to allow for their use on boats in rough water and/or in heavy winds, which astrolabes are ill-equipped to handle. In the sixteenth century, the instrument was also called a ring.
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The earliest known description of how to make and use a sea astrolabe comes from Martín Cortés de Albacar’s Arte de Navegar published in 1551, although the basic principle is the same as that of the archipendulum used in constructing the Egyptian pyramids.
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The mariner’s astrolabe would have replaced or complemented instruments such as the cross staff or quadrant as a navigator’s instrument.
The mariner’s astrolabe was used until the middle or, at the latest, the end of the 17th century.
Wikipedia – Mariner’s Astrolabe
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariner%27s_astrolabe
Pingback: Ptolemy’s Paradigm: Aftermath | MalagaBay
The mariner’s astrolabe was typically 15 cm in diameter with a least count of one degree, on the perimeter circular scale, one millimetre apart. The accuracy of measurement was theoretically estimated to be around 1-2 degrees (which translates to 60-120 nm along a median of longitude). However, expert mariners estimated that an accuracy of 15 nm could be achieved. In 1989, Sir Knox-Johnston replicated the voyage of Columbus using an astrolabe for navigation – his observations were cross-checked with a satellite transmitter and he managed an average accuracy of less than 15 nm. So yes, it has been conclusively proven that in the right hands the astrolabe can be used for accurate navigation.
However, the navigator requires an accurate declination table to derive the latitude from the observations taken using the astrolabe. The voyage of Columbus (and that recreated by Johnston) were well within the tropics using known and proven declination tables.
Schouten’s voyage around the Cape Horn, in the southern hemisphere was a different matter altogether. The accuracy of declination tables being used may be a factor and an error of 2 degrees amounts to 120 nm along a meridian. I agree with you that this would mean one needs to discount all measurements they made before and after they rounded Cape Horn – which may imply an issue with the declination tables itself they had used for the southern hemisphere. What I am getting at is we do not seem to have a second independent set of observations in the same period, from another voyager in a ship or an explorer who set foot on land and took observations.
The problem is further compounded when one checks out maps of that era, of Cape Horn .
A map dated 1635 shows Cape Horn at around 57 deg 15 min. map-magellan-strait-hondius-1635.jpg (6180×4853) (princeton.edu). Here is another map from 1675 that also puts Cape Horn at 57+ deg map-magelan-strait-wit-1675.jpg (6794×5970) (princeton.edu).
So at first glance, these maps seems to support Schouten’s observations.
However, a map dated 1787 depicts Cape Horn at around 55 deg 17 min. map-magellan-strait-schraembl-1787.jpg (7137×5414) (princeton.edu). This map is closer to the present observation of 55 deg 58 min.
So does one conclude that all maps are accurate and must be taken at face value? Therefore in a period of just about 100-150 years, Cape Horn and surrounding terrain went north by about 120 nm? That would be almost or more than one nm per year! Also, it would mean that Cape Horn and terrain went back and forth – first went up to 55deg 17min and then down to present position at 55deg 58min !
Navigation is both a science and an art – trust me I have some experience in aerial navigation with a lot of it in the pre-GPS era. A fair amount of what we managed back then included precision tactical flying with pin-point accuracy in marginal weather. However I am not ashamed to admit there were quite a few times when I was absolutely lost and had blundered around.
This is NOT to say that I do disagree with all that you have put forward in this blog. Some of the stuff that you brought up is indeed eye-opening, especially about the Vostok ice cores, the points about Antarctica, etc. You must have spent many hours delving deep into the subject matter to have come up with so many fascinating observations.
Apologies for the broken links to the maps and an error due to reference to a wrong map.
Here are the links:
1635: https://lib-dbserver.princeton.edu/visual_materials/maps/websites/pacific/magellan-strait/map-magellan-strait-hondius-1635.jpg
1675: https://lib-dbserver.princeton.edu/visual_materials/maps/websites/pacific/magellan-strait/map-magelan-strait-wit-1675.jpg
1776: https://lib-dbserver.princeton.edu/visual_materials/maps/websites/pacific/pacific-ocean/map-pacific-bellin-1776.jpg
It can be seen that the 1776 map puts Cape Horn just short of 56 deg – about where the present day observation also puts it.
”So does one conclude that all maps are accurate and must be taken at face value?”
The difficulty with the errors & accuracy argument is that the error margin is usually quoted as a plus or minus figure with the “face value” being the mid-point.
On the one hand:
Many early maps contain mistakes.
On the other hand:
Many early mariners who made mistakes discovered their mistakes were fatal.
Therefore, as always, each case should be judged upon it’s merits.
It’s to be expected that differences of opinion will arise.
In the case of Cape Horn there is more to discover and more to tell in a following post…