ABC Wednesday—A is for "astrolabe"

There's documentation (in Cairo) that proves this brass
astrolabe was made by a 13th-century Yemeni prince.
Don't know how its last owner got his hands on
it, but his bequest left it to the Met in 1891.

[To see more ABC posts, go here.  I've been at it
every Wednesday since this post in 2009,
and still think it's one of the best memes ever!]