New debate on the Nebra disc.Archaeologists have revived the debate over whether a spectacular Bronze Age disc from Germany is one of the earliest known calendars.
The Nebra disc is emblazoned with symbols of the Sun, Moon and stars and said by some to be 3,600 years old.
Nebra disc
Moderators: MichelleH, Minimalist, JPeters
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6722953.stm
http://www.eux.tv/article.aspx?articleId=14001
This quote is the entire article. Little by little more facts about the Nebra disk keep dribbling out. From the Arch. newsroom.Archaeologists find remains of sky-disc people in Germany
Goseck, Germany (dpa) Archaeologists digging at the place where an amazing Bronze Age disc was found in Germany have turned up a body and remains of a Stone Age building, adding to the riddle around one of the world's biggest archaeological sensations of the past decade.
Andreas Northe, giving the results of this summer's dig on the remote hill in eastern Germany, said, "We found a child's grave, a cache of stone tools and some remains from a long-house."
The dig was done at a spot in a line of sight from the place where amateurs using metal detectors in 1999 found the Nebra celestial disc, a 3,600-year-old depiction of the sun, moon and stars which is believed to be the oldest extant calculator of the seasons.
Controversy has raged since 2001 about what the gold-and-green disc was for, who its owners were and whether it could be a scientific hoax.
Digs have revealed that the deserted hill in woods near Goseck may have been a town for millenia. The "temple of the sun" has been been reconstructed as a tourist attraction.
Northe dated the latest finds by his 13-member team to the Stone Age and said they included burned pieces of plaster wall.
Nothing comparable had ever been found before and it would be possible now to study how Stone Age houses looked from the outside. The house had had been 6 metres by 20 metres.
The grave was of a child aged between 1 and 3 who had been buried with a fired-clay bottle, "a provision for the after-life," Northe said.
I'm the only one in step, again.
I'm retired so I don't count, so what do the rest of you use a a calendar for?
Taking my country as an example, a 1000yrs ago, we'll say, a calendar would have been used by clerics to ensure that various religious rites etc, were carried out at the correct time and that rents and tythes were paid and collected at the appropriate dates. Even then, a calendar as such would be unnecessary, a slate and chalk would have functioned just as well, I certainly don't see any need for damn great stone circles!
I'm retired so I don't count, so what do the rest of you use a a calendar for?
Taking my country as an example, a 1000yrs ago, we'll say, a calendar would have been used by clerics to ensure that various religious rites etc, were carried out at the correct time and that rents and tythes were paid and collected at the appropriate dates. Even then, a calendar as such would be unnecessary, a slate and chalk would have functioned just as well, I certainly don't see any need for damn great stone circles!
First people deny a thing, then they belittle it, then they say it was known all along! Von Humboldt
But they built them anyway!
Needed for day to day life or not!
So they had to be for religious purposes.
I remember a story about a Central American battle, I don’t recall if Mayan or Incan, that had to be called off due to lack of interest. (Remember, these people had a calendar accurate to the hour.) By the time the powers that be had decided where and when to fight, the armies on both sides had faded away! Why? It was planting season.
A farmer doesn’t need a calendar to know seasons. He gets up in the morning and looks out the window. And seasons, not dates, are what he is interested in.
Until you start talking about gods, life after death, pleasing your ancestors, etc.
Now we are talking beyond life day to day.
Needed for day to day life or not!
So they had to be for religious purposes.
I remember a story about a Central American battle, I don’t recall if Mayan or Incan, that had to be called off due to lack of interest. (Remember, these people had a calendar accurate to the hour.) By the time the powers that be had decided where and when to fight, the armies on both sides had faded away! Why? It was planting season.
A farmer doesn’t need a calendar to know seasons. He gets up in the morning and looks out the window. And seasons, not dates, are what he is interested in.
Until you start talking about gods, life after death, pleasing your ancestors, etc.
Now we are talking beyond life day to day.
That at least appears indisputable KB, but, like you, not for Joe Blogs to use as a calendar.But they built them anyway!
By the time some one in western Britain had found out what the date was at Stonhenge it wouldn't be any longer. Priests, probably.
First people deny a thing, then they belittle it, then they say it was known all along! Von Humboldt
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clubs_stink
- Posts: 197
- Joined: Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:43 pm
HUMM seems like some opinions might need to change....
Goseck, Germany (dpa) Archaeologists digging at the place where an amazing Bronze Age disc was found in Germany have turned up a body and remains of a Stone Age building, adding to the riddle around one of the world's biggest archaeological sensations of the past decade.
Andreas Northe, giving the results of this summer's dig on the remote hill in eastern Germany, said, "We found a child's grave, a cache of stone tools and some remains from a long-house."
The dig was done at a spot in a line of sight from the place where amateurs using metal detectors in 1999 found the Nebra celestial disc, a 3,600-year-old depiction of the sun, moon and stars which is believed to be the oldest extant calculator of the seasons.
http://www.eux.tv/article.aspx?articleId=14001
Interesting.
Goseck, Germany (dpa) Archaeologists digging at the place where an amazing Bronze Age disc was found in Germany have turned up a body and remains of a Stone Age building, adding to the riddle around one of the world's biggest archaeological sensations of the past decade.
Andreas Northe, giving the results of this summer's dig on the remote hill in eastern Germany, said, "We found a child's grave, a cache of stone tools and some remains from a long-house."
The dig was done at a spot in a line of sight from the place where amateurs using metal detectors in 1999 found the Nebra celestial disc, a 3,600-year-old depiction of the sun, moon and stars which is believed to be the oldest extant calculator of the seasons.
http://www.eux.tv/article.aspx?articleId=14001
Interesting.
I am in the process of moving all my files from the old system to the new.
I came across this that is relevant.
They are worldwide!
From 6000 (or more) BC to the present day.
How and why?
Stonehenges all around us
Architectural relics and modern structures show that we may not be much different than our ancestors.By Craig Childs
CRAIG CHILDS is the author, most recently, of "House of Rain: Tracking a Vanished Civilization Across the American Southwest."
February 16, 2007
ARCHEOLOGISTS recently discovered what appears to be the other half of Stonehenge, illuminating what they believe is a much larger Neolithic complex than has long been envisioned. What is coming to the surface seems strangely familiar. Looking closely at Stonehenge and other Neolithic sites, we find the formative patterns of our modern world.
Step out of your house and you might notice your street is fixed on a cardinal grid: north, south, east, west. This pattern defines many American and European cities, as well as Neolithic sites such as Anyang in China and the Mexican city of Teotihuacan.
The new discovery, two miles from Stonehenge itself, is an elaborate residential compound now being excavated. It is a site where the builders of Stonehenge may have lived and where pilgrims may have stayed while attending feasts and ceremonies. Fascinating tidbits have been unearthed: a timber version of Stonehenge, evidence of different kinds of occupations in the 4,600-year-old village and a processional "road" leading to the nearby Avon River. These finds add to the picture of an enigmatic Neolithic religion, in which stone-paved roads are aligned with celestial features and great circles frame the rising and setting sun at key times of the year.
This all has an uncanny resemblance to Neolithic sites in different parts of the world. The Big Horn Medicine Wheel in Wyoming, dating back several hundred years, is a complex celestial calendar, its 28 spokes of aligned stones pointing to risings and settings of the sun and various stars. This medicine wheel, in turn, is similar to the Nonakado Stone Circle of Japan, from the 1st millennium BC, where standing stones mark important, calendrical events on the horizon.
My friend and colleague, Kim Malville, recently discovered an Egyptian Stonehenge in the Sahara dating back more than 6,000 years. Malville believes that it acted as both a calendar and a temple for people living along the edge of an ancient lake, and it is the oldest known megalithic site in the world.
My personal favorite Stonehenge look-alike — at least in concept — is in northern New Mexico, where in the 11th century, the Chaco culture built hundreds of miles of processional "roads." Rather than rings of giant standing stones, the Chacoans erected enormous masonry temples known as great houses. Many of these great houses are aligned to view celestial events through portals and windows.
Looking at the way ancient people assembled themselves, archeologists see cults and primitive, celestial religions. But how primitive were these people's beliefs, and how different from them are we?
I once ambled around the Colorado Capitol in Denver with a compass and notebook in hand. I had come to a modern landmark to apply the same questions we had been asking at ancient sites. I found that every aspect of the building's neoclassical architecture has alignments you see at many Neolithic ceremonial centers. Every bench is symmetrically arranged around the cruciform building, which is, in turn, set to cardinal directions. It lies within an array of other government buildings and open processionals, each holding to the same cardinal patterns.
At the Chaco site, certain ruins were found swept clean, while nearby buildings were loaded with trash. The same thing was just unearthed near Stonehenge: some buildings littered with broken pottery and discarded bones — what archeologists believe to be the leavings of feasts and pilgrimage — and others remarkably clean.
Julian Thomas of the University of Manchester commented that these clean rooms near Stonehenge may have belonged to special people, chiefs or priests. He also suggested that they were possibly shrines and cult centers.
That day in Denver, tens of thousands of people were gathered in an open area at the foot of the Capitol for some kind of weekend fair. The atmosphere boomed with music and smelled of food cooking in numerous tents. What was I seeing? Pilgrims, feasts and cult centers? Were the meticulously kept buildings erected for priests and chiefs?
The same kind of architecture can be seen in Washington, where countless astronomical alignments are constructed into the Capitol and its surrounding buildings and monuments. Most recently, Gerald Ford joined a long line of presidents whose bodies have lain in state inside the majestic, symmetrical Rotunda. Will future archeologists imagine the worship of ancient leaders whose bodies were kept within circular chambers before burial?
So often we see ourselves as a lonely, cultural pinnacle, superior beyond all comparison. But if recent excavations at Stonehenge offer anything, they put our era in perspective, reminding us of an unbroken lineage shared across continents and cultures. We are simply an extension of an ancient age, living now in the next lost civilization.
Copyright 2007 Los Angeles Times
A grave for a child is not something someone interested only in day to day survival does.
For sure not with valuable things buried with her!
These people (HS-HE-HN-whatever) had a religion.
And it seems to be across oceans, continents, tribes, societies, even “kinds”.
I came across this that is relevant.
They are worldwide!
From 6000 (or more) BC to the present day.
How and why?
Stonehenges all around us
Architectural relics and modern structures show that we may not be much different than our ancestors.By Craig Childs
CRAIG CHILDS is the author, most recently, of "House of Rain: Tracking a Vanished Civilization Across the American Southwest."
February 16, 2007
ARCHEOLOGISTS recently discovered what appears to be the other half of Stonehenge, illuminating what they believe is a much larger Neolithic complex than has long been envisioned. What is coming to the surface seems strangely familiar. Looking closely at Stonehenge and other Neolithic sites, we find the formative patterns of our modern world.
Step out of your house and you might notice your street is fixed on a cardinal grid: north, south, east, west. This pattern defines many American and European cities, as well as Neolithic sites such as Anyang in China and the Mexican city of Teotihuacan.
The new discovery, two miles from Stonehenge itself, is an elaborate residential compound now being excavated. It is a site where the builders of Stonehenge may have lived and where pilgrims may have stayed while attending feasts and ceremonies. Fascinating tidbits have been unearthed: a timber version of Stonehenge, evidence of different kinds of occupations in the 4,600-year-old village and a processional "road" leading to the nearby Avon River. These finds add to the picture of an enigmatic Neolithic religion, in which stone-paved roads are aligned with celestial features and great circles frame the rising and setting sun at key times of the year.
This all has an uncanny resemblance to Neolithic sites in different parts of the world. The Big Horn Medicine Wheel in Wyoming, dating back several hundred years, is a complex celestial calendar, its 28 spokes of aligned stones pointing to risings and settings of the sun and various stars. This medicine wheel, in turn, is similar to the Nonakado Stone Circle of Japan, from the 1st millennium BC, where standing stones mark important, calendrical events on the horizon.
My friend and colleague, Kim Malville, recently discovered an Egyptian Stonehenge in the Sahara dating back more than 6,000 years. Malville believes that it acted as both a calendar and a temple for people living along the edge of an ancient lake, and it is the oldest known megalithic site in the world.
My personal favorite Stonehenge look-alike — at least in concept — is in northern New Mexico, where in the 11th century, the Chaco culture built hundreds of miles of processional "roads." Rather than rings of giant standing stones, the Chacoans erected enormous masonry temples known as great houses. Many of these great houses are aligned to view celestial events through portals and windows.
Looking at the way ancient people assembled themselves, archeologists see cults and primitive, celestial religions. But how primitive were these people's beliefs, and how different from them are we?
I once ambled around the Colorado Capitol in Denver with a compass and notebook in hand. I had come to a modern landmark to apply the same questions we had been asking at ancient sites. I found that every aspect of the building's neoclassical architecture has alignments you see at many Neolithic ceremonial centers. Every bench is symmetrically arranged around the cruciform building, which is, in turn, set to cardinal directions. It lies within an array of other government buildings and open processionals, each holding to the same cardinal patterns.
At the Chaco site, certain ruins were found swept clean, while nearby buildings were loaded with trash. The same thing was just unearthed near Stonehenge: some buildings littered with broken pottery and discarded bones — what archeologists believe to be the leavings of feasts and pilgrimage — and others remarkably clean.
Julian Thomas of the University of Manchester commented that these clean rooms near Stonehenge may have belonged to special people, chiefs or priests. He also suggested that they were possibly shrines and cult centers.
That day in Denver, tens of thousands of people were gathered in an open area at the foot of the Capitol for some kind of weekend fair. The atmosphere boomed with music and smelled of food cooking in numerous tents. What was I seeing? Pilgrims, feasts and cult centers? Were the meticulously kept buildings erected for priests and chiefs?
The same kind of architecture can be seen in Washington, where countless astronomical alignments are constructed into the Capitol and its surrounding buildings and monuments. Most recently, Gerald Ford joined a long line of presidents whose bodies have lain in state inside the majestic, symmetrical Rotunda. Will future archeologists imagine the worship of ancient leaders whose bodies were kept within circular chambers before burial?
So often we see ourselves as a lonely, cultural pinnacle, superior beyond all comparison. But if recent excavations at Stonehenge offer anything, they put our era in perspective, reminding us of an unbroken lineage shared across continents and cultures. We are simply an extension of an ancient age, living now in the next lost civilization.
Copyright 2007 Los Angeles Times
A grave for a child is not something someone interested only in day to day survival does.
For sure not with valuable things buried with her!
These people (HS-HE-HN-whatever) had a religion.
And it seems to be across oceans, continents, tribes, societies, even “kinds”.