A kamal is a celestial navigation device that determines latitude. The invention of the kamal allowed for the earliest known latitude sailing, and was thus the earliest step towards the use of quantitative methods in navigation. The kamal originated from Arab navigators of the in the late 9th century, and employed in the Indian Ocean from the 10th century. It was then adopted by Indian navigators soon after, and then adopted by Chinese navigators some time before the 16th century. The kamal cons… (More on Kamal)