X-Nico

unusual facts about meridian arc



Khālid ibn ʿAbd al‐Malik al‐Marwarrūdhī

Together with ʿAlī ibn ʿĪsā al-Asṭurlābī in 827, he measured at 35 degrees north latitude, in the valley of the Tigris, the length of a meridian arc and thus the Earth's circumference, getting a result of 40,248 km (or, according to other sources, 41,436 km).

Kourou

In 1744, La Condamine, in charge of the expedition sent to Peru in 1735 to determine the length of a degree of the meridian arc in the neighbourhood of the equator, passed by and gave his name to one of the mountains behind Kourou.

Tornio

The most notable expedition (1736–1737) was led by a member of the Académie française, Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertuis, who came to take meridian arc measurements along the Torne River Valley which would show that the globe is flattened towards the poles.


see also