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 Head To Head The Modern Antiquarian City of Glasgow Forum | Start a topic | Search |
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tiompan wrote: Evergreen Dazed wrote: tiompan wrote: One of the major problems in archaeoastronomy is that of intentionality i.e. it’s all very well noting a possible “alignment “ but was it the intention of the builders ?. The Sighthill circle presents a rare opportunity to discover the intentions of a builder and we discover that it was never the intention to align the circle with the The Univeristy of Glasgow Tower ,a prominent building to the west . The interesting thing is that from the circle at equinoxes the sun is seen to set over Creuch Hill 33 miles to the west but the Uni tower is bang on line . If this was a prehistoric circle and the Uni Tower a prominent standing stone or monument would anyone be convinced that the “alignment “ wasn’t intended? Great point Tiompan. I suppose then you look to see how many times an equinox alignment occurs in other monuments and if the number is greater than 'luck', it becomes significant or more likely to be intentional. Not sure I get your point ED . In this case it's what most people would accept as an alignment ,if we pretend that the circle and tower were prehistoric monumnets , but we know it was never intended . Alignments in general can be contentious ,then there is the added problem of intention , is the type of alignment found elsewhere in similar circumstances etc . If we were aware of Sighthill being a modern circle but didn't have the builders intentions then it would make sense to see the Uni alignment as being intended as that is the the sort of thing that late 20 th C punters believed happened at stone circles . Realistically , how many genuine stone circles have genuine alignments to equinoxes ? If it's a case of sighting from one stone to another then you can find anything you like particularly when the number of stones and diameter make it easy but archaeoastronomers don't accept that type of thinking . My point was that I agree that if the circle was prehistoric rather than modern and the uni tower a menhir, we would most likely be thinking it an intentional alignment on the equinox by the builders, and your post was highlighting that error, in order to say, essentially, don't be too hasty in presuming intention, even when there are seemingly intentional alignments as they may be coincidence. I was simply suggesting that surely we test intentionality in prehistoric sites (where we can't be certain from just one site) by seeing if other sites have the same characteristics, and if a number of sites share similar alignments (LBs east/west for example, or even better the Scottish recumbents with their S/SW emphasis) we can feel reasonably confident the alignments were intended. Reply | with quote |  7th January 2013ce 22:50 In reply to: Re: Save Sighthill Stone Circle (tiompan) |
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