ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Torquetum

Imagine you want to find out where a star is in the sky. A tool called a torquetum can help you do that.

It looks like a complicated toy with many parts, but it's really an instrument that was used a long time ago to figure out the positions of stars and planets before we had telescopes.

The torquetum has circles that spin around each other and point to different parts of the sky. It also has a pointed stick that moves around the circles to tell you what angle the star or planet is at.

So, if you wanted to know where a star was in the sky, you would use the torquetum to help you. You would move the circles to get to the right spot and then use the stick to point to the star.

Overall, the torquetum is a really cool tool that helps people study the stars and planets, and figure out where they are in the sky.