We explain what the cardinal points are and what these four directions can be used for. Also, its different meanings.
What are the cardinal points?
It is called cardinal points to the four senses or addresses which, in a Cartesian frame of reference, allow spatial orientation in a Map or in any region of the land surface.
The cardinal points are East (E), West (W), North (N) and South (S). This is understood as the region approximate of planet for which the Sun every day; to the West the opposite point, where the Sun hides every day; to the north the upper part of the axis of planet earth and to the south the lower part of the same axis on which it rotates.
This results in two axes: East-West and North-South, among which there are also intermediate points: Northwest (NW), Northeast (NE), Southwest (SW) and Southeast (SE), known as secondary cardinal points. From this geometric operation is derived the "Rose of the Winds", used together with a compass for navigation since ancient times.
The names of the four points are of Germanic origin: Nordri (North), Sudri (South), Austri (East) and Vestri (West), from Germanic mythology. These terms became universal and incorporated into other languages relatively recently, as they were previously called in Spanish: Septentrión or Boreal (North), Meridión or Austral (South), Oriente, Levante or Naciente (East) and Occidente or Poniente (West) .
For its part, the term cardinal points comes from the Latin termcardus, which was the name that the Romans gave to the orientation axes, generally North-South, with which they built their military camps and their cities. Hence the expression of being "cardinal" when it comes to something central or very important.
In the different Western traditions, the four cardinal points were incorporated into certain imaginations and conceptions of the nature, who associated them with the four elements (water, earth, fire and wind), the four seasons (summer, spring, autumn, winter), the four humors (blood, yellow bile, black bile and phlegm), etc.