Today: Astronomy in Old Architecture

! Archaeoastronomy (sometimes with fewer vowels, or astro-archaeology)! ! Align structures (or markings) with Solar motions, Moon, stars! ! Highly debated eld!!
! Tensions between archaeologists and astronomers, need for conjecture (unknown true uses for sites, require assumptions and applications, etc.)!

! Found around the globe; well limit to UK/ Ireland and USA!

Why it makes sense

! Ancient cultures did use the sky as a calendar!
! Critical for agriculture!

! Natural to assume theyd build in the calendar function to their surroundings and structures!

Sun Alignments

APOD image by Ayiomamitis!

! Idea of landscape as a sort of simple calendar!

! Choose a location, see where Sun rises/ sets along landscape over course of year!

Father Of Archeoastronomy?
! J. Norman Lockyer (1836-1920)! ! Astronomer (mostly Solar), co-discoverer of Helium!
! Found via spectroscopy during eclipse (say, what causes an eclipse?)!

! Founder and rst editor of Nature (interdisciplinary science journal)!

Lockyer and Archeoastronomy

! Wrote The Dawn of Astronomy: A Study of the Temple-Worship and Mythology of the Ancient Egyptians (1894)! ! Applied assumptions and astronomical principles to archaeology questions!
! Assumption: ancient temples and structures were aligned in relation to stars and Sun!
! Need to understand those cultures understanding of the heavens! ! Not just Sun! Stars/clusters like Sirius, Pleiades! ! Recall importance of heliacal rise of Sirius to ooding of Nile!

! Application: date those structures off those assumptions via knowledge of precession and nutation!

The Dawn of Astronomy

! The premise wasnt new. Previous scholars had noted alignments:!
! Stonehenge and summer solstice! ! Gothic church windows (eastern windows face sunrise on festival date of patron saint)! ! Greek temples aligned in same direction!

! Book developed case for Egyptian pyramids, dating of reigns of various kings!
! Examples: Alignment of Temple of Karnak with obelisks and Sun (sunset of summer solstice), alignment of Great Temple with Sirius!

Temple of Karnak
Mostly open air complex of temples! and monuments. Built over many ! years, divided into precincts. The! larger portion is the precinct of ! Amun-Re (the Sun version of the ! god Amun).!

Above: wikipedia commons! Right: silkroadandbeyond! (UK tour company)!

Lockyer Techniques: Precession

! While gross alignments were previously noted, Lockyers application of the astronomical principles was quite clever.! ! Precession is the wobble of the orientation of the Earths spin axis!
! Direction to which the pole points draws a circle with a ~26,000 year period! ! Ages in astrology (vernal equinox begins when Sun is in a Zodiacal sign; current Pisces, future Aquarius)!

Precession
Earth wobbles like a top since it isnt ! a perfect sphere and gravitational force! of Sun tries to straighten its axis ! (make it vertical relative to plane of! orbit).!

Positions of stars shift; the star! nearest the rotation axis ! changes over the 26000 year! cycle. Also means the rising! positions of stars change slowly! over time.!

Lockyer Techniques: Nutation

! The 23.5o tilt of the Earths axis relative to its orbital plane varies slightly, going from between around 22o to over 24o with a 42,000 year period!
! Roughly 0.02o per century! ! Lockyer used this to date Stonehenge!

Stonehenge and Solstice

! Sunrise at summer solstice aligns with central structures and Heel Stone!

Image from Dr. Christopher! Witcombe of Sweet Briar! College!

Lockyer and Stonehenge

! 1901 paper in Nature uses alignment of Sun at summer solstice, through central horseshoe and Heel Stone. Suggests center was constructed around 1680 BC!
! Flaws to method, but not far off! ! Earths axial tilt would have changed by ~0.8o to align! Off Witcombe website!

Lockyers Stongehenge
! Despite being an astronomer, he didnt view it as an astronomical observatory so much as a ritual calendar!

Photo from Wikipedia!

Stonehenge
! Located in southern England!
! County of Wiltshire! ! Star marks location within Wiltshire! ! Near River Avon! ! 51o N latitude!

! Rings of stones, also lesser known mounds, ditches, and holes! ! henge meant either hinge or hang (inverted U was gallows shape)!
! Later became term for outer ditch/wall!

And the children of Stonehenge danced

Aubrey! Holes (56)! Trilithons!

Sarsen! Stones! Slaughter! Stone! Station ! Stones (4)! Avenue! Heel! Stone!

Stonehenge Layout
From Castledon! (The Making of! Stonehenge)! Off Witcombe! website! Note various! rings of ! structure, that! seem to corre-! spond to period! of construction! (Atkinson, 1940s! and 1950s)!

Phase I
! Outer ring is ditch, bank, holes!
! About 3000 BC (ditch contains bones and deer antlers, carbon dated)! ! Ring broken in direction of Solstice, smaller breaks elsewhere! ! 56 equally-spaced holes discovered(?) by John Aubrey in 1666, hence called the Aubrey Holes! ! Outer ditch is ~320 diameter, Holes are in ring ~285 diameter!

Astro Tangent: Carbon Dating

! C14 is an unstable isotope that has a half life of about 5700 years! ! It is present on Earth because cosmic rays make neutrons that convert N14 to C14!

From HowStuffWorks!

Carbon Dating
! C14 in atmosphere reaches an equilibrium (new is produced at rate old is lost to decay/uptake)! ! Winds up in CO2 that enters organic material through photosynthesis and consumption of plants!
! Living organisms have roughly same ratio of C14 to C12! ! Once they die, get no new C14 and ratio of C14 to C12 declines! ! Use half life to determine age!

Carbon Dating Issues

! Big assumption is that C14/C12 is constant over long periods!
! Ratio is about 1 to 1 trillion!!
! Dating only works to about 60,000 years!

! Possible issues:!
! Fossil fuel usage! ! Atomic bomb testing! ! Variations in Earths magnetic eld? In cosmic ray rate?!

Back to Stonehenge: Why 56 Aubrey Holes?

! Gerald Hawkins 1963 Nature paper, later book: Astronomical calendar!
! Used computer, locations of all points, alignments with celestial objects! ! Move 2 holes a day to track Lunar cycle! ! Move 3 holes per year to track eclipses (~18.6 period of standstills and solar eclipses)!

! Similar purposes for Station Stones! ! Not universally accepted; many of the holes have been found to hold cremation burial remains!

Hawkins Layout

Witcombe site, from 1983 book by Krupp !

Standstills and the Moon

! Lunar orbit inclined by 5o relative to plane that includes Earth and Sun!
! Eclipses only when all three align! ! Angle of moon can vary by up to 23.5 + 5 = 28.5 to either side of Sun, so 57o over the course of a month! This maximum variation is a Major Standstill, and happens about once every 18.6 years. Minor standstill is 23.5 - 5 = 18.5, so 37o over a month.! ! Last major: 2006!

Graphic for Standstills

23.5o!

SUN!

5 o!

New Moon!

Summer! (for us)!

Full Moon!

For this picture, New Moon is high in the sky (90o 40o + 23.5o = ! 73.5o), Full Moon is low in the sky (90o 40o 23.5o = 26.5o). ! Variation is 47o in two weeks. Relative tilt of Moons plane (5o) can! add or subtract to this; major standstill is 57o, minor is 37o.!

Hawkins and Thom

! Similar to Hawkins, engineering professor Alexander Thom studied Stonehenge and other circles!
! Suggested circles were prehistoric calendars, year divided by 8 (four seasons, and midseason points)! ! wisdom of the ancients notions seized by pseudoscience!
! Warning: You will nd pseudoscience in some supposed archeoastronomy research! ! This is a restatement of archeoastronomy being contentious; subjective application of real astronomy!

Stonehenge - Phase II
! From ~3000 BC to 2500 BC!
! Post holes in center and some outer regions, presumably for wooden structures (timber)!
! Smaller than Aubrey Holes, not terribly obvious but found from archaeological work!

! Note dating of this phase in part from the cremation burial remains in Aubrey Holes (and also in the ditch)!

Phase III
! From ~2500 BC to ~1600 BC! ! Usually divided into multiple separate portions, general theme is construction of central stone portion of monument (the part everyone thinks of as Stonehenge)!

Phase III
! Bluestones added (about 80 of them)!
! igneous rock! ! Smaller than later stones (a few tons each)! ! Possibly from as much as 245 miles away!
! Brought by raft on sea? Glaciers? Raw manpower?!

Phase III: Sarsen Stones

Sandstone,! about 4m high,! in ring of about! 108 diameter.! 30 stones, of! which 17 still! stand.! Capped by stone! with tongue &! groove tting.! Probably from ! about 20 miles! away, each about! 25 tons! (Witcombe)!

Phase III: Trilithons

Biggest stones - 50! tons! Standard two! upright stones with a! crosspiece.! Five sets in a horse-! shoe; three still stand.! Opens toward the! summer solstice.!

(Witcombe)!

Phase III
! Heel Stone (right) probably early in Phase III, but might have been at any time!
! Name from legend (devil, Arthur), or from helios, or heel as in leans?!

! Slaughter Stone similar (probably a portal stone that fell over)! ! Bluestones rearranged at various times!
(Witcombe)!

Was it a cemetery?
! Stonehenge Riverside Project (research group) identication of Bluestonehenge!
! On Avon, Avenue connects to Stonehenge! ! Ceremonial route for dead (Durrington Walls)!

! No stones remain; found excavated pits consistent with bluestones at Stonehenge!

Credit: Peter Dunn!

Even More Recent Finds

! Found summer 2010! ! Ground penetrating radar of area! ! Very near Stonehenge (about half a mile)! ! Earth circle of similar size, two openings in same orientation as Stonehenge! ! Contemporary to Stonehenge phase I, 24 interior holes!

! No stones found, supposition is that holes were for timber posts! ! Stonehenge not isolated!!

Stonehenge Summary
! Who built it, and for what purpose?!
! Druids? Rituals, symbolic of Earth mother! ! Early astronomers?! ! Cemetery?!

! Same questions not just for Stonehenge, but for megalithic structures in general!
! There are lots of them!!

Similar Sites Near Stonehenge: Avebury

! Multi-pointed star North of Stonehenge on map (about 20 miles distant)! ! Huge! Same ditch and bank outer region as Stonehenge, but ~1400 diameter!

Avebury Images

Top: Witcombe! Bottom: Wikipedia!

Avebury
! Stone circle (each about as big as Trilithons in Stonehenge) just interior to ditch/bank! ! Two smaller stone circles contained within! ! Slightly older than Stonehenge? ! ! Village of Avebury right on it; some stones cannibalized!

Other Nearby Sites: Woodhenge

! A few miles northeast of Stonehenge! ! Discovered from aerial photos in 1920s! ! Similar to initial Bluestone layout of Stonehenge, but timbers instead of stones! ! Remains of presumably sacriced child found at center!
! Suggests Stonehenge was also ritual?!

Other Nearby Sites: Barrows

! Wayland Smithy, West Kennet Long Barrow, Silbury Hill, etc.!
! Burial mounds and structures, although often aligned to some preferred axis! ! Part of argument against Stonehenge as an observatory; prevalence of ceremonial burial sites throughout the region! ! Especially a bit further away in Ireland!

Ireland: Knowth
! Passage tomb, c3200 BC (large burial mound with long passages leading to burial chambers)!
! E-W alignment, although cant easily tell signicance (entrances lled in, mound later used for other purposes)! ! Two chambers and hallways; they dont connect!

! Chambers contain stone urns with cremated remains!

Knowth
! Also satellite mounds! ! Kerbstones! ! Largest source of neolithic/megalithic art in Europe (about a third of all examples from here)! ! Sundial stone at right!

Astronomical?
! Claim that kerbstones show advanced astronomical knowledge! ! Supposed calendar at right (29 things that might be moons, 31 wavy lines; synodic period of moon, reconcile cycles with solar year? Martin Brennan)!

Ireland: Newgrange

! Passage Tomb, c3200 BC! ! Winter Solstice sunrise illuminates inner tomb through roof box over doorway!
! Best of Solar alignments among the burial tombs!

! Also standing stones in front! ! Quartz rock faade has been restored (might have been a plaza instead of faade)!

Newgrange

Newgrange: Interior
Passage ! rises so center! chamber is! aligned with! roof box.!

Ireland: Tara

! Like Newgrange, but aligns with cross quarter they called Samhain (midway between Autumnal Equinox and Winter Solstice)!

Ireland: Loughcrew
! Cairn T at Loughcrew has alignment with equinoxes! ! At equinox, morning sunlight enters entrance and illuminates carvings on back wall (right)!

Ireland: Others
! Dowth: similar to Knowth, less well preserved/excavated!
! Possible setting winter solstice sun illuminates chamber (image below)!

! Fourknocks!

In the US Southwest
! Anasazi (Navajo word for the ancient ones or ancient enemies)!
! Name not favored by current Pueblo people!

! Main society around Chaco Canyon, ~900 AD to ~1300 AD!

! Rapidly abandoned drought? war (raiding Navajo, Apache)? religious change?! ! Other dwellings: Canyon de Chelly, Mesa Verde, Hovenweep!

Chaco Canyon
! Anasazi transition from hunter/gatherers to agrarian, society in cliff dwellings (high altitudes) with cultivated elds in valleys!
! Water availability important (snow melt, rivers)! ! Climate could be challenging (temperatures from -10 to 100 F)! ! Domesticated turkeys!

! For planting/harvesting (and intertwined religious observances), need astronomical calendars!

Pueblo Bonito
! Largest community, over 600 rooms, including some with multiple stories, occupied by ~1000 people! ! Many rooms for food storage! ! Rooms did have roofs, often accessible via climbing ropes (brought in hundreds of thousands of trees!)! ! Passive solar: well aligned facing South! ! Some wall corners appear aligned to Lunar standstills!

Image from sacredsites.com!

Chaco Community
! Many other smaller pueblos around Bonito! ! Very straight roads/ lines run from Bonito for tens of miles!
! Often cardinal directions! ! How made?! ! Some to other pueblos, others more obscure!
! Varied explanations for usage; standard roads, roads for spiritual journeys, etc.!

Inside Pueblo Bonito!

Chaco Astronomical Sites: Kivas

! Kivas were circular structures up to 60 diameter! ! Dug into ground about 15, stone walled! ! Oriented along cardinal directions!
! But couldnt use a pole star!!

! Historical, religious signicance to people!

Great Kiva at Casa Rinconada! Recommended site:! www.traditionsofthesun.org!

The Kiva as Observatory

Sunlight passes! through windows,! enters marked ! positions on walls! (would post block?)! Also 28-29 niches! in walls lunar! cycle?!

Chaco Astronomical Sites: Sun Dagger

! On Fajada Butte in Chaco Canyon! ! Petroglyphs on rock face, were found to be a solar clock!
! 1977 by Anna Sofaer (artist)!
Sun Dagger photos from! www.solsticeproject.org (Sofaers site)!

Sun Dagger
! Three slabs of rock against almost vertical rock face!
! Rock face has the petroglyphs, a pair of spirals!

Sun Dagger
! Discovery at Summer Solstice, where it was noticed that a sliver of sunlight fell right through the middle of the large spiral! ! Winter Solstice, two slivers bracket spiral (at right)! ! Equinoxes have a single sliver cut through middle of smaller spiral to side!

Sun Dagger
! Sad outcome: so many visitors to site, path eroded and slab slipped in 1989 the dagger no longer works!
! Hence digital pictures hard to nd!!

! Some suggestion that large spiral can also be used to follow lunar 18.6 year period!
! 19 grooves to spiral! ! Shadow of Moon at standstills apparently marked!

! www.exploratorium.edu/chaco/HTML/ fajada.html!
! Nice java applet demonstrating sun dagger!

Chaco: SN1054 Petroglyph

Peasco Blanco ! site! Crescent Moon! Supernova! (Hand is for orient-! tation, also shows! site is sacred)! (On outcropping;! petroglyph is over-! head)! Comet Halley? (1066)! (Photo: Ron Lussier)!

SN1054 Background
! Now known as Crab supernova remnant (and central pulsar)!
! In constellation of Taurus!

! Written record of it from early Chinese astronomers! ! When it appeared, it was visible during daytime for about 23 days!
! About 6x brighter than Venus! ! Seen in night sky for a couple years!

SN1054 Theory
! Can work backwards to recorded date of SN1054 (July 4/5, 1054)!
! Lunar phase is crescent, as in petroglyph! ! Location of crescent moon on that date very near location of SN! ! Hand gives sky orientation, looking up at petroglyph! ! But Crescent Moon & Morning star a popular theme in Pueblo art! ! Comet Halley would have appeared in 1066; this part of story is likely more conjecture!

SN1054 Today
From Hubble Space! telescope! Colors mapped from lters! used to observe. Detect! line emission:! Blue: neutral oxygen [OI]! Green: ionized Sulfur [SII]! Red: doubly ionized! oxygen [OIII]!

SN1054 Today

VLA Radio Image! (NRAO/AUI and M. Bietenholz)!

Chandra X-ray Image! (smaller region)!

Non-Chaco: Hovenweep
! Built around 1275 AD (Southeastern Utah)! ! Similar examples of sun daggers and observation rooms! ! Hovenweep Castle has bottom room (the sun room) that may have been used for solar calendar (sunlight through small holes in walls)!

Castle at Hovenweep

Other Non-Chaco Sites

Left: Canyon De Chelly! Bottom: Mesa Verde!

Non-Chaco: Chimney Rock

Gap in Chimney Rock may align with Lunar Major Standstill! viewed from Kiva in pueblo.! Extreme northern outpost of Anasazi Chaco culture.!

Pseudoscience
! General notion that an ancient culture could not have been so adept at astronomy, architecture! ! Disappearance mysterious!
! Not likely true, as Anasazi people probably split up and merged with other pueblo cultures!

Just for Fun

! Will future archaeologists ascribe some signicance to orientation of Manhattan?!
! APOD image of Manhatten, from Neil de Grasse Tyson! ! Twice a year, in late May and mid July!

Summary
! MANY others not discussed today - Peru, Mexico, etc.! ! Basic notions defensible: solar alignments, need for calendar for agriculture and religion!
! More detailed angles and measures (long range lunar cycles, etc.) more debatable! ! Usual problem: given a vast universe of signicant numbers, its not hard to force some to t into any architecture/geometry!