Maghrebian astrolabe, circa 17th century

Maghrebian astrolabe, circa 17th century
Hammered and engraved brass planispheric astrolabe, comprising a mother, a spider, four eardrums including a later one, an alidade, a nail and a key called a horse. The spider is fitted with four large silver nails (mudir) to facilitate the rotation of the spider, and twenty-four smaller silver nails. It is engraved with inscriptions in Maghribi kufic script. It is unsigned and undated.

The mother is decorated with a scalloped throne (kursi), surmounted by a belly through which a ring passes. The limb is divided into 360°, divided in 10° intervals, subdivided for every 1°, with the graduations in abjad.
The inside of the mother is engraved with rays indicating the place of many cities, including : Marrakech, Tangier, Meknes, Fes, Sijilmassa, Malaga, Tlemcen, Granada, Oran, Bijaia, Kairouan, Tunis, al-Mahdia, Tripoli, Alexandria, Cairo, Damascus, Jerusalem, Mecca, Yatrib (Medina), Askalon, Samarkand, Gurgan, al-Hind (India), al-Sind (Pakistan).
The reverse side of the mother is engraved in the upper left quarter with a diagram of unequal hours, and the square of shadows in the lower part.

The spider bears the names and positions of 22 stars, 12 inside the ecliptic and 10 outside, indicated by curved or hook-shaped indexes and a small silver nail. The engraving is possibly by a different hand from that of the eardrums. The signs of the zodiac are inscribed on the line of the ecliptic and four silver nails (mudir) are fixed on the spider.

The eardrums indicate the position of cities. They are established for:
Tympanum 1: Mecca 21°40 and Medina 24°
Tympanum 2: Fez 33° and Marrakesh 31°30
Tympanum 3: Cairo (Misr) 30° and li-jami' al-'urud (for all latitudes)
Tympanum 4 bears an inscription on one side, the other being plain :
li-zawiyat wazzan 'ammaraha allah لزاوية وزان عمرها الله
"For the Sufi Shrine (zawiya) of Ouezzane, may God preserve it"

Condition: the belly is detached from the throne and reattached with a screw; it looks original; the nail and the horse are not original; small accidents on the spider.

North Africa, probably Morocco, around 17th century.
Height with belly: 15.5 cm; Height of throne: 13.5 cm; Diameter: 11.8 cm

The manufacture of astrolabes in the Maghreb continued for several centuries according to the same model. It is therefore difficult to give a precise date for this instrument, which probably dates from the 17th century, but may also be later.

The fourth tympanum of this astrolabe bears a dedication to the zawiya (zawiya) of Ouezzane. This tympanum looks different from the other three, both in the colour of the metal and in the inscription. It seems to be later than the others and was added to the astrolabe at a later date, when the instrument was offered to the religious centre of Ouezzane.
The city of Ouezzane (or Ouazzane), in the Western Rif in northwest Morocco, is known as the city 'of the forty-four saints'. In the 17th century, it was home to Moulay Abdallah Cherif (1596-1678), a great master of Sufism and a descendant of Idriss I, coming from one of Morocco's most prestigious lineages, the Idrissides. In 1649, he created in this city a religious and scholarly center (zaouïa), cradle of the religious brotherhood Ouazzania of the Taibia. This zawiya became an important political and spiritual centre during the 18th and 19th centuries, and many pilgrims come every year to visit its sanctuary.
The list of cities inside the mother city mentions many cities, including two in southern Spain: Malaga and Granada, and two very eastern regions such as India and Sindh. Automatically translated by DeepL. To see the original version, click here.