Humfrey Cole Revisited

Abstract England’s first native scientific instrument maker, Humfrey Cole (c. 1530–1591), is well-known to historians thanks to a collection of twenty-six instruments and a map of Palestine that survive today in public and private ownership. Two recently studied instruments have enhanced our knowledge of Cole’s work: i) an horary quadrant, signed and dated 1573, now in the collections of the British Museum, and ii) an astronomical compendium, signed and dated 1590, held in a private collection. The unusual design of the horary quadrant demonstrates Cole’s versatile approach in adapting his products for specific customers, while certain features on the astronomical compendium, possibly the last piece ever made by Cole, suggest that he was aware of his final days and passed on his work to a younger maker, James Kynvyn (c. 1550–1615), hinting at a possible collaborative working relationship between these two generations of instrument makers in Elizabethan London.