BRIDOL is the British Sundial Society's Register of Fixed and Mass Dials, which gives detail and photographs of about 8000 fixed sundials and 3000 mass dials in the UK.
Some of these are in private gardens, but the majority are publicly available.
The dial is to be found near the Orangery. The motto reads: ’Cada uno es hijo de sus obras’ (Each one is the son of his deeds). The elaborate pierced gnomon contains the initials ’IC’ of the first owner Mr J Conduit. (Conduit married Isaac Newton’s niece, Catherine Barton, in 1717, and the dial is sometimes known as the ’Newton Dial’, but it is most unlikely that he had any hand in its design or delineation.) The furniture includes a 16 point compass rose, an EoT (ring/table not recorded), 30 Cities (there is a list on file) marked against each hour, and a Coat of Arms. The dial shows 4am to 8pm, using XII and IIII, subdivided in 30,15,10,7.5, 5 and 1 min marks. The numerals are read from outside the chapter ring and there is a split noon line. A zigzag dotted transversal ’vernier’ scale allows reading to less than a minute. The dial is mounted on an ornate, bulbous pedestal (1220h) having eight protruding ’teeth’, all set on square plinth on a circular base. The gardens are open occasionally under the NGS.
Ref: Mrs Gatty (1900), p112.
Ref: Report r08614a for list of place names.
