Riddle of the Compass, Amir D. Aczel
Riddle of the Compass, Amir D. Aczel
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Riddle of the Compass

Author: Amir D. Aczel

Narrator: Henry Leyva

Abridged: 3 hr 19 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/02/2001

Synopsis

The story of the compass is shrouded in mystery and myth, yet most will agree it begins around the time of the birth of Christ in ancient China. A mysterious lodestone whose powers affected metal was known to the Chinese emperor. When this piece of metal was suspended in water, it always pointed north. This unexplainable occurrence led to the stone's use in feng shui, the Chinese art of finding the right location. However, it was the Italians, more than a thousand years later, who discovered the ultimate destiny of the lodestone and unleashed its formidable powers. In Amalfi sometime in the twelfth century, the compass was born, crowning the Italians as the new rulers of the seas and heralding the onset of the modern world. Retracing the roots of the compass and sharing the fascinating story of navigation through the ages, The Riddle of the Compass is Aczel at his most entertaining and insightful.

About The Author

Amir D. Aczel is the author of many research articles on mathematics, two textbooks, and nine nonfiction books, including the international bestseller Fermat's Last Theorem, which was nominated for a Los Angeles Times Book Award. Aczel has appeared on over thirty television programs, including nationwide appearances on CNN, CNBC, and Nightline, and on over a hundred radio programs, including NPR's Weekend Edition and Morning Edition. Aczel is a Fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Dwight on November 05, 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 coincidenc......more

Goodreads review by Phrodrick slowed his growing backlog on 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: T......more

Goodreads review by Rob on 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......more

Goodreads review by Chris on 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......more

Goodreads review by Mark on May 18, 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 "invente......more

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