Thanks to Dava Sobel’s Longitude, the story of the British search for the longitude has been focused around the conflict between John Harrison the clockmaker and the lunar distance method espoused by Nevil Maskelyne. What little literature has discussed other actors and proposals in this process has, likewise, focused on the British context and British interactions.

Yet, on reading the many pamphlets which were instigated by the 1714 British Longitude Act, it becomes clear what a variety of schemes were proposed, and how aware ‘longitudinarians’ were of each other’s disparate ideas. Pamphleteers actively considered and criticised other proposals, either ridiculing or building on the ideas therein, and questioning the motives behind their contribution. This took place not only within the London community, but countrywide, across the channel, and across Europe. ‘Longitudinarians’ were aware that many countries sought a solution and offered prizes, and that many people were seeking to win them.

This talk considers these interactions from two angles. Firstly, it considers the proposals that came from abroad and were discussed by other contributors, how these interacted with the British context, and what they added. Secondly, it considers the process of information dissemination that made the British longitude prize internationally famous and, more crucially, of mis-information: what got distorted in transit, and therefore how the British longitude prize was seen by its international contributors.