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 commemorates Admiral Arthur Phillip, commander of the First Fleet and founder of modern Australia. It is in a small sunken courtyard in the NE corner of the site (left of the main portico entrance). It stands on a carved pedestal like a quayside bollard about 500 high, which flows smoothly into circular plinth 2500 dia, stepped about 150 high, in Bath stone. Rope and ring and chain carving on the pedestal. Carving by local mason Nigel Fenwick. Carvings in Aboriginal style around the plinth edge.
Globe of the Earth about 250 dia. with land features, at centre of gnomon. External horizon band L- shaped section. Circles for equator, tropics, Arctic and Antarctic circles, meridian and prime vertical.
The gnomon is a rod, slightly longer than the diameter of the sphere, terminating in small solid spheres.
The internal globe is rotatable and tracks the historic route of the eleven ships of the First Fleet. At the top, there is a compass rose and a topograph indicating the distances (nm) to key points on the eight-month journey to found New South Wales in 1787. Engravings on the dial and base list Phillip’s achievements and memorable quotations.
Ref: BSS Bulletin 26(iii) 2014 p.48
