Search

Astronomy, Navigation. the arc of the horizon measured clockwise from the south point, in astronomy, or from the north point, in navigation, to the point where a vertical circle through a given heavenly body intersects the horizon.
Surveying, Gunnery. the angle of horizontal deviation, measured clockwise, of a bearing from a standard direction, as from north or south.
Contemporary Examples

Variables like weather, azimuth, elevation, crude launchers, and rocket viability quickly add up.
Dodging Rockets in Afghanistan as the Taliban’s Fighting Season Begins Nick Willard May 13, 2014

Historical Examples

Then the azimuth is represented unaltered, and any spherical distance z is represented by ρ.
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 17, Slice 6 Various

To find an azimuth of the sun: Note the time of taking the azimuth by chronometer.
Lectures in Navigation Ernest Gallaudet Draper

Bivalve apparatus; panels of 147 in azimuth and 122 vertical angle; mercury rotation.
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 16, Slice 6 Various

At the same time, get your true bearing of the sun from the azimuth Tables.
Lectures in Navigation Ernest Gallaudet Draper

The angle which this line makes with a line pointing due south is called the sun’s azimuth.
A Text-Book of Astronomy George C. Comstock

These were the chronometer and the azimuth compass of the Bounty.
The Lonely Island R.M. Ballantyne

Its operation was very much as if his mural quadrant could be swung round in azimuth.
Astronomy David Todd

Observations for azimuth were always taken to the sun before and after noon.
The Andes of Southern Peru Isaiah Bowman

What is the object of the travel-devices for range and azimuth correction on the gun-arm?
The Gunner’s Examiner Harold E. Cloke

noun
(astronomy, nautical) the angular distance usually measured clockwise from the north point of the horizon to the intersection with the horizon of the vertical circle passing through a celestial body Compare altitude (sense 3)
(surveying) the horizontal angle of a bearing clockwise from a standard direction, such as north
n.

“distance of a star from the north or south point of the meridian,” late 14c., from Old French azimut, from Arabic as-sumut “the ways,” plural of as-samt “the way, direction” (see zenith).
azimuth
(āz’ə-məth)
The position of a celestial object along an observer’s horizon. Azimuth is a horizontal angle measured clockwise in degrees from a reference direction, usually the north or south point of the horizon, to the point on the horizon intersected by the object’s line of altitude (a line from the observer’s zenith through the object to the horizon). If north is the reference point (0°), then east has an azimuth of 90°, south is 180°, and so forth through 360°. See more at altazimuth coordinate system.