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 Re: A shot in the dark 85 messages | Select a forum: |
| The East end analogy is a good one, though it’s not quite the same as the (sacrificial) bog body phenomenon. The Whitechapel killings (assuming it’s Whitechapel here :-) took place in a relatively small area, and over a very short period (1888, plus a year or two more maybe). Bog body sacrifices are found throughout northern Europe and lasted for some sixteen hundred years. Though it’s likely some bog bodies were the result of non-sacrificial practices (execution of criminals/enemies) there’s enough evidence from other bodies that bogs and rivers held considerable significance, as well as a shared belief system, that was maintained over considerable distances and time. Along with that we have votive offerings, as well as people, being cast into these places (portals to the underworld?) as acts of contrition, appeasement or just requests for good fortune. All that adds up to a shared belief system, and one that certainly seems to have been at work with human sacrifices – ie as is evident in that some of the bodies appear, “...consistently to have been members of the upper class: their fingernails are manicured, and tests on hair protein routinely record good nutrition.” (Wiki). All this might not be proof positive that (all) bog bodies were the result of sacrificial killings but there’s enough evidence to suggest that some of them certainly were. Ditto the three ancient stone foundations in the shape of a cross analogy; I placed those three foundations some 5,000 years hence when, “...‘archaeologists'... stumbled on three – just three - ancient stone foundations in a relatively small area, and all in the shape of a cross, with the longest section of the cross aligned roughly east-west (in all three)... [In those circumstances] it’d be reasonable for them to assume that the shape and positioning of the foundations had meaning for their builders, and that those structures might once have been part of some sort of belief system... more especially if there were human remains in or nearby the foundations.” Perhaps I wasn’t being too clear there – I was picturing a scenario where the archaeologists (maybe alien archaeologists would have been better :-) had no information (certainly not masons’ accounts, architectural records or a big book) other than the ancient stone foundations in front of them. Just foundations on which to hypothesise what the structures might once have been and what they might once have meant. Given that was all they (the aliens) did have to go on (foundations, aligned in a certain way) I don’t think it unreasonable that they would conclude that the original structures had once been part of a shared belief system. I didn’t actually mention churches in the above scenario by the way, though it would be natural for our alien archaeologists to assume (as did you :-) from the sketchy evidence before them that the foundations were indeed the remnants of buildings belonging to a shared belief system. Reply | with quote |  28th July 2012ce 16:48 In reply to: Re: A shot in the dark (thesweetcheat) |
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