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 gun barrel and the 86mm diameter burning glass are missing from this ’Noon Cannon’ dial, but the marble base and the brass supporting framework for the lens remain. The base is inscribed across the centre ’VICTOR CHEVALIER, INGr BREVte QUAI DE L’HOROLOGE 77A PARIS’. In the southern half are the hour numerals VII - XII - IV - V, with a noon gap and divided to half and quarter hours. The small gnomon is a solid plate with a fimbriated northern edge, and its angle is 48° (Paris is 48° 50’). The cannon was in the northern half of the dial plate, where the adjustable lens mount is still in place. The east side of the mount is marked JANVIER to JUIN, the west JUILLET to D[ECEMBRE].
The dial is not on public display; view by arrangement with the Curator.
The drawing is by Hogg (see ref) from 1893 or earlier.
The second photo is of another noon cannon dial by the same maker, for comparison.
Ref: ’The Book of Old Sundials and their Mottoes’, H Warrington Hogg, T N Foulis, 1914.
1893
2022
Maidstone Museum, St Faith’s Street, Maidstone, ME14 1LH, Kent
