Without the detail from Mr Plegge it's difficult to judge . Whilst it is entirely possible that there are astro alignments associated with the enclosures it is worth considering that enclosure D has 13 pillars and enclosure D , 20 neither are greater than 30 m in diameter and the potential for finding “alignments “ if choosing individual pillars as markers is immense .

On 2012-12-24 20:04, jonm wrote:

Quote:

Without the detail from Mr Plegge it's difficult to judge . Whilst it is entirely possible that there are astro alignments associated with the enclosures it is worth considering that enclosure D has 13 pillars and enclosure D , 20 neither are greater than 30 m in diameter and the potential for finding “alignments “ if choosing individual pillars as markers is immense .

On another website, I came across this interesting (and quite old) quote from a chap called Ruggles:

"In the literature on archaeoastronomy, declinations are often quoted to a precision of 0.1 or even greater. However, the quality of the material evidence, together with the fact that the horizon around Stonehenge is relatively close (Cleal et al. 1995, 37) and devoid of prominent distant features interpretable as accurate foresights, do not justify considerations of declination to a precision much greater than the nearest degree, or approximately twice the apparent diameter of the sun or moon. To do otherwise is to risk obscuring any intentional, low-level astronomical effects with meaningless detail."

What do you think of this George? It is taken from the proceedings of the British Academy 1997; a prestigious UK body.

Happy Christmas all

Belief is a hot potato, then as now, and if it is thought that knowledge encoded into stone circles is in any way subversive to the status quo you can have a pretty safe bet on that knowledge remaining illusive. Two thirds of Avebury is still underground or has been destroyed.

I couldn't agree more except to add that the the problem of accepting alignments that are clearly nowhere near a potential target provides the same problem i.e." risk obscuring any intentional, low-level astronomical effects with meaningless detail.".

On 2012-12-25 09:32, jonm wrote:

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I couldn't agree more except to add that the the problem of accepting alignments that are clearly nowhere near a potential target provides the same problem i.e." risk obscuring any intentional, low-level astronomical effects with meaningless detail.".

Thanks George. The phrasing concerned me because it could be used as justification for all sorts of alignments and thus generate meaningless detail. Is this out of context, or is it what Ruggles meant?

On 2012-12-26 02:14, sem wrote:
Having not read any of Mr Ruggles' work, is it possible to enlighten MegP readers as to whether he has tried to view the supposed alignments or has just used mathematics/computer to work out the "angles"? I suspect the latter.
WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) does not only apply to computer printers but also to stone alignments. eg looking at StoneA from StoneB could give a 45deg arc of view, BUT if you look via the notch in StoneB to the notch in StoneA, the line of sight becomes precise..... and when such sightlines are seen, much like a cryptic crossword, the answers are obvious!
Maybe more people should "do a Cerrig" and check out the stones instead of sitting at home and relying on computer-fed info!

I’m assuming that you are concerned with “ intentional , low-level astronomical effects “ .
To be fair to Ruggles these would have to be judged on their merits but the use of “intentional “ provides a clue as to what is likely to be considered and it’s not open house .

Maybe more people should "do a Cerrig" and check out the stones instead of sitting at home and relying on computer-fed info!

I’m assuming that you are concerned with “ intentional , low-level astronomical effects “ .
To be fair to Ruggles these would have to be judged on their merits but the use of “intentional “ provides a clue as to what is likely to be considered and it’s not open house .

On 2012-12-26 10:28, jonm wrote:
This was the thing about the Ruggles quote: Sunrise did not align exactly with the solstice in 2500BC unless the trees on the near horizon were manicured, so until George's comment I thought that the quote could be read as justification for it still being aligned to Solstice, though not exactly.

Mind you, I don't know one way or the other. Perhaps it was intended to be aligned?

Does anyone know what additional justification has been used to confirm the intent of Stonehenge's designers that it aligned to Solstice sunrise? All I've seen are claims that it was so exactly aligned that the intent could not be otherwise.

Jon, the intent is usually seen as the general orientation of the axis of the monument plus the alignment from the centre of the monument following the alignment of the Avenue which is close enough to suggest intentionality .

What benefit is the study of the past to the present? That we might learn from it.

On 2012-12-26 18:44, jonm wrote:

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What benefit is the study of the past to the present? That we might learn from it.

Learning has a benefit but, for example, my son loves learning about Pokemon. There is, at best, only a marginal benefit to learning about Pokemon in my opinion (though I may be biased).

A defined benefit of learning about the past history is that it allows people to do better in the future by understanding how things have worked out in the past. Learning about Pokemon, by comparison, has no real defined benefit.

But is there more, or is that the only basis for trying to understand the past of monuments such as Stonehenge?

On 2012-12-26 18:11, jonm wrote:

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Jon, the intent is usually seen as the general orientation of the axis of the monument plus the alignment from the centre of the monument following the alignment of the Avenue which is close enough to suggest intentionality .

Agreed on that George, but that defines the orientation and that there was an intent. But it does not show what the design intent was. For example:

My house, because the main road of our block runs between two villages, is oriented to the south east; and this is towards a major lunar standstill.

This can be shortened this to: My house is oriented towards a major lunar standstill. Any house, building or monument anywhere in the world, modern or old, can be show to align with some sort of stellar horizon alignment.

Stonehenge's alignment can be shortened to Stonehenge is oriented towards a solstice sunrise , but that's not the same as saying that its designers intended to mark sunrise.


What has made Stonehenge writers so certain that the design intent was to orientate it with solstice sunrise in mind rather than any other design intent?

On 2012-12-26 14:08, megalith6 wrote:


Equally, significant aspects of alignments may have been lost down the millennia. Take that tree hole at Stonehenge for example. I don't go a bundle on the 'totem pole' reading for the car park beams. In relation to Stonehenge in its formative stage - and including the tree they look suspiciously like proto markers to the summer solstice sunset to me?

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SQpZNR9UNmc/T_rllfDJMDI/AAAAAAAAA5o/sMh8N2_tfuI/s1600/Stonehenge+Carpark+postholes.jpg

Ric

[ This message was edited by: megalith6 on 2012-12-26 14:09 ]

[ This message was edited by: megalith6 on 2012-12-26 19:01 ]

Stonehenge architecturally could have had it’s axis facing any direction but 1) it faced towards the solstice , 2) the southern extreme of the entrance with it's outlying stones was also aligned towards the solstice but possibly more importantly 3) the avenue stretching for 500 m maintaining the same solstitial orientation was 4) in line with the entrance and aligned within 1.7m with the 5) the centre of the Aubrey Holes 6) the centre of the Sarsen circle and 7) centre of the bluestone circle . 8)From the centre point the solstice would be seen framed between lintelled Sarsens 30 and 1 with the possibility of the Heel Stone and a companion stone providing further framing of the rising solstice sun .

There are few major monuments like Stonehenge but some of the major monuments do appear to have alignments on solstices e.g. Newgrange , Maes Howe being the most obvious .