In the 17th and 18th centuries, instrument makers in European cities made many types of portable sundials suitable for use by individuals at different latitudes. To aid the traveler, many sundials came with a gazetteer listing cities and their latitudes where the user might find himself – typically cities in the region where the dial was made or popular destinations throughout Europe. The gazetteers were pasted inside the lid of the sundial case, included as a broadsheet, or most frequently, engraved right on the surfaces of the sundial.

Rare among these portable dials are examples designed for use in colonial possessions and territories inhabited by the indigenous peoples in North and South America. This paper will closely examine some surviving pocket sundials with remarkable gazetteers listing remote forts, Native American tribal lands, pirates’ lairs, and more.

Analysis of the material culture will shed light on the makers of the sundials, the people who used them, the range they covered, and the transmission of cartographic and ethnographic knowledge.