• A catalogue of medieval astronomical Instruments to CA. 1500
• http://web.uni-frankfurt.de/fb13/ign/instrument-catalogue.html A catalogue of medieval Islamic and European astronomical instruments is currently being prepared at the Institute for the History of Science at Frankfurt University. It is hoped that this catalogue will serve as a useful research tool by providing critical descriptions of all historically-significant instruments, arranged according to provenance and type. The total number of instruments included in the catalogue will be about 550 astrolabes (some 300 Islamic and 250 European) and 250 quadrants, sundials and other instruments.
• Adler planetarium
• http://www.adlerplanetarium.org/research/collections/websters/index.shtml Tis is a database of makers’ signatures from scientific instruments around the world, not limited to the Adler Collection. To search for information about artifacts that are in the Adler collection, the user has to click Search the Collection database.This database of instrument makers, or more precisely of their signatures, is a product of many years of research by Roderick and Marjorie Webster, longtime curators of the collection of scientific instruments at Chicago's Adler Planetarium & Astronomy Museum.
• Catalogo degli stumenti, fondazione Scienza e tecnica, Firenze.
• EPACT : Scientific instruments of Medieval and renaissance europe
• http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/epact/ Epact is an electronic catalogue of mediaval and renaissance scientifc instruments from four European museums : the Museum of the History of science, Oxford, the Instituto e Museo di storia della scienza, Florence, the British Museum, London, and the Museum Boerhaave, Leiden. Together, these museums house the finest collections of early scientific instruments in the world. Epact consists of 520 catalogue entriesand a variety of suppporting material. Alle European Instruments from the 4 museums by makers who were active before 1600 have been entered in the catalogue. They include astrolabes, armillary spheres, sundials, quadrants, nocturnals, conpendia, surveying instruments, etc. Exemples range from ordinary instruments for everyday use to more extravagant and often lavish pieces destined for the cabinets of princes. Each instrument in the catalogue is described with the aid of one or more photographs and two levels of text: an overview text providing a short account of the most notable features of the instrument and detailled text giving more technical and scholarly information.
• Historical Collections of scientific Instruments around the world
• http://www.uniurb.it/PhysLab/On-line4.htm To enter this site, the user click a map and a list of websites related to the continent is shown. The website is related to the Urbino.s website which holds a big collection of instruments .
• http://physics.unl.edu/outreach/histinstr/ The Historical Scientific Instrument Gallery website, hosted by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, displays images of and information about the collection that has been assembled from items used in teaching, demonstrating, and research by University staff from 1887 onward. The physical collection contains around seven hundred items from the last part of the nineteenth century and the first part of the twentieth, and a substantial sample of these appear on the website. The instruments are catalogued according to their field of use (optics, electrostatics, vacuum discharges, etc.). Brief descriptions are provided, alongside thumbnail photographs that can be clicked to view a larger image. Unfortunately, few original records remain detailing the provenance of the instruments, although the curator has recovered as much information as possible from old books and sale catalogues. This is a well-presented site that will be of interest to anyone studying the more recent history of scientific instruments or who requires images of such equipment.
• Instrument catalogue, Department of Astronomy, Bologne
• http://www.bo.astro.it/dip/Museum/english/index_5.html The Museo della Specola thus reflects the development and evolution of astronomical instruments over more than a century, from the beginning of the XVIIIth to well into the XIXth century. The history of these instruments can be followed in some detail through the many existing inventories and the annotations recorded in the observation registers of the Specola, as well as in the documents preserved in the Archives of the Department of Astronomy.
• Inventaire des Instruments scientifiques anciens dans les etablissemets francais
• http://www.inrp.fr/she/instruments/instruments.htm A INRP project consisting in making a systematic list of all ancient scientific material in schools, describing them, taking pictures. So far, they collected more than 1200 instruments. This project is part of the work of l'ASEISTE, Association de Sauvegarde et d'Étude des Instruments Scientifiques et Techniques de l'Enseignement.
• Kinematic Models for Design digital library
• http://kmoddl.library.cornell.edu/ KMODDL is a collection of mechanical models and related resources for teaching the principles of kinematics--the geometry of pure motion. The core of KMODDL is the Reuleaux Collection of Mechanisms and Machines, an important collection of 19th-century machine elements held by Cornell's Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. The site provides an interesting virtual tour.
• National Maritime Museum, collections Online/ greenwich
• http://www.nmm.ac.uk/collections/explore/index.cfm/catagory/telescopes The National Maritime Museum (NMM) holds a large and vl instruments. These range from astrolabes and armillary spheres to quadrants, nocturnals and sundials. Most of the collection dates within the last 200-300 years. Some of the instruments, such as the oldest astrolabes are up to 800 years old. Many of these objects are housed at the Royal Observatory Greenwich (ROG).
• Online Register Of Scientific Instruments / Oxford
• http://www.isin.org/ The Online Register of Scientific Instruments is an international database of historic scientific instruments and related objects available via the Internet. It is developed and supported by the Museum of the History of Science in Oxford in association with the Scientific Instrument Commission of the International Union of the History and Philosophy of Science.The primary purpose of the Online Register is to provide an efficient, centralised, widely available register of historic scientific instruments and related objects that exist in dispersed collections of all kinds from around the globe. It is analogous to a computerised library catalogue in that it holds only a limited amount of key information about each instrument: the information most commonly used to allow an instrument to be located. It does not contain any detailed information about an instrument's form, use, or history. It is a gateway only - a stepping-off point to more extensive information that will be held by institutions themselves, whether on-line or off-line.As in a computerised library catalogue, visitors to the Online Register can search through the key indexes of the register for certain keywords, phrases, or any other text pattern. In addition, visitors may browse through any of the available indexes alphabetically.
• Patrimoine de l'astronomie : le cercle des meridiens
• http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/revue-inv/insitu-ns/davoigneau/html/davoigneau.htmlAlthough it was first designed at the beginning of the eighteenth century, the meridian circle only really began to equip astronomical observatories around 1850. It rapidly became an essential instrument for positional astronomy and its intense use lasted for more than a century. A recent inventory of France's heritage of astronomical instruments and sites, carried out under the auspices of the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Research, offered the chance to study eleven of these instruments, along with the architectural and technical aspects of the buildings which house them.
• Scientific Instrument Commission
• http://www.sic.iuhps.org/refertxt/catalogs.htm This (Meta)website provides lists of the most important web addresses where it is possible to find online scientific instrument trade catalogues. Note: these address provide immediate access to the list of online catalogues at a particular institution and not access to the home pages of the institution which put them on the web.
• Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of American History, Physical Sciences Collection
• Instruments and Makers: Surveying and Geodesy: http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/surveying/ ies in America since the first European colonists settled here some 400 years ago and turned the American landscape into property. With these instruments, and others of their ilk, Americans determined the limits of private and public lands, the paths of transport, and the boundaries of colonies, states, and nation. This site currently features a selection of over 300 museum objects relating to surveying and geodesy. The user may access the collection in the following ways: By makers, to view objects grouped by maker and to see selected biographies - by instrument, to view objects grouped by type and to read generic descriptions - or view a complete index of the objects on the site. & Navigation : http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/navigation/ Historical navigation instruments illustrate the various ways that people have determined the location, direction, and speed of their ships at sea and in the air. Most of the instruments on this site were used by Americans engaged in commercial or military enterprises. They are housed in two bureaus of the Smithsonian Institution: the National Museum of American History and the National Air and Space Museum. The user may access the collection in the following ways: By makers, to view objects grouped by maker and to see selected biographies - by instrument, to view objects grouped by type and to read generic descriptions - or view a complete index of the objects on the site.
• The Astrolabe
• http://www.astrolabes.org/ An introduction to the astrolabe, this site provides a clear, detailed account of the astronomical instrument's history and the principles behind its operation, with several large colour photographs. There is a small collection of annotated links to other sites in the same field, and a good brief critical bibliography. The site is maintained by Janus, a commercial company producing replicas of historical astronomical instruments: their "personal astrolabe" is advertised for sale here, but the commercial content is limited and does not prejudice the remainder of the site. Also available, downloadable at no charge, is a computer simulation known as the "electric astrolabe".
• The Astrolabe : an online ressource
• http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/astrolabe/ The Museum of the History of Science houses the world's largest and most important collection of astrolabes. With ancient origins and a two thousand year history, the astrolabe illuminates astronomy, time-telling, astrology and religion across cultures, time and place. The Museum's collection ranges from India and the Middle East to Europe, with many unique and significant examples. This website provides three separate but interlinked sections: • Exhibition - an introduction based on the Museum's exhibition 'The Astrolabe, East and West'. • Guide - an online handbook introducing the history, form and function of the instrument. • Catalogue - a uniquely comprehensive account of all the astrolabes in the Museum collection: browsable, searchable and fully illustrated.