Stajnia Cave Poland Mammoth Ivory Pendant Dorsal Side Decipherment Corroborated by "Opposite Astronomy Stars" on the Ventral Side Carvings

 No less a thinker than Bertrand Russell wrote in Human Knowledge: Its Scope and  Limits (Simon and Schuster, Clarion Books, New York, 1948) that:

"Astronomy is the oldest of the sciences, and the contemplation of the heavens,

with their periodic regularities, gave men their first conceptions of natural law."

 __________________________________________

Our previous decipherment of the so-called "dorsal side" carvings on the Stajnia Cave mammoth ivory pendant is corroborated by our "flipping" the pendant over and deciphering the carvings on the "ventral side" of that same pendant, as found pictured at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-01221-6/figures/1.

Critical, truly "scientific method"-oriented readers would arguably have examined this essential probative option on their own initiative -- right?

and we are sure you did....

Based upon our astronomical decipherment of the "dorsal side" of the pendant as representing midheaven stars ca. 7500 B.C., we would logically expect the "ventral side" to also represent stars, indeed, stars on the "other" side of Draco opposite that dorsal side, i.e. especially the stars of Cygnus, the swan.

And so it is, as shown by our decipherment image of the ventral side below:

The "Ventral Side" of the Stajnia Cave Mammoth Ivory Carved Pendant ca. 7500 B.C.
Our Decipherment of the Holes, Lines and Figures as Ancient Astronomy viz. "Stargazing"
Marking the Starry Night Stars of Midheaven
The underlying star map was created
via Starry Night Pro astronomy software
while the explanatory marks are by Andis Kaulins of Traben-Trarbach
(click on the graphic to obtain our larger, original decipherment image)

 We have been doing these kinds of decipherments for over 40 years now.

One day, some smart mainstream "scientists" will take notice ....

I myself turn 75 years of youth tomorrow.

I greet my few loyal "smart" followers herewith.

You belong to the "chosen few" who want to know

what our human ancestors were really like

and how our concepts of who we are in this universe

including the origin of our heaven-centered religions

developed through the ancient study of the stars.

The ancients sat around their campfires, 

looked up at the Milky Way,

and asked,

"Where -- in God's name -- are we?"

__________________________________________

No less a thinker than Bertrand Russell wrote in Human Knowledge: Its Scope and  Limits (Simon and Schuster, Clarion Books, New York, 1948) that:

"Astronomy is the oldest of the sciences, and the contemplation of the heavens,

with their periodic regularities, gave men their first conceptions of natural law."

__________________________________________

Stajnia Cave Mammoth Ivory Pendant Carvings Deciphered by Andis Kaulins as Portraying the Midheaven Stars of the Starry Sky ca. 7500 B.C.

An article titled "A 41,500 year-old decorated ivory pendant from Stajnia Cave (Poland)" by Talamo, S., Urbanowski, M., Picin, A. et al. was presented at Nature Magazine's Scientific Reports, Sci Rep 11, 22078 (2021), https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-01221-6. For the location of Stajnia Cave, please see the map at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-71504-x.

That same pendant has now subsequently appeared in Nature Magazine's News, November 29, 2021, under the headline "Is this mammoth-ivory pendant Eurasia’s oldest surviving jewellery?", sub-headlined as "Radiocarbon dating suggests 41,500-year-old carved tusk fragment could be the region’s earliest known example of jewellery decorated by humans."

We do not analyze here the dubious alternative interpretative explanations offered by the archaeological mainstream community for the significance of the ivory carvings on the mammoth pendant, nor do we go into the radiocarbon dating of the mammoth ivory, whose carvings can of course be of a much later origin.

There is in our opinion a clear and inescapable interpretation of the mammoth ivory carvings possible -- our decipherment -- as portraying the midheaven of stars of the starry night sky, which carvings we thus date to ca. 7500 B.C.

Our date of ca. 7500 B.C. was selected because of our decipherment-required position of the North Celestial Pole in that era. The position of the North Celestial Pole changes slowly but continuously over a period of ca. 25920 years due to axial precession, so that a date of ca. 33420 B.C. would be theoretically, but not technologically, possible, when the North Celestial Pole was at this same location.

However, we regard an earlier provenance of the carvings to be impossible, since the sophistication of the stargazing astronomy represented here would fit well into post-Pleistocene Ice-Age technology, but not into previous technology eras.

To produce our decipherment, we created an independent, unaffiliated drawing of the most prominent lines on the pendant, as based on our analysis of a photo of the pendant in question as credited to Antonino Vazzana/BONES Lab see https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03534-y.

The Stajnia Cave Mammoth Ivory Carved Pendant ca. 7500 B.C.
Our Decipherment of the Holes, Lines and Figures as Ancient Astronomy viz. "Stargazing"
Marking the Starry Night Stars of Midheaven
The underlying star map was created
via Starry Night Pro astronomy software
while the explanatory marks are by Andis Kaulins of Traben-Trarbach
(click on the graphic to obtain our larger, original decipherment image)

 

The red dashed lines overlapping the Starry Night Pro star map clip underneath have been added by Andis Kaulins and are meant to correspond to the round marks found carved on the Stajnia Cave mammoth ivory pendant. The blue circular objects overlappingly drawn in the star map by Andis Kaulins identify groups of stars which correspond to figures viz. markings that we allege to be found carved on the pendant, but those identifications are speculative as such lines on the pendant are very weak, if they exist at all, and are difficult to prove. The dark grey lines added by Andis Kaulins mark areas with few stars in the sky that correspond to dark areas on the pendant. The light grey lines added by Andis Kaulins mark the outer perimeter of the pendant in the stars.

Late addition: please note that the lowest figure on this side of the pendant, called the "dorsal side", marks the stars of Ursa Minor. Our decipherment of the "ventral side" as corroborating ancient astronomy follows in the next posting.

Star Constellations of Ancient Egypt and the Astronomical Decipherment of the Northern Arabia Neolithic Camel Site

The Celestial River: Identifying the Ancient Egyptian Constellations, Sino-Platonic Papers, 253 (December 2014), Victor H. Mair, Editor, Dept. of East Asian Languages & Civilizations, Univ. of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, 19104-6305 USA, vmair@sas.upenn.edu, www.sino-platonic.org

authored by Alessandro Berio

-- as posted by Magdi Saleh at Academia.edu --

presents astronomical analysis that bears significantly upon our recent postings about the Northern Arabia "Camel Site", which we have -- allegedly --- deciphered as Neolithic astronomy, and which, in our opinion maps the stars of the starry night ca. 4800 B.C.

... with "the legs of the Camel" standing on the Celestial Equator at the Vernal Equinox, the left side of the camel marking the Summer Solstice and the right side of the camel marking the Winter Solstice, with the stars in the heavens being marked by carved figures and cupules (holes viz. indentations carved into stone).

We thank here the website Academia.edu for alerting us to the respective link to the article by Berio as found at https://www.academia.edu/23910738/The_Celestial_River_Identifying_the_Ancient_Egyptian_Constellations.

We are sympathetic to Berio's approach, but our present posting does not engage in individual analysis -- pro or contra -- of the ancient Egyptian Constellations identified in Berio's publication or the system of rising and setting stars that is said there to explain some of the hieroglyphs (viz. "emblems") of the nomes. Each reader can evaluate the material on their own starting at the above link.

Given our own knowledge and understanding of the use of rising and setting stars in ancient astronomy and given our own writings about MUL.APIN : Decipherment as Astronomy (see there for a start), we find that Berio has definitely produced a remarkable and highly interesting analysis which deserves our attention. See in this regard also our year 2004 postings on the astronomical and hermetic significance ("as above, so below") of the nomes of Egypt at:

• The Nomes of Egypt and Astronomy - A - Identification - ANE BC P4 
• The Nomes of Egypt and Astronomy - B - Map of Egyptian Nomes - ANE BC P5 
• The Nomes of Egypt and Astronomy - C - Nome Hieroglyph Chart - ANE BC P6
  

What interests us here as a general matter is the star placement comparison of:

• a map of the heavens that results from our decipherment of the ca. 4800 B.C. Neolithic Northern Arabia Camel Site
  

THE NEOLITHIC CAMEL SITE of NORTHERN ARABIA
ASTRONOMICAL DECIPHERMENT as ca. 4800 B.C. by ANDIS KAULINS

with Berio's Classical star map with Ptolemaic constellations compared to nome emblems overlaid on a map of the sky circa 3100 BC as seen from Memphis (30.57° N).

Classical Star Map with Ptolemaic Stellar Constellations and
Nome Emblems Overlaid on a Sky Map ca. 3100 B.C.
according to Alessandro Berio

 

Our decipherment placement of starry night stars at the Camel Site finds numerous comparables in depiction on the above map of Ancient Egyptian stellar constellations as represented by Berio, though we do not agree on all of them, but that latter is not the issue here. Some DO agree, and that is what is important.

Moreover, in terms of researching the importance of the Ancient Egyptian nomes as hermetic astronomy ("as above, so below"), perhaps marking rising and setting stars, take a look at our Camel Site decipherment finding that the dog, Anubis, is there at the position of the stars of Libra, which stellar location was a mystery to us initially, but which makes sense as a placement given the rising and setting star analysis for nome emblems by Berio, who writes as follows:

"Sirius, the brightest star of Canis Major, was identified with the goddess Isis-Sothis, the Egyptian mother goddess. Diodorus explains that the ritual procession of the Festival of Isis was led by dogs, an association illustrated in a passage by Diodorus:

On the stele of Isis it runs: “I am Isis, the queen of every land… I am she who riseth in the star that is in the Constellation of the Dog; by me was the city of Bubastus built.”

The capital of the 18th nome of Upper Egypt ... was a place for the worship of Anubis, the dog-headed god, as the city was known as the “House of Anubis.” This nome corresponded to the time at which Canis Major’s star, Aludra, known as the “Virgins” to early Arab astronomers, was in its lower culmination, and Spica, the brightest star in Virgo, the virgin, was setting ...."

It would seem, therefore, as a possibility, that the astronomy deciphered by us at the Neolithic Camel Site in Northern Arabia may be a precursor to the hermetic ("as above, so below") astronomy of the later Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt. 

Obviously, the historical ramifications are substantial if the chronological dates in question -- starting with around 4800 B.C. -- are correct. And it also may raise the question of whether the creators of the Camel Site were indigenous inhabitants, or more distant nomads, or, indeed, especially because of the "megalithic" style of portrayal, were perhaps even more distant ancient surveyors, stargazers and/or navigators from elsewhere who first carved the astronomical figures in Northern Arabia.

See in this wider connection our previous postings at:

• The Four Corner Stones of a Land Survey in Ancient Egypt and Arabia: Sais (Sa al Hajar, Rosetta Stone), Nabta Playa (Table Rock Stone), Mecca (Kaaba), Dumat Al-Jandal (Missing Stone) and
  
  
• Sais, the Rosetta Stone, Champollion and Google Earth in the Context of the Alleged Four Corner Stones of Sais, Nabta Playa, Mecca, and Dumat Al-Jandal viz. Sakaka and Al Rajajil
  
  
• The Standing Stones (Megaliths) of Al Rajajil Deciphered as an Ancient Land Survey Triangulation: لرجاجيل في سكاكا al-Rajajeel Archeological Site
  
  

Neolithic Northern Arabia Archaeoastronomical "Camel Site Decipherment Image" by Andis Kaulins Updated October 20, 2021

Please note:

The graphic Neolithic Northern Arabia Archaeoastronomical
"Camel Site Decipherment Image" by Andis Kaulins
presented in full in previous postings
was updated on October 20, 2021 with some additions
and improved color management of the figures,
thus, for example, retaining a clear view of the legs of the camel.

See the updated decipherment.

The Rock Art "Camel Site" in Arabia Deciphered as a Neolithic Representation of the Night Starry Sky by Figures ca. 4800 B.C.

The Neolithic Rock Art "Camel Site" in Arabia Deciphered as Astronomy

Please note: the graphic below
was updated with some corrected star placements on October 20, 2021.

Our Interactive Lesson #6 consists of our independent archaeoastronomical decipherment of the Rock Art so-called "Camel Site" located in Northern Arabia.

This is the last interactive lesson in this series of postings, which we will follow up with some explanatory postings about various aspects of our decipherment below. 

There are many unexpected surprises, especially for the era in question.

Look at the decipherment graphic and draw your own conclusions.

The Neolithic Rock Art "Camel Site" in Arabia:
Interactive Lesson #6: Our Full Decipherment Image
The Camel Site Portrays the Night Starry Sky
ca. 4800 B.C. by Figures

Click on the graphic below
to obtain a larger, more readable image! 

Please note that the graphic below
was updated on October 20, 2021
with improved color management of the figures
and some corrected star placements

 

The Neolithic Camel Site in Northern Arabia: Interactive Lesson #5: Auriga to the Left of Perseus and Carved Figures and Cupule Stars to the Right of Perseus

The Neolithic Rock Art Camel Site in Arabia: Interactive Lesson #5: Auriga to the Left of Perseus and Carved Figures and Cupule Stars to the Right of Perseus

The stars of Auriga at the Camel Site are represented by the head of a goatherd with typical headdress, plus the head (and fleece ?) of an adult goat with several goat kids. This corroborates the correctness of our previous placement of the stars of Perseus to the right of Auriga. The fleece viz. the "wool" of Auriga is carved in the rock in an appropriate "ruffled" texture way. The adult goat appears to have several goat kids behind it, plus maybe a goat dog ("sheepdog") to the back left. 

The Neolithic Rock Art Camel Site in Arabia: Interactive Lesson #5
Auriga the Goatherd is to the Left of Perseus
Auriga includes a Goat head profile and several goat kids, plus goatherd dog.
Cepheus, Cassiopeia, and Andromeda are to the Right of Perseus

Please click on the graphic below to obtain a larger image.

The figures to the right of Perseus are more difficult to assign with certainty, as they are very strongly characterized by the megalithic style of carving figures within figures within figures, which makes identification more speculative.

We think those figures mark stars of what we moderns identify as the stellar constellations of Cepheus, Cassiopeia, wife of Cepheus, and their daughter Andromeda -- a heavenly family as it were -- whose origins, e.g., in Egypt, and even by mainstream archaeology, reach back far and at least into predynastic ("pre-Pharaoh") times. Just how old these heavenly figures assigned to groups of stars in the starry sky actually are -- nobody really knows, but it is clear from the Neolithic Rock Art Camel Site in Arabia that they are much older then previously thought by the mainstream of researchers.

Just as an aside:
We think the term Auriga originally meant "sheep, lamb" as arguably in what we see as a hypothetical proto-Indo-European root found e.g. in Latvian jēr- jēruk- (=*aurig-) meaning "of (a) lamb".

The Latin meaning of "charioteer" may arise out of a linguistic confusion of "auriga" with e.g. the root of a word like "quadriga" and similar terms, which at their root have the meaning "yoke" in proto-Indo-European, as in archaic Latvian "jūgs, jūg-".

The next posting in this series is Interactive Lesson #6. 

Can you already find the stars portrayed on the left side of the carved rock but not yet identified?

The Camel Site in Arabia: Interactive Lesson #4: More Figures at Perseus and the Stars of the Leg to the Left

The Camel Site in Arabia: Interactive Lesson #4: More Figures at Perseus and the Stars of the Leg to the Left

In the image below we see the figure of Perseus, and an additional coiled (?) figure below it -- above the Hyena -- that emerges when we look at the stone-carved figures in detail.

THE STARS OF PERSEUS (IN FULL) AT THE CAMEL SITE
AND THE STARS OF THE CAMEL'S LEG TO ITS LEFT

Click on the image to view a larger image version.

Perseus appears to wear a military-type (?) plumed hat and we can only ask ourselves if the figure below him is Medusa or a serpent-type figure, for this is very speculative and not perfectly clear. Such a hat is not likely to date back to 4800 B.C. Perhaps such figures were added later in time, in another era, by ancients who knew which stars the carved Camel Site represented in the sky.

Posting #5 of this decipherment series on the Camel Site of Northern Arabia follows, deciphering figures and stars to the right of Perseus, including the camel's leg to the right.

The Camel Site in Arabia: Interactive Lesson #3: Where are the Stars of Perseus Marked by a Figure and Cupmarks? And Where is the Hyena?

Once one recognizes that the large camel at the Camel Site marks the Celestial Equator, the Celestial Meridian and the Celestial North Pole by its features...

and if we also have a good idea of the date of the human stone carving work...

then the general positions of the stars at the Camel Site are inevitable...

because their position is thereby determined by the major astronomical parameters.

The stars can not be elsewhere, and we can thus not place them subjectively,

although it is also true, however, that individual stars may be difficult to identify with perfect certainty. Everything is not always as easy as it appears.

We started out with the figure and cupmarks of the stars of Perseus because their placement at the Camel Site is eminently obvious. Just look at the Starry Night Pro star map below, a stellar map which we have already posted previously. Find Perseus on that star map and you will then know where to look for Perseus at the Camel Site stone relief.

THE STARRY SKY SECTION REPRESENTED AT THE CAMEL SITE
MARKS STARS AT AND ABOVE THE CELESTIAL EQUATOR ca. 4800 B.C.
Image clip 2021 A.D. by Andis Kaulins via Starry Night Pro astronomy software

 Click on the image to view a larger image version.
(image updated on 7 October 2021)

As one can see from above, Perseus is to the far right of the Vernal Equinox on that 4800 B.C. star map and that is where we expect to find Perseus represented on the large camel at the Camel Site ... and so it is, as seen below.

THE CAMEL SITE MARKS THE STARS OF PERSEUS
TO THE RIGHT OF THE VERNAL EQUINOX in 4800 B.C.
AND ITS LOWER STARS SHOW A HYENA NIPPING AT THE HEEL OF THE CAMEL
We have previously written that:
"Significant for our discussion of ancient celestial poles
is the fact that the Arabic Bedouins in Egypt, instead of a dragon,
saw a circle of camels at heaven’s center that was being attacked by hyenas."
https://megalithicworld.wordpress.com/2007/11/14/horusfalconcultasastronomy/

 Click on the image to view a larger image version.

The arguably older representation is the tapered relief-carved figure of Perseus.
The arguably younger presentation consists of cupmarks
(carved holes in stone) of the brighter stars of Perseus,
as still used in modern astronomy to portray the figure of Perseus in the sky.

The hyena at the heel of the camel -- supporting ancient heavenly depiction --
is proof of the correctness of our decipherment of "The Camel Site" in Arabia.

 Lesson #4 is forthcoming in the next posting.

 

The Camel Site: Interactive Lesson #2: What is the Camel Carrying? The Camel Carries the Starry Sky

The Neolithic Rock Art Camel Site in Northern Arabia as Astronomy:
Interactive Lesson #2:
What is the Camel Carrying?
The camel carries the starry sky.

The mid-center Celestial Meridian as the prominent left foreleg of the camel and the top of the camel's hump at the location of the North Celestial Pole indicate that the camel carries the stars in the sky, i.e. the vault of heaven.

Arab sources of antiquity place the camel at a position near the North Celestial Pole. Citing to Richard Hinckley's Star Names: Their Lore and Meaning (Dover edition, 1963)We have previously written that:

"Significant for our discussion of ancient celestial poles is the fact that the Arabic Bedouins in Egypt, instead of a dragon, saw a circle of camels at heaven’s center that was being attacked by hyenas."

See:
https://megalithicworld.wordpress.com/2007/11/14/horusfalconcultasastronomy/

Before we present our decipherments, the reader may try to identify stars represented at the Camel Site by carved figures and holes carved in stone to represent bright stars or groups of bright stars. Good luck!

Groups of stars can be represented by figures, as we still do in modernity by the stellar constellations.

But stars can also be represented individually by "cupmarks" (cupules, holes carved in stone to represent stars).

Usually -- the larger the hole, the brighter the magnitude of the star.

Please note:

The carved figures at the Camel Site are likely to be older than the identifiable cupmarks, which appear to be younger, because they cover less space than the corresponding figures. We see this at the representation of the stars of Perseus, which we add to our decipherment image in the next posting.

This same phenomenon is found at sites such as Lascaux in France -- but, to our knowledge, is something not recognized by mainstream archaeologists -- where cave paintings cover rocks that were already previously carved to mark the same stars as the later paintings.

People often see what they want to see or things easy to see ... and miss the rest. No less an observer than Albert Einstein said that he had little patience with scientists who drilled only where the drilling is easy.

The Camel Site in Northern Arabia ca. 5000 BC: Neolithic Rock Art as Astronomy: Interactive Lesson #1: Where does the Camel Stand? It Stands on the Celestial Equator

The Neolithic Rock Art Camel Site in Northern Arabia as Astronomy:
Interactive Lesson #1:
Where does the Camel Stand?
It Stands on the Celestial Equator

Our interactive decipherment begins with a clip of the section of sky that we regard to be represented by carved figures and cupmarks at "The Camel Site"
-- figures and holes carved in stone to mark bright stars viz. star groups.

The starry sky corresponding to the stars represented by the Camel Site is found
in the image below -- applying to stars ca. at or above the Celestial Equator on which the camel stands ... carrying the heavens. Our image clip from Starry Night Pro astronomy software is the year 4800 B.C., close to the dates of ca. 5600 to 5200 BCE estimated by archaeologists for human inhabitation of the site.

THE STARRY SKY SECTION REPRESENTED AT THE CAMEL SITE
MARKS STARS AT AND ABOVE THE CELESTIAL EQUATOR ca. 4800 B.C.
Image clip 2021 A.D. by Andis Kaulins via Starry Night Pro astronomy software

 Click on the image to view a larger image version.
(image updated on 7 October 2021)

 

The Celestial Equator in the star map above is the red nearly horizontal line running through the Vernal Equinox. The Celestial Equator at the Camel Site is the line drawn below -- and identified by us -- upon which the camel stands:

THE CAMEL SITE CELESTIAL EQUATOR ON WHICH THE CAMEL STANDS

Click on the image to view a larger image version.

That line provides the foundation for the astronomical decipherment. Once such an important astronomical parameter is correctly identified, the rest follows. 

See if you can now identify the stars represented at the Camel Site without referring to our decipherment. You have the star map above.

This posting begins a series of experimental interactive presentations of our recent, independent, and unaffiliated archaeoastronomical decipherment of the so-called archaeological "Camel Site" in Northern Arabia...

as that site is described by the following authors
Maria Guagnin, Guillaume Charloux, Abdullah M. AlSharekh, Rémy Crassard, Yamandú H. Hilbert, Meinrat O. Andreae, Abdullah AlAmri, Frank Preusser, Fulbert Dubois, Franck Burgos, Pascal Flohr, Pascal Mora, Ahmad AlQaeed, and Yasser AlAli...

in their article
Life-sized Neolithic camel sculptures in Arabia: A scientific assessment of the craftsmanship and age of the Camel Site reliefs, Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 2021, 103165, ISSN 2352-409X
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jasrep.2021.103165 as found published online at...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352409X21003771.

More Camel Site photos are also published at Artnet.com in Thousands of Years Before the Pyramids, Neolithic Peoples Were Carving Camels into Saudi Arabia’s Rocky Desert, an article by Sarah Cascone online at :

https://news.artnet.com/art-world/ancient-saudi-arabian-camel-carvings-are-actually-older-than-stonehenge-and-the-pyramids-of-giza-2012754

In order to avoid copyright image issues -- we make our own drawings for use in the course of our decipherment and refer readers to original photographs in the above cited sources for review. We have no affiliation with any of the above.

We now look at the Celestial Meridian and Celestial North Pole in Lesson #2, i.e. the next posting. The question is: What is the Camel Carrying?

The Hebrew Calendar Starts Autumn 3761 B.C. Is it Because the Autumn Equinox Location in the Stars Was Virtually at the Center of Our Galaxy in that Era?

We came to the conclusion some years ago that the main focus of Stonehenge alignments (our independent discovery) is the galactic center of our Milky Way Galaxy (the "Galactic Centre"). 

Megalithic culture seems to mirror an ancient belief of mankind that the galactic center of our galaxy was the origin of souls, a location in the stars to which human souls were correspondingly also believed to return upon worldly passage.

We examined the origin of the Hebrew Calendar and found it to be similar.

What reason did the Hebrew forefathers possibly have for starting their calendar in Autumn, 3761 BC?

People did not likely say, "Oh, let's start a calendar today!" just any day. They surely had a very strong TIMELY reason for their choice.

We were then not surprised to find that the Autumn start of the Hebrew Calendar in Autumn 3761 B.C. corresponds to the location of the Autumn Equinox in that era at the Galactic Centre of our Milky Way of stars.

At TimeAndDate.com, Konstantin Bikos writes at The Jewish Calendar that:

"12th-century Jewish philosopher Maimonides established 3761 B.C. as the biblical Date of Creation". [link added by us]

That post facto later date creationist-type explanation arguably reflects ancient astronomical religious knowledge, myth or legend as conceivably passed down over the generations by astronomically calendric-savvy Jewish diaspora priests.

We present below an image of the stellar center of our Milky Way galaxy, via an underlying clipped star map made by us via Starry Night Pro astronomy software, to which the present author of this posting, Andis Kaulins, the LawPundit, has added a circle to represent the Galactic Centre with arrows added to show the "striking" lines of stars pointing to the center of our Milky Way Galaxy.

There is of course no way to fully "prove" that this theory of the origin of the Jewish Calendar in 3761 B.C. is correct beyond doubt, but we think it adds some new astronomical and calendric sense to the origin of mankind's calendar time-keeping by the positions of the "Sun, Moon and Stars".

Note that the position of the Center of our Milky Way Galaxy must have been known by the ancient stargazers already in that era. These ancient "astronomers" likely formed the "purposeful" if also subjective figures of the nearest surrounding stellar (star) constellations viz. asterisms or similar groupings of stars to correspond to their astronomical knowledge of the location of the Galactic Centre.

These ancient "druids", for lack of a better term, also surely drew prominent "pointing" lines of stars using bright magnitude stars in their subjectively drawn figures, precise intended lines that point to the Galactic Centre, specifically:

• the tip of the arrow of Sagittarius points to the Galactic Centre
  
• the stinger of Scorpio points to the Galactic Centre, and
• the lowered (we think, then serpent head of Ophiuchus), or one could view it as the bottom head of the "staff" around which the serpent of Ophiuchus perhaps twined, also points to the Galactic Centre. One can be of different minds about which precise stars the ancients actually intended, but the posited scheme is clear.
  

 "Striking" Stars at the Milky Way Galactic Centre

Some might suggest that this confluence is chance only, but such a pure coincidence would be unlikely given the "striking" nature of the figures used.

The three constellations Ophiuchus, Scorpio and Sagittarius not only "surround" the Galactic Centre but are specifically characterized and marked by what might be called "striking" directional lines of stars aimed at the Galactic Centre. In our view, such an unusual merging of purpose was INTENDED by the ancients.

As one can read in our other postings, it was this galactic center that was the focus of attention of major later megalithic sites, e.g. Stonehenge in particular.

 

Words, Acts and Cognition: Speech as an Act of Performative Utterance: Language Performativity Suggests Rethinking the ImpACT of the Human Word

What a superb article by Peggy Noonan at the Wall Street Journal (WSJ)
at Why We Care About the Royal Family Feud.

Noonan's "performativity"-centered discussion about the British Monarchy has had a special bonus for us, by opening up a new way of thinking about human communication and interaction in the form of "speech acts", which analysis also provides an unexpected connection to "critical legal thinking" (see the link below).

The Wikipedia writes: "Performativity is the concept that language can function as a form of social action and have the effect of change. The concept has multiple applications in diverse fields such as anthropology, social and cultural geography, economics, gender studies (social construction of gender), law, linguistics, performance studies, history, management studies and philosophy." [link added]

Indeed, "performativity" suggests to us that the unending mainstream media discussion about controversial social topics such as e.g. White House lies and untruths over the last four years have completely -- and we mean completely -- missed the point in their analysis of the significance of an avalanche of Twitter Tweets from the past U.S. President and from his similar performative utterances. Something else -- arguably more important than truth -- was at work.

As the language professionals writing about performativity suggest to us, it is not the content of spoken words per se or even the truth or falsity of that content that is at issue, but rather the purpose viz. societal influence of a given "speech act",
ala John L. Austin.

Read on below .... where we find to our astonishment ... really, in a fascinating turn of analysis ... that the assertion of truth or untruth has nothing to do with it.

• https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/performative 
• https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/performative 
• https://criticallegalthinking.com/2016/11/14/judith-butlers-performativity/ 
• https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/p/performativity 
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performative_turn 
• https://medium.com/humanist-voices/performative-language-a466e9aee860

Who would have thought it. Performativity is even applicable to basic science.

It is thus likely e.g. that the truth of history or other content being written about is not the chief issue in academic publications, as otherwise alleged by the powers that be, but rather the often hidden ulterior motives lurking behind such publications that are among the main driving forces of science. Scientific periodicals and human interactions at gatherings such as congresses can thus fundamentally be viewed as forums for performative acts. Recall that the motto is "publish or perish" but NOT "publish the truth or perish".

We have always known the above to be true, but never understood why.

Now we suspect to know a little more.

Hat tip to CaryGEE.

Should We Also Amend Our Ways? - Nicholas Kristoff at the NY Times Examines How to Reach People Who Are Wrong

Opinion | How to Reach People Who Are Wrong - The New York Times

Definitely worth a thought, also by us.

 

Amazon Mounds and Earthworks: Too Difficult for Contemporary Archaeologists or Modern Astronomers? Here is an Update.

One of the primary obstacles that we face in our megalithic research -- an obstacle that is greater than the difficulty of astronomical decipherment of standing stones themselves -- is the lack of a wide, knowledgeable audience.

Many contemporary archaeologists and people in related professions erroneously seem to assume that e.g. megaliths or earthwork mounds erected by prehistoric societies are properly the realm of study of Archaeology, even though most archaeologists seem to know little about megaliths, and even less about astronomy. The sky above is exactly the opposite of their chosen "geo-bound" interest. Who cares about the far distant stars above them? Pots rule.

Similarly, those few researchers who call themselves archaeoastronomers or astroarchaeologists, often do not go beyond elementary solar and lunar considerations, virtually ignoring the starry night of stars -- thus suggesting to us that their understanding of ancient mankind is very limited. We expect little help from their ranks.

We have found, contrary to flawed prevailing directions of research -- research is an area in academics that we taught at the university level -- that the starry night of stars and the ever-present band of the Milky Way DOMINATED ancient society as the domicile of their gods.

As we have written at Megaliths.net

"Megaliths.net is a systematic graphic-supported analysis of megaliths and megalithic sites around the world which shows that ancient megalithic sites are land survey sites located by prehistoric astronomy. As observed by Alice Cunningham Fletcher (Alice C. Fletcher) in her 1902 publication in the American Anthropologist, there is ample evidence that some ancient cultures, e.g. the Pawnee in Nebraska, geographically located their villages according to patterns seen in stars of the heavens. FLETCHER, A. C. (1902), STAR CULT AMONG THE PAWNEE —A PRELIMINARY REPORT. American Anthropologist, 4: 730–736. doi: 10.1525/aa.1902.4.4.02a00050."

However, that knowledge has not seeped into so-called mainstream science. Unless one is shooting rockets into the sky for war or putting new satellites into orbit, the stars are ignored. Indeed, even the Zodiac of stellar groupings has been relegated to the realm of esoteric Astrology. Any hermetic "as above, so below" explanation for prehistoric mankind's cultural focus is not taken seriously.

Sadly, the profession of astronomy itself has not persevered where Archaeology and related professions have dismally failed, thus leaving a "black hole" in science as regards serious research regarding the megaliths and similar constructions. 

Paradoxically, so-called modern astronomers and people in related professions spend a lot of resources studying "black holes" in far distant space that bear little relation to human life on Planet Earth, now or ever. A stellar connection for ancient human technology is of no interest to them. Indeed, your average academic astronomer seems no longer to know much about the visible stars -- those that we humans see above with the naked eye. How ancient mankind viewed the wide expanse of the starry sky above them is not a scientific question for modern skywatchers. That is "below them". Their eyes are focused on distant space, where billions are spent on NASA, planetary visits (mostly by machines), and the search for extraterrestrials.

Those same dedicated people, however, seem to consider it lunacy to allege that ancient mankind ALSO had an overriding interest in the stars.

You figure it out, we can't.

Perhaps mainstream scientists just find this entire field to be too difficult for them. Just two months ago we posted Landmarks by the Stars in Ancient Days: Amazonian Pre-Columbian Earthworks & Geoglyphs Represent Stars in the Sky in a Cosmic Geo-Hermetic Stellar Map "As Above, So Below", which contains an explanatory map for perusal by contemporary archaeologist and/or modern astronomer. That posting has 27 hits thus far. It should be hundreds of times more than that.

Too tough? We post an elementary explanatory visual update below:

and here is how we explained it in the previous posting:

"Why would the ancients have used stars of the starry night to "map" their Earth?

Just imagine trying to make your way in a tropical climate in ancient days. How did you get around and know where you were?

We think stars and landmarks based on stars are the answer.

West & SW Amazonian Pre-Columbian village mounds viz. earthworks, geoglyphs and "enclosures" identified by archaeologists are shown here in our independent decipherment -- not related in any way to the publications of the archaeologists -- as having been located by the ancients to represent the Milky Way and corresponding stars in the stellar constellations Aquila, Sagittarius, [Scorpio perhaps via a natural mountain formation], Lupus, Centaurus, Crux, Musca, Carina, Vela, Pyxis, & Puppis. Note that the ancients may have grouped and designated the respective stars somewhat differently, but the principal star locations in the sky remain the same nevertheless, concentrating on the sky's brightest stars by magnitude, which form the "shape" of artificial star groupings.

The star correspondences shown below were discovered in December 2020 by Andis Kaulins after reading an article in Smithsonian magazine about Amazonian Pre-Columbian mound villages and other earthwork and similar constructions. See the article by Livia Gershon in Smithsonian magazine at These Amazonian Villages Were Laid Out Like Clock Faces https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/archaeologists-find-clock-face-layout-amazon-villages-180976553/.

As retained down to this day, we find that the ancients placed their religious "gods" in the heavens, i.e. stellar locations which provided a natural, fixed easily accessible map, which was mirrored geographically on Earth "as above, so below".

Please note that our decipherment star maps -- shown below -- were created using our clips of star maps produced via Starry Night Pro astronomy software, to which we have added explanatory texts, labels, and figures, as necessary.

See http://www.starrynight.com/

In the image below, the upper section shows a geographic map clip by us from

-- a geographic map at Iriarte, J., Robinson, M., de Souza, J., Damasceno, A., da Silva, F., Nakahara, F., Ranzi, A. and Aragao, L., 2020. Geometry by Design: Contribution of Lidar to the Understanding of Settlement Patterns of the Mound Villages in SW Amazonia. Journal of Computer Applications in Archaeology, 3(1), pp.151–169. DOI: http://doi.org/10.5334/jcaa.45 --

which shows the locations of the Amazonian archaeological sites in question, together with our added star labels and the appropriate Milky Way section of stars. These identifications were made independently by Andis Kaulins, Traben-Trarbach, Germany, who is not affiliated in any way with any of the authors of the article cited above. We use the geographic map as fair use for research purposes.

In the article cited above, Iriarte et al. mention a possible "cosmic" meaning to the locations, as follows:

"Arranged in symbolically significant ways with no clear hierarchy, the villages' circular layouts may reflect their Indigenous inhabitants' conceptions of the cosmos (Iriarte et al., Journal of Computer Applications in Archaeology, under CC BY 4.0)".

To that we can independently add: YES ... the COSMOS ... We find that the cosmos referred to is comprised of specific "landmark" stars and sections of the Milky Way of stars visible from the identified Amazonian locations.

 

Still too difficult?

-- given the map update further above in this posting??? 

Take another look at the updated explanatory map.

You want to go contra? Forget it.

It is time for you all to bring your "science" up into the modern age.