The Noon gun is an historic symbol of keeping time in South Africa since 1806, situated on Signal Hill, close to the centre of Cape Town.

History

In 1795 Britain took Cape Colony from the Dutch East India Company, also known as Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie (VOC) as a tactic in the Napoleonic Wars. The two Dutch guns were removed from Imoff Battery at the Castle and placed in town as signal guns. The castle got the latest English 18 pounders.

The signal would have been to announce to the interior the arrival of an important ship, perhaps requiring provisions for a trip onward to India.

VOC transferred its territories and claims to the Batavian Republic in 1798 and ceased to exist in 1799. The British handed Cape Colony back to the Batavian Republic in 1803. In 1806, the Cape was occupied again by the British in the Battle of Blauberg, as a strategy against Napoleon.

Time signalling

A time signal has been fired by one of these guns since 1806, in addition to signalling duties. Its primary purpose was to allow ships at sea or in port to check the accuracy of their chronometers, a necessary instrument for the accurate calculation of Longitude. They would do this from the smoke, for accuracy, rather than the sound of the cannon.

Since the advent of the galvanic telegraph it became possible to trigger a gun remotely and since 1864 the noon gun has been accurately fired from the master clock of the oldest timekeeper in the country, the South African Astronomical Observatory as it is still being fired today.

Due to noise, the guns were moved from town to Signal Hill. The first signal fired from here was on the 4 August 1902.

The same guns are still in use today as Cape Town's oldest living tradition and are the oldest guns in daily use in the world.

On January 7, 2005, both the main and backup gun failed to fire [1] due to a technical difficulty.

Other guns

Other guns used for signalling time can found in Hong Kong (fired at one o'clock, because the astronomer was watching for the transit at 12), in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and in Edinburgh (the One O'Clock Gun ) and in Rome, where a gun called Michelle is fired from the Janiculum hill.

External link

• Picture of Noon Gun being fired