Echoes of the Ancient Skies The Astronomy of

Popular, authoritative look at the world of archaeoastronomy, the study of ancient peoples' observation of the skies and its role in their cultural evolution. Contents include The Lights We See, The Skies We Watch, The Gods We Worship, The Tales We Tell, The Dead We Bury, The Vigils We Keep, The Days We Tally, and more. 208 illustrations.

1. The Lights We See

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How the sky works and how we use it: Day and night.

Directions.

The seasons.

The year.

Precession.

Cycles of planets.

Cycles of the moon.

The sky symbolism of Osiris.

2. The Skies We Watch

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Ancient and prehistoric observatories: "Stretching of the Cord" ceremony (Egypt).

Bronze age inscriptions in China.

Babylonian astronomical tables.

The "Sun Circle" at Cahokia, Illinois.

Kintraw, Scotland.

Megalithic lunar observatories.

Inca skywatchers at Machu Picchu.

The Caracol of Chichén Itzá, Yucatán.

Gnomons in ancient China.

3. The Gods We Worship

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Sky gods around the world-why we have them and what they mean: Sun gods, divine planets, and sacred stars.

Gods of rain, fertility, and storm. Sacred kingship--the connection between sky and earth.

4. The Tales We Tell

82

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Sky myths and the cycle of cosmic order: Phaëthon, a Greek myth.

The Pleiades and the opossum (Barasana Indians, Colombia).

The Omaha Indian myth of the sacred pole.

The birth of Huitzilopochtli (Aztec).

The retreat of the sun goddess and her return (Japan).

5. The Dead We Bury

100

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The celestial components of funerals and tombs and the journeys of the dead: The Great Pyramid.

Royal Tombs of New Kingdom Egypt.

The tumulus of China's first emperor and other Chinese tombs.

Burial and the city plan of Cahokia.

The Temple of the Inscriptions at Palenque (Maya).

Newgrange (prehistoric Ireland).

6. The Vigils We Keep

126

(31)

Shamanism and the celestial travels of the soul: California Indian sun shrines.

Mystical star treaders of China.

Tukano Indians and their shamans (Colombia).

Medicine wheels of North America.

Sun priests in the American Southwest.

Fajada Butte, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico.

7. The Days We Tally

157

(33)

Calendars and the sacred structure of time: Notation and the Ice Age hunters of Europe.

Stone rings and the calendar of prehistoric Britain.

Namoratunga II and the calendar in ancient Kenya.

The three calendars of dynastic Egypt.

Calendars, omens, and kings in China and Babylon.

The Inca calendar and Inca society.

Calendar cycles of the Maya and the Aztec.

8. The Rituals We Perform

190

(24)

Ceremonies that celebrate the sky: The Hopi Indians and the winter solstice.

The "Burning of Tara" and the Irish Celts.

Imperial ritual in old Beijing.

The Inca festival of Intl Raymi.

The Babylonian New Year.

"Bundling the Years" in ancient Mexico (Aztec).

The "Opening of the Mouth" ceremony in ancient Egypt.

9. The Space We Enclose

214

(17)

Astronomy, geometry, and sacred space: Stonehenge.

Other mega-lithic rings in England.

Scotland's recumbent stone circles.

Sarmize-getusa-a Thracian temple.

10. The Temples We Align

231

(28)

Astronomical orientation and symbolism in ancient temples: Casa Rinconada and other kivas (American Southwest).

The Skidi Pawnee earth lodge.

Kogi temples (Colombia).

Alta Vista, Monte Albán, Uaxactún, and Uxmal-celestial alignment in ancient Mexico.

Solar sanctuaries of New Kingdom Egypt.

11. The Cities We Plan .

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Sacred capitals and the source of world order: Beijing.

Pueblo Bonito.

Tenochtitlán.

Cuzco.

Teotihuacán.

12. The Symbols We Draw

286

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How we code the sky and what those messages say about our brains: Mescalero Apache and the four-pointed star.

Cross glyphs and pecked crosses from ancient Mexico.

The Aztec "Calendar Stone."

The serpent of equinox sunlight at Chichén Itzá.

Irish rock art, Knowth.

A honeycomb mural from prehistoric Turkey (Çatal Hüyük).

Babylonian boundary stones.

Winged suns from Mesopotamia and Egypt.

Horizon symbols and astronomical observation.

The UFO-a modern sky symbol.

13. The Universes We Design

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Cosmology and why we do it: The Desana Indian cosmos (Colombia).

The bell-shaped universe of the Warao (Venezuela).

Creek cosmologies.

The sky and earth in ancient China.

The heralds of modern cosmology-Copernicus, Kepley, and Newton.

The hierarchical universe of ancient Mexico.

Hubble's redshift and the expanding universe.

Bibliography

351

(30)

Index

381

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Echoes of the Ancient Skies The Astronomy of Lost Civilizations

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