Note 313 — BOOK VI CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM (continued 2)

It is doubtful if the Chinese knew of the mariner’s compass. Hirth, Ancient History of China, p. 126 sqq. comes to the conclusion, after a careful examination of all data, that, although it is probable something like the compass was known in high antiquity, the knowledge of it was lost for a long time afterwards, until, in the Middle Ages, it reappears as an instrument in the hands of geomancers (people who selected favourable sites for graves, etc). The earliest unmistakable mention of its use as a guide to mariners occurs in a work of the 12th century and refers to its use on foreign ships trading between China and Sumatra. Hirth is rather inclined to assume that Arab travellers may have seen it in the hands of Chinese geomancers and applied its use to navigation, so that it was afterwards brought back by them to China as the “mariner’s compass.”—J. J. L. D.