File talk:Het gebruik van het astrolabium door Amerigo Vespucci, Jan Collaert II, Museum Plantin-Moretus, PK.OPB.0186.018.jpg
What in the world is this an image of? edit
It's labeled "astrolabium" which is the name of: a book, and a clock, and later a wristwatch.
This has been conflated with "astrolabe" on Wikipedia.
The image absolutely does not depict an astrolabe, nor any planer astronomical tool.
There is an armillary sphere on the table, you can see Earth inside it. There is a 2nd sphere in his hand (sans Earth), but he's holding it like it's an astrolabe, but it doesn't matter because he is looking over the top of it rendering it irrelevant what he's holding. Might as well be a stein of beer for all the navigational/astronomical use it is to look over the top of it.
Spherical astrolabes did exist, so this could be one... except they all seemed to use a large solid sphere. That is clearly not what is depicted here. The spheres shown are not solid and one can see through them, so this does not appear to be a spherical astrolabe.
I think it was a confused artist drawing the wrong tool held the wrong way with the wrong name. Skintigh (talk) 05:07, 31 August 2023 (UTC)
