So it became reasonable to admit that the Earth could be quite different in shape. In the extreme, it could be shaped like an American football, with meridians that are circular except near the poles (Columbus may well have thought so when he reached “India” three times faster than could be expected). In another extreme, Earth could be toroidal, shaped like an American donut – arguably as perfectly composed of circular shapes as a sphere.

Four observatories over an area no larger than Bornholm, forming a known pattern together with a point such as the one on Christiansoe, would make it possible without the use of telescopes to test the hypothesis that Earth is approximately spherical. A way to do this, here called the Bornholm Method, is described below.

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