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The Riddle of the Compass: The Invention That Changed the World
The best-selling author of Fermat's Last Theorem and God's Equation discusses the twelfth-century invention of the compass; its dramatic influence on navigation and the rise of Italian sea power; and its impact on the development of world trade and the Age of Discovery. 35,000 first printing.
200 pages, Hardcover
First published May 2, 2001
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737 people want to read
About the author
Amir D. Aczel
48 books158 followersAmir Aczel was an Israeli-born American author of popular science and mathematics books. He was a lecturer in mathematics and history of mathematics.
He studied at the University of California, Berkeley. Getting graduating with a BA in mathematics in 1975, received a Master of Science in 1976 and several years later accomplished his Ph.D. in Statistics from the University of Oregon. He died in Nîmes, France in 2015.
He studied at the University of California, Berkeley. Getting graduating with a BA in mathematics in 1975, received a Master of Science in 1976 and several years later accomplished his Ph.D. in Statistics from the University of Oregon. He died in Nîmes, France in 2015.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 85 reviews
November 6, 2014
This time it was The Riddle Of The Compass, by Amir D. Aczel.
Have you ever read a popular history book where the author takes a simple object or idea, and weaves a thread through the course of civilization, drawing remarkable connections and weaving a web of thought, people, incidents and coincidence that leaves you marveling at human ingenuity and accomplishment, and awed by the vast scope of the author’s erudition and synthesis of vision?
Maybe it was something like Longitude, by Dava Sobel, or Cod, by Mark Kurlansky, you’re thinking of. It was definitely not this book.
I should have put this one down by page four, when he unnecessarily described his drive to the library where he did his research. “As soon as I left Salerno and drove west along the coast toward Amalfi, the road became extremely curvy. I had to downshift, but the Alfa Romeo 156 was made for such treacherous driving…”
This was a big clue that Dr. Aczel had gotten a nice little advance from Harcourt Inc. to take a nice little sabbatical and write a nice little book that might ride the wake behind Ms. Sobel’s success.
One problem is that the history of the compass was mostly anonymous. He was going to Amalfi, because they claim to be the birthplace of the compass. But the “inventor” turns out to have been a mostly fictional composite born of the misreading of a typo in a rehash of an old history, written for a Chamber of Commerce centennial event. We then hear a vague account of the development of trade in the Mediterranean, and how it was transformed when the compass arrived obscurely around 1300. Digging further back, he found the Chinese had been using a compass-like device for ritual purposes for centuries before, but the Portuguese missionaries in the 1600’s burned all the records. That was a shame, but at least it kept this book from being too long.
He ties these tenuous fibers together with a chapter on Marco Polo, who learned to navigate from Chinese mariners. Unfortunately, the compass was never mentioned in his Travels, presumably because by that time, it was so commonplace, he took it for granted.
This is all told in a "Tell ‘em what you’re gonna tell ‘em/Tell ‘em/Tell what you told ‘em” style that would be admirable in a high school term paper, but is embarrassing and repetitive in a book for grown ups. Toward the end of the book, he even resorts to the phrase “The list goes on and on,” as he hurries to wrap up his manuscript before he has to get back to Boston to dust off his notes for the Fall semester.
You may have noticed, I’m feeling very smug, and a little mean. It's not as though I could write a better book, or ever intend to. I’m just pleased that for once in my wishy-washy life, I didn’t like something, and I can put my finger on why. I take that as proof, however unconvincing to the rest of you, that my critical faculties haven’t completely left me, ...yet.
Have you ever read a popular history book where the author takes a simple object or idea, and weaves a thread through the course of civilization, drawing remarkable connections and weaving a web of thought, people, incidents and coincidence that leaves you marveling at human ingenuity and accomplishment, and awed by the vast scope of the author’s erudition and synthesis of vision?
Maybe it was something like Longitude, by Dava Sobel, or Cod, by Mark Kurlansky, you’re thinking of. It was definitely not this book.
I should have put this one down by page four, when he unnecessarily described his drive to the library where he did his research. “As soon as I left Salerno and drove west along the coast toward Amalfi, the road became extremely curvy. I had to downshift, but the Alfa Romeo 156 was made for such treacherous driving…”
This was a big clue that Dr. Aczel had gotten a nice little advance from Harcourt Inc. to take a nice little sabbatical and write a nice little book that might ride the wake behind Ms. Sobel’s success.
One problem is that the history of the compass was mostly anonymous. He was going to Amalfi, because they claim to be the birthplace of the compass. But the “inventor” turns out to have been a mostly fictional composite born of the misreading of a typo in a rehash of an old history, written for a Chamber of Commerce centennial event. We then hear a vague account of the development of trade in the Mediterranean, and how it was transformed when the compass arrived obscurely around 1300. Digging further back, he found the Chinese had been using a compass-like device for ritual purposes for centuries before, but the Portuguese missionaries in the 1600’s burned all the records. That was a shame, but at least it kept this book from being too long.
He ties these tenuous fibers together with a chapter on Marco Polo, who learned to navigate from Chinese mariners. Unfortunately, the compass was never mentioned in his Travels, presumably because by that time, it was so commonplace, he took it for granted.
This is all told in a "Tell ‘em what you’re gonna tell ‘em/Tell ‘em/Tell what you told ‘em” style that would be admirable in a high school term paper, but is embarrassing and repetitive in a book for grown ups. Toward the end of the book, he even resorts to the phrase “The list goes on and on,” as he hurries to wrap up his manuscript before he has to get back to Boston to dust off his notes for the Fall semester.
You may have noticed, I’m feeling very smug, and a little mean. It's not as though I could write a better book, or ever intend to. I’m just pleased that for once in my wishy-washy life, I didn’t like something, and I can put my finger on why. I take that as proof, however unconvincing to the rest of you, that my critical faculties haven’t completely left me, ...yet.
May 26, 2017
کتاب باحالی بود.یادمه وقتی میخوندمش هیجان داشتم.به عنوان یه آدمی که قطب نما یکی از ابزارهاییه که قلبا عاشقشه، خوندن کتابی که بیاد یه تاریخچه بده در
این باره و یه سیر هیجان انگیز براش ارائه بده و این وسط کلی چیز هم راجع به دریانوردی(شیرین ترین و دل نشین ترین و خفن ترین و...حرفه ی عالم)قبل و بعد از اختراع قطب نما تعریف کنه، کتاب به یاد موندنی میشه.
این کتابو سال 91 یا حداکثر 92 خریدم و خوندم.3500 تومن!!! به کجا داریم می ریم؟؟؟کتاب چاپ 88ه. 3500 تومن؟؟
این باره و یه سیر هیجان انگیز براش ارائه بده و این وسط کلی چیز هم راجع به دریانوردی(شیرین ترین و دل نشین ترین و خفن ترین و...حرفه ی عالم)قبل و بعد از اختراع قطب نما تعریف کنه، کتاب به یاد موندنی میشه.
این کتابو سال 91 یا حداکثر 92 خریدم و خوندم.3500 تومن!!! به کجا داریم می ریم؟؟؟کتاب چاپ 88ه. 3500 تومن؟؟
August 15, 2018
Given that there is such a thing as a beach read, I found Amid Aczel’s The Riddle of the Compass a decent plane read. I picked it up at a mapping conference and read it on the plane coming back. It is another in the micro histories of science that seemed to spring up with the success of Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific. How impressed I am with it can be summarized by saying that I having read it in a few hours I remember little of it barely a month later. Odds are I will stumble across it again in a few years, get intrigued by the title and be 50 pages into it before remembering that I had read it already.
To his credit, Amir Aczel grew up aboard ships commanded by his father and became a mathematician as well as an author. All good qualification for someone wanting to explain the history of and importance of the compass. I am a onetime Navy officer and can vouch for the continuing importance of the compass in modern seamanship. Or maybe not. I was last on the deck of an underway ship just as the first GPS systems were making the tasks of a ship’s navigator primarily one of reading the screen. Ahem, “In my day” we still shot the stars and the helmsman read out his course from both the gyroscope and the magnetic compass. I cannot say if this is still true.
In order to add structure and give his narrative a name, the author begins with the traditional claim that the ships compass was invented in Amalfi, Italy in the 1300’s by Flavio Gioia. Great inventions, especially those from many hundreds of years ago often have many inventors. Aczel never exactly refutes Almalfi’s claim, but he notes that we cannot be sure who Gioia was or if he was. The Riddle of the Compass is not meant to be tough investigative journalism. He has no need to challenge local heroes.
Because most of us know nothing of Almfi, or why it may have the rights to this invention, Aczel begins with the case for the city as having been, briefly and in the 1300’s a major center of navigation. For the rest, a total of 160 pages, plus notes and references, he traces the more ancient record of load stones and magnetic “fish” small metallic slivers that when magnetized point to the magnetic north and the slow development of what a navigator would now recognize as a compass rose.
Besides being brief, it is very accessible to a general reader. Altogether not a bad book just not remarkable. About right for a relaxing plane ride.
To his credit, Amir Aczel grew up aboard ships commanded by his father and became a mathematician as well as an author. All good qualification for someone wanting to explain the history of and importance of the compass. I am a onetime Navy officer and can vouch for the continuing importance of the compass in modern seamanship. Or maybe not. I was last on the deck of an underway ship just as the first GPS systems were making the tasks of a ship’s navigator primarily one of reading the screen. Ahem, “In my day” we still shot the stars and the helmsman read out his course from both the gyroscope and the magnetic compass. I cannot say if this is still true.
In order to add structure and give his narrative a name, the author begins with the traditional claim that the ships compass was invented in Amalfi, Italy in the 1300’s by Flavio Gioia. Great inventions, especially those from many hundreds of years ago often have many inventors. Aczel never exactly refutes Almalfi’s claim, but he notes that we cannot be sure who Gioia was or if he was. The Riddle of the Compass is not meant to be tough investigative journalism. He has no need to challenge local heroes.
Because most of us know nothing of Almfi, or why it may have the rights to this invention, Aczel begins with the case for the city as having been, briefly and in the 1300’s a major center of navigation. For the rest, a total of 160 pages, plus notes and references, he traces the more ancient record of load stones and magnetic “fish” small metallic slivers that when magnetized point to the magnetic north and the slow development of what a navigator would now recognize as a compass rose.
Besides being brief, it is very accessible to a general reader. Altogether not a bad book just not remarkable. About right for a relaxing plane ride.
February 19, 2023
برام جالب بود خصوصا نتیجهگیری آخرش، اینکه چینی ها باروت و قطب نما رو برای بار اول کشف کردند ولی اروپا بهترین استفاده رو ازش کرد جالبه. چینی ها از باروت برای اکسیر جوانی استفاده میکردند و از قطب نما برای فنگ شویی و فلسفه تعادل. ولی اروپا با با قطب نما دنیا رو کشف میکرد و با باروت به گسترش مستعمره هاش میپرداخت.
از دانستن یک علم و کشف آن تا به کار بستن و استفاده از آن کیلومترها فاصله است.
از دانستن یک علم و کشف آن تا به کار بستن و استفاده از آن کیلومترها فاصله است.
February 26, 2019
Thought this would be good because of the maths one he did, and you know, fuckin' magnets, but he's all about the "who did it first?" rather than the "how did people use this thing and what difference did it make?" The former approach worked for the Fermat thing because he knew who everyone was, and one of them won a medal or something, whereas it turns out, unsurprisingly, no-one knows exactly who made the first compass, and so it's not that loads of fun to read about, especially when the framing device is the author going on an exciting journey to a library. Not even in a library on an island he has to sail to using a compass, he just goes in his car.
June 28, 2020
I think it a) needed to be twice as long and b) needed more interaction with what the discoveries made by these navigators did to the countries they “discovered.”
July 20, 2022
Not a very strong book.... largely because, unlike Longitude, there isn't a central person to hang the story upon.... there isn't a good personality to give the book some plot.
The origins of the compass are pretty cloudy and the author is forced to make broad comments about it's introduction in both China, originally, and Europe, later on. So no great story of so and so the real inventor of the compass and his(her) trials and struggles to create the thing.
And so the author then flails all over the place (Venice! Marco Polo! Magellan!!) trying to make tenuous connections between these places / people and the compass to get enough pages to be able to call this thing a book and sell it to people... as opposed to what this ALSO could have been... which is a 3 or 4 page magazine article.
Luckily I find maritime history interesting (Magellan, Venetian ship building etc)... so that kept my interest at least a little bit. But otherwise the story of the compass remains pretty cloudy after reading this book.
Plus... the editor should have eliminated many of the author's statements that "the compass" or this or that other thing "changed the world!"
The origins of the compass are pretty cloudy and the author is forced to make broad comments about it's introduction in both China, originally, and Europe, later on. So no great story of so and so the real inventor of the compass and his(her) trials and struggles to create the thing.
And so the author then flails all over the place (Venice! Marco Polo! Magellan!!) trying to make tenuous connections between these places / people and the compass to get enough pages to be able to call this thing a book and sell it to people... as opposed to what this ALSO could have been... which is a 3 or 4 page magazine article.
Luckily I find maritime history interesting (Magellan, Venetian ship building etc)... so that kept my interest at least a little bit. But otherwise the story of the compass remains pretty cloudy after reading this book.
Plus... the editor should have eliminated many of the author's statements that "the compass" or this or that other thing "changed the world!"
October 24, 2025
Was there a riddle? Pretty dry, but I did learn a few things about the development of navigation overall.
May 19, 2016
This is a perfectly decent short book surrounded by some really annoying framing chapters.
There is no particular "riddle" surrounding the compass--it was a valuable navigational aid invented by the Chinese and exploded in western use in the Mediterranean during the 13th century. It was not "invented" in Amalfi, although it may first have been put in a box there, and the identity of the inventor is lost to time despite there being a tradition from several centuries later attributing it to a non-existent townsman.
Everything else is entertaining, edifying or both. Staying on course during cloudy winter weather, when sun and stars could be invisible most of the time, meant voyages could be made safely and more accurately year round. There's a good job putting it in context of other navigational tools such as sounding lines, prevailing winds, dead reckoning and navigational charts. The compass added to these but did not replace them all, and longitude remained especially tricky. Perhaps because of the lack of mystery about the compass Aczel makes some chapter-length but interesting detours about Venetian history (in which the compass played a large part) and Marco Polo (who doesn't so much as mention a compass).
There is no particular "riddle" surrounding the compass--it was a valuable navigational aid invented by the Chinese and exploded in western use in the Mediterranean during the 13th century. It was not "invented" in Amalfi, although it may first have been put in a box there, and the identity of the inventor is lost to time despite there being a tradition from several centuries later attributing it to a non-existent townsman.
Everything else is entertaining, edifying or both. Staying on course during cloudy winter weather, when sun and stars could be invisible most of the time, meant voyages could be made safely and more accurately year round. There's a good job putting it in context of other navigational tools such as sounding lines, prevailing winds, dead reckoning and navigational charts. The compass added to these but did not replace them all, and longitude remained especially tricky. Perhaps because of the lack of mystery about the compass Aczel makes some chapter-length but interesting detours about Venetian history (in which the compass played a large part) and Marco Polo (who doesn't so much as mention a compass).
June 12, 2011
I was disappointed by the lack of meat about the subject. There was only a couple of chapters of discussion of the evidence of the origin of the compass. The rest was about historical context and about what it helped accomplish. A whole chapter was devoted to Marco Polo even though the author states that Polo did not bring the compass back from China and did not mention it in any of his writings.
June 2, 2018
it was interesting at the beginning and then i felt he was repeating things and then I felt as if the chapters were padded. Like too long to be a magazine feature but not enough material to make a full length book.
He also stated technological developments that resulted because of the magnetic compass but never provide any supporting evidence.
I guess I wanted/expected more.
He also stated technological developments that resulted because of the magnetic compass but never provide any supporting evidence.
I guess I wanted/expected more.
June 13, 2009
This was a great read, describing how the compass was invented and how it changed the world.
July 17, 2013
This was a slow read for a short book. It was sort of interesting, but it more made me want to read up on the other areas of history it mentioned than made me excited for the compass' history.
September 7, 2014
Interesting title. Nice cover art. Impressive author background. Below average writing level. All hype and very little substance.
June 24, 2020
Having recently finished Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time I wanted to continue reading up on historical methods of navigation. I found Axzel's book in the discount section of Barnes & Noble several years ago and bought it. It was nice to be able to get a book from my "To Read" stack read!
This was an informative book for me and unlike what I expected. While I was disappointed to not read more about the scientific properties and discoveries of the lodestone itself, I what I did find was a history of Venice around the turn of the first millennium (and also a little Chinese history). I confess that outside of knowing Venice being part of Italy and that a few Shakespear plays were set in the region, I did not know much about this ancient city. I did not know that at one time they were the dominant sea power of Europe.
There were a couple of additional tidbits I learned from this books. First, the idea that ancient mariners hugged the coastline due to their inability to navigate in the open sea is a myth. This is because the coast line is far more dangerous due to the risk of shallows and under submerged obstructions. Running aground could prove devastating to a ship's crew.
Second, ancient mariners used the direction and sensations of the wind to help them navigate prior to the introduction of the compass. This was particularly true in the Mediterranean where southerly winds would blow warm and dry (coming from an arid region), whereas northerly winds would blow cooler and wetter. Wind navigation was so important that the wind rose was developed with the cardinal points (north, south, east, west) and sub-divided points (north-northeast and so forth). When the compass came along, the magnetic needle was simply added to the wind rose.
One criteria for me in determining if a book is good is if it inspires me to read another book. Aczel did this by exposing my ignorance of Venetian history. I bought Venice: A History on Kindle to help me learn more. I just wished there was more content about navigation itself.
This was an informative book for me and unlike what I expected. While I was disappointed to not read more about the scientific properties and discoveries of the lodestone itself, I what I did find was a history of Venice around the turn of the first millennium (and also a little Chinese history). I confess that outside of knowing Venice being part of Italy and that a few Shakespear plays were set in the region, I did not know much about this ancient city. I did not know that at one time they were the dominant sea power of Europe.
There were a couple of additional tidbits I learned from this books. First, the idea that ancient mariners hugged the coastline due to their inability to navigate in the open sea is a myth. This is because the coast line is far more dangerous due to the risk of shallows and under submerged obstructions. Running aground could prove devastating to a ship's crew.
Second, ancient mariners used the direction and sensations of the wind to help them navigate prior to the introduction of the compass. This was particularly true in the Mediterranean where southerly winds would blow warm and dry (coming from an arid region), whereas northerly winds would blow cooler and wetter. Wind navigation was so important that the wind rose was developed with the cardinal points (north, south, east, west) and sub-divided points (north-northeast and so forth). When the compass came along, the magnetic needle was simply added to the wind rose.
One criteria for me in determining if a book is good is if it inspires me to read another book. Aczel did this by exposing my ignorance of Venetian history. I bought Venice: A History on Kindle to help me learn more. I just wished there was more content about navigation itself.
March 6, 2018
The Riddle of the Compass: The Invention That Changed the World was an interesting quick read on the early days of compass navigation, though it did leave a bit to be desired. I picked it up after reading Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time (which is excellent, if you haven't read it) and was let down. For one thing, Aczel meandered through unnecessary topics and got mired in the weeds of early Venetian politics. At the end of the day, there was actually very little information about the compass as an object of history. Most of this book was spent explaining the economic and political effects the compass had on early European countries. An interesting topic, to be sure, but not the promised "riddle of the compass." It was a bit dry, a bit wandering, but on the whole a decent read.
May 29, 2018
Amalfi, Italy, claims to be where the compass was invented. China claims to be where the compass was invented. Aczel went in search of the truth.
Most people don't think about a compass much now. Yet the compass was one of those inventions that changed the world. It changed commerce. It found new worlds. It changed transportation. It is still essential, even with GPS.
The compass we know today is really two things. One is the lodestone or magnet that orientates itself with the Earth's magnetic field. The other is the windrose or direction picture under the needle. Who put the two together?
This book is packed with interesting facts, tidbits of information about people and events that never seem to make it into text books. Even so, the book is easy reading. It gets a bit dry here and there, but never for long stretches.
As so much of the history of the compass is also the history of trade between Europe and Asia and the events of the Age of Discovery, some basic knowledge of these makes the book more understandable. It will then add depth and understanding to these periods of history.
Most people don't think about a compass much now. Yet the compass was one of those inventions that changed the world. It changed commerce. It found new worlds. It changed transportation. It is still essential, even with GPS.
The compass we know today is really two things. One is the lodestone or magnet that orientates itself with the Earth's magnetic field. The other is the windrose or direction picture under the needle. Who put the two together?
This book is packed with interesting facts, tidbits of information about people and events that never seem to make it into text books. Even so, the book is easy reading. It gets a bit dry here and there, but never for long stretches.
As so much of the history of the compass is also the history of trade between Europe and Asia and the events of the Age of Discovery, some basic knowledge of these makes the book more understandable. It will then add depth and understanding to these periods of history.
January 9, 2026
I normally do not finish books this bad. I was ready to quit by page 50, but this book's short length (159 paperback pages with large type and larger page margins) meant that it would be a fast read.
This book contains almost no information on compasses. It is a series of vignettes on subjects tangentially related to navigation and the Mediterranean Sea.
It reads as though the author is struggling to make a word count requirement. If the publisher typed CRTL + A on the original manuscript they might find lots of two letter words in white color ink buried in the margins. Over 10% of this book is blank pages between chapters.
There is a chapter on Venice including speculation that the ancient Venetians were Roman nobility. Does this have have anything to do with compasses? No, but maybe the author wanted to expense a vacation to Venice and had to meet a word count quota.
There is a chapter on Marco Polo. Did he have anything to do with the compass? No, but he was from Venice and traveled some, so he meets the criteria for inclusion in the book.
This book contains almost no information on compasses. It is a series of vignettes on subjects tangentially related to navigation and the Mediterranean Sea.
It reads as though the author is struggling to make a word count requirement. If the publisher typed CRTL + A on the original manuscript they might find lots of two letter words in white color ink buried in the margins. Over 10% of this book is blank pages between chapters.
There is a chapter on Venice including speculation that the ancient Venetians were Roman nobility. Does this have have anything to do with compasses? No, but maybe the author wanted to expense a vacation to Venice and had to meet a word count quota.
There is a chapter on Marco Polo. Did he have anything to do with the compass? No, but he was from Venice and traveled some, so he meets the criteria for inclusion in the book.
June 26, 2018
As the daughter of a merchant navy officer and navigator I’ve long had an interest in sea travel and ships, and had been looking forward to reading this book on the history of the compass. However, something about it didn’t quite gel with me. There were certainly some fascinating nuggets of information in there but I didn’t learn quite as much as I would have liked. It’s a quick read - only 159 pages, including several diagrams, and I finished it in two evenings, but perversely I would have liked it to have been longer, not so much because I was I was enjoying the book - it was only ok - but a bit more ‘meat’ and information in there would have made it a much more satisfying read. It was a bit like being really hungry but only being given a small and bland snack. I felt I’d just had a taster of what there was to learn, and some more ‘flavour’ in terms of detail would have made it much more satisfactory.
May 1, 2023
Simple, superficial and very fast to read. Only 159 pages of text, and that it with large font, lots of white space on chapter title pages, blank pages at the end of chapters and numerous illustrations (some of which aren't entirely necessary). So the book is really only like 100 pages of actual text. What he writes is a combination of superficial coverage of commonly known facts (like the journeys of Marco Polo and Columbus), but he does have some deeper dives into more specific things, like the mythical inventor of the compass, and if he was a real person.
If you are looking for deep scholarship on the compass of history of exploration, this might not be the book for you. He clearly knows what he is talking about, but he goes through it very quick. Also, his citations are general list of works cited at the end, not footnotes or end notes.
Overall, though, I thought this book was good for what it is. It was a fast read and I learned some new things.
If you are looking for deep scholarship on the compass of history of exploration, this might not be the book for you. He clearly knows what he is talking about, but he goes through it very quick. Also, his citations are general list of works cited at the end, not footnotes or end notes.
Overall, though, I thought this book was good for what it is. It was a fast read and I learned some new things.
December 24, 2023
A brief, compact history of the lodestone arc and navigation before the compass. He starts the journey in Amalfi, Italy, where stands a statue honoring Flavio Gioia, a native son who supposedly invented the compass sometime between 1295 and 1302 to belie that fiction and discourse on the effective pre-compass navigation talents of sailors.
Before the compass, invented in China, was successfully introduced into Europe and the greater Mediterranean world, maritime navigation included dead reckoning, soundings for depth and soil, the then current star, and following migrating birds.
Before the compass, invented in China, was successfully introduced into Europe and the greater Mediterranean world, maritime navigation included dead reckoning, soundings for depth and soil, the then current star, and following migrating birds.
December 12, 2018
This was a very interesting little book. I had to drag out my atlas & research the Crusades & the Plaque as it mentioned places I was unfamiliar with & historical events I had a bit fuzzy about. But I find that fun. (I need to ask Santa for a new Atlas. Mine still shows the Soviet Union!)
Bottom lines, the compass was the 2nd greatest achievement after the wheel & if you don't believe me, read this book!'
Bottom lines, the compass was the 2nd greatest achievement after the wheel & if you don't believe me, read this book!'
July 30, 2020
Interesting a relatively quick read. I felt that it could have benefitted from a few more maps of the area in question, relative to the eras discussed, with all the cities referred to in the text (East and West). There was a bit of redundancy mid- or 3/4-through the text, where the author sort of circled back after the rise of Venice and spoke about events and society in the 7th century in more detail than had been covered in the prior chapters.
April 25, 2024
It is ok, I don’t know what the riddle was supposed to be. It explores the history of the discovery of the compass and its application to navigation. He also explores the history of Europe, Middle East and China - their discovery and application of the compass in each.
I was hoping for a dive into the earth’s magnetic field, its deviation, how it is generated and how it affects the compass and navigation.
Entertaining, worth a read.
I was hoping for a dive into the earth’s magnetic field, its deviation, how it is generated and how it affects the compass and navigation.
Entertaining, worth a read.
September 12, 2020
This is a fantastic armchair history book for a rainy day with a headache. It would also be great to hand to a middle or highschool student to jumpstart a study of the highlight reels of history of navigation during exploration years. I enjoyed it quite a bit, even if there wasn't any startling new information. The author's writing style is laid back and the book is definitely a quick read.
August 2, 2025
I had a great experience reading this book! all the information about the invention of the compass and the impact on the world was so fascinating. I do believe there was a lot of info that wasn't necessary but I enjoyed most of it none the less. I was definitely in the mood for this book and that helped
November 13, 2018
It's a cool premise, but was underwhelming. Doesn't go into some technical detail that would be helpful (how *is* the compass literally used at the most basic level?), Terms are often used well before they are defined or illustrated leading to some confusion.
February 6, 2019
Interesting, but not satisfying. The book is more about the history of exploration and the role of the compass. Complex questions of dominance and manipulation of encountered people’s and cultures are ignored and the riddle of the compass is never solved.
May 29, 2021
I’m a former Merchant Marine and Naval Officer so I found this book a fascinating read. Very interesting to read about how the use of the compass came about and was developed by the Chinese and Italians.
August 17, 2024
I was expecting much more from Aczel. The book has many repetitions and it is a bit boring. It has interesting information about the art of navigation over the centuries, something you will find reading good history books.
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