Why did the sundial make the transition from stone to metal?
That’s a little bit buried in obscurity. In the time of Tutmoses the Third, which is when the first stone sundial was discovered, metal wasn’t a very common thing, and it wasn’t until the age of bronze that metal things began to be made – both mechanical things for geared mechanisms. The oldest geared calendar and sundial came from a tomb which was ransacked outside of Alexandria in northern Egypt and that was about 597 AD. And to my knowledge that’s the first metal sundial that was ever made. However the gnomons of stone sundials were often made of metal. The gnomonis the path of the sundial which casts the shadow and indicates the time by the movement of the shadow throughout the day and throughout the year. So that’s why I’m a gnomonist. I imagine that one of the problems with using metal for the dial is that over time – since this has to be in the open air – the metals would be affected by the elements, which would make it hard to read. Has this been a problem through history with
