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Re: Britain's Ancient Capital: Secrets Of Orkney
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tiompan wrote:
Evergreen Dazed wrote:
tiompan wrote:
Just had another look at Thornborough central in relation to the paper .
What is clear is that if there is any astronomy related to the entrances the moon is a far more likely than the sun .
The observation point is considered to be from the centre of the monument , a fair enough possibility in itself but the opposite terminal could also be a possibility although there is not much difference in the width of the horizon between the two choices But as noted earlier the view that is included in the assessment is actually over parts of the bank providing a much wider horizon than is suggested by the gaps between the terminals , which are pretty wide (16 -20 wide gaps don't provide the kind of limits of the passage of a passage grave or through stones onto the Avenue at Stonehenge ) . Why did they extend the view to include looking over the bank rather than than in the most obvious one of between the terminals ? I would have thought that the bank terminals make the most sensible point to choose as the limits for observing ,with a choice of looking straight down the centre or the four possible choices of the terminal to terminal when looking in one direction . But if you do that , you don't get a view of the solstice ,as that occurs over the bank , not in the gap , when looking in both directions , but you do get a an orientation towards the standstills , in both directions . Hope this is not too confusing .


A little yes, but all good!

From what you're saying it seems to me that, if there was any intention at all, it wasn't for the solstice. I think you said earlier that intention for the standstill would be unlikely because of the difficulties in calculating, so it would seem reasonable to conclude there was no intention for astro alignments at all?

I think you said the cursus east to solstice sunrsie wasn't mentioned in the paper, does that mean the bit regarding the setting of the 3 stars that make up orions belt to the cursus west is also not there?
Hard to imagine where that came from if nothing in it.
Do you have the software to have a look?


Yes , in my estimation the solstice to the south is unlikely, as well as to the north , which I don't believe they make any claim for .

Recording minor standstill has produced a lot of scepticism among astronomers , but not major standstills ,and it is major standstills that can be seen to fit the bill here i.e. decs of -30 and +28 (unlike solstices standstills have different decs for north and south ). Dunno if they conflated the two or just didn't want to consider he moon , it's not that difficult to find the standstill orientation as it's not a one off event as it takes place over a period although you would have to compare notes from earlier recordings (18 years earlier ) .
So, if you accept the possibility of recording major lunar standstills between the terminals of henges, Thornborough has a much better case going for it than solstices .

I seem to remember a problem about Orion and Thornborough (not just another Giza type correlation theory )but it was in some Knight and Lomas
book .
If I get a chance I'll see what they are saying in the paper .



It looks like you can get info on this one on the web .
http://megalithicscience.org/i[...]-the-moon-s-maximum-standstill .

That is more like it, some salt needed for other bits and no mention of the possible orientation to the south .

There is a further potential problem re. the solstice (related to the original paper )too.


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tiompan
Posted by tiompan
31st January 2017ce
15:40

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