Azimuth Bearings

Sometimes if you are doing map work you might find yourself expressing a direction using an "azimuth" bearing. That just means you are drawing an imaginary circle around your site, with 0 degrees at straight N, 90o straight East, South at 180 degrees, and West at 270 degrees. So if you wanted to describe something straight south of your site, you would refer to it as being 270 degrees from your site. Why wouldn´t you just say "south"? That works well in some cases, but not all. Suppose I am trying to describe a site ten miles from me, on a bearing of 116 degrees - that would be hard to define in words, but using an azimuth bearing, anyone with a map and a protractor could find the spot.