ABSTRACT
Comparativism enables differences and similarities to emerge in outline from historical social responses to the object. These outlines generate meaning that can shed further light on the understanding of each object beyond the function of comparativism. This chapter explores how comparativism works and considers how such a practice, with its social or anthropological roots, can be beneficial for the study of material objects. Historians of science and scientific instruments have debated the functionality of the astrolabe. The Regensburg astrolabe may have had the engraved lines that would have allowed it to imitate an astrolabe and may have stood as some form of horologium. In examining the early reception of the astrolabe in western Europe, Arianna Borrelli has recently noted that in many instances discourse on the translation of technology has been misidentified by scholars as related to the astrolabe rather than to the medieval sundial.
