Found a quote on the use of the ki-mal or ka-mal: Book> l'instrument de la marine, 1977, page 82, chapter: How to measure the star hight> "The Arabs sailing on the Indian Ocean used the kamal als a measurement instrument, it was a square with a hole in it where they could pull a cord with knots through it. They held the square in such a way that the sun was at the upperside of the kamal and the horizon at the underside of the kamal square. To make that possible you can change the distance from your face to the square or ki-mal. To measure that distance, they used the knot cord of which each knot counts for 10 degrees. From this instrument and the knot cord was the Jacobsstaf developed before the year 1342. The instrument was described in the book 'Traite de trigonometrie' from 1342."
Hope this info helps to recover the ancient knowledge of early navigation.🙏

Yes searching for it: there was one about the enormous fires in america that destroyed entire citys with very big houses. Build for giants. The origin of the weird fires were never explaned, somewhere around 1860? Looked like a warzone.