Ice Age Astronomers



Taken from: http://www.archeociel.com/Accueil_eng.htm

[We (AMAIC) would query date of 35,000 years ago].

....



Welcome to the site of Chantal Jègues-Wolkiewiez, independent researcher, PhD in Humanities, Anthropologist, Ethno-astronomer and psychologist






This site presents the main results obtained during fifteen years of investigations. First, since 1992, it was the Vallée des Merveilles, a site full of cave engravings from the Chalcolithic period and from the Ancient Bronze Age, located in the Maritime-Alps. Later, starting from 1998, a study of the caves and Paleolithic ornamented shelters in France (Ornamented caves and shelters Atlas), and other different caves recently discovered.



My works belong to the Archeoastronomy and ethno-astronomy domains. Through several studies together with geographical and astronomical orientation measurements made in the field, which were later related with the specific celestial coordinates of each period, these disciplines succeeded to establish the observations and celestial knowledge achieved by the human groups that created the works founded in the site.

About archeoastronomy: http://www.wam.umd.edu/~tlaloc/archastro/cfaar_as.html



My researches tend to prove that as well as the Paleolithic works date from 35000 years ago (the Blanchard shelter bone in Sergeac en Dordogne), the works founded in the Vallée des Merveilles show precise and meticulous observations of the solar, lunar and stellar cycles. They reveal unsuspected astronomical knowledge in periods as ancient as the Aurignacienne era. All this knowledge was indispensable for the survival of Occidental Europe’s first habitants. It allowed them, for example, to anticipate season changes with the deriving modifications in their vital environment as animal migration.



However, beyond that, these parietal works, furniture, caves, could reveal the link between the sequence of seasonal celestial cycles and the foundational myths of the Indo-European civilizations, myths that we will find later in ancient Egypt or in Mesopotamia, Greece, Etruria and more.



By presenting here my results I wish sincerely that they will be discussed, verified or infirmed. I hope above all that these hypotheses will serve as parting points for future interdisciplinary works, carried over by other people. When coming to the hyper-specialization of researches, these works will be able to conciliate between two disciplines that tend to ignore and even turn their backs on each other: The astronomy and the prehistory, on the expense of the comprehension of the major sites of our prehistoric patrimony. Can a future dialogue contribute to the discovering of the meaning of the deep mystery bequeathed by our ancestors in the form of signs, painted animals, engraved or sculptured in the depths of the ornamented caves…



I would like to thank all the scientists and sites owners for allowing me to have the access to all these fascinating research fields and to the researches from the different disciplines that believed in my capacity for getting onto these questions with the double vision of an ethnologist and astronomer, even though I do not belong to any research laboratory. Following their suggestions, their lectures, critics of my studies or articles, and the conversations we had, they helped me to progress on the difficult path of the comprehension of our ancestor’s astronomic motivations. I’m thinking about: Emannuel Anati, CCSP’s Director, Capo di Ponte, Italy; Christian Archambeau, Dordogne’s regional curator; René Castanet and his grand-daughter Isabelle, Pre-historians and owners of the Castel-Merle site; Jean Clottes, Patrimony General Curator; Christine and Hubert de Commarque owners of the Commarque caves and castle; Annie Echassoux, Maritime-Alps departmental archeologist; Pierre Erny, Ethnologist; The Corte Faculty and the Ajaccio amateur astronomers, who created the ARKEORB program: Antoine Ottavi, François Radureau and Jean-Pierre Boyer. Jean-Michel Geneste, Lascaux’s cave curator, and Prehistory National Director; Brian Hayden, Archeologist of the Simon Fraser University; Jean-Pierre Jardel, Professor of Ethnology Laboratory of Nice Sophia Antipolis, Gérard Jasniewicz, Languedoc Astronomy and Astrophysics research group Director; Jean Michel Le Contel, Astronomer, CNRS research director; Yannick Le Guillou, Pre-historian, Mid-Pyrennees curator; Henry de Lumley, Archeologist, Natural History Museum’s Director; Jean Malaurie, Geographer, arctic studies director for EHESS; Catherine Schwab, Paleolithic collections Director in the National Antiquity Museum; Robert Triomphe, Linguistic.



Chantal Jègues-Wolkiewiez, France



Abstracts and Publications (Paleolithic period)



- “Lascaux, View of the Magdalenian Sky” Abstract: In 1999, it was found that the setting sun during the summer solstice entered the cave, illuminating the paintings on this one occasion in the year, a revolutionary discovery for the perception of this art, which was considered above all as art that existed in the darkness. It was also calculated that the paintings in the Lascaux cave were the image of the Palaeolithic sky.



Publication: Val Camonica 2000 Symposium of Cave Art, Italy. “Lascaux, View of the Magdalenian Sky”, Prehistoric and tribal art, Conserving and safeguarding messages, 10/11/2000.



- “Chronology of the orientation of painted caves and shelters in the French Palaeolithic”

Abstract : Measurements of 130 caves in the south of France showed that all are oriented in the direction of important solar points: sunrise and sunset at summer and winter solstice and spring and autumn equinox. It was also showed a relationship between the way in which some animals were painted (fur colour, erection) and the season when the sun illuminated the cave: summer for animals painted with a summer coat, winter for animals with winter coats.



Publication: Val Camonica 2007 Symposium of Cave Art, Italy. “Chronology of the orientation of painted caves and shelters in the French Palaeolithic” (pages 225-239), 19/05/2007.



- “The roots of astronomy, or the hidden order of a Palaeolithic work”

Abstract : Measurements on a small bone, with 69 engraved incisions made 32,000 years ago in the “Abri Blanchard”, Dordogne, associated with calculations of the moon’s position in the Palaeolithic sky, showed that the 69 incisions corresponded to the trajectory of the moon over a 69-day period. This is an important revelation, that indicates astronomical knowledge in very ancient periods: it was hitherto thought that the origins of astronomy were to be found in Babylonian culture, 6000 years ago.



Publication: “The roots of astronomy, or the hidden order of a Palaeolithic work” (in Les Antiquités Nationales, tome 37 pages 43 - 52), February 2007.









--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



" Whilst other animals lean towards the soil and only have eyes for it, man (the creator) turns his face towards the sky which proposes to him the contemplation and invites him to raise his vision towards the stars "

(Ovid, Metamorphosis, I.V. 84-86)











Cette page a été mise à jour le 05 mars 2012.

Stone Age People Not Ignorant: Challenge to Evolutionary View



Taken from: http://www.spacetoday.org/SolSys/Earth/OldStarCharts.html



The Planet Earth:


Carved and Drawn Prehistoric Maps of the Cosmos





Ancient star chart carved in ivory mammoth tusk

[Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies]

A European researcher has interpreted carvings in a 32,500-year-old ivory tablet as a pattern of the same stars that we see in the sky today in the constellation Orion.



The tablet is a sliver of ivory from the tusk of a mammoth — a large woolly animal like an elephant. Mammoths are extinct today.



Carved into the ivory is what appears to be a carving of a human figure with outstretched arms and legs. The pose suggests the stars of Orion, according to Michael Rappenglueck, formerly of the University of Munich, known for his interpretation of ancient star charts painted on walls of prehistoric caves.



The ivory tablet has notches carved on its sides and back, which are not understood but might be an ancient pregnancy calendar to estimate when a woman would give birth.



The tiny piece of ivory was in a cave in the Ach Valley in the Alb-Danube region of Germany when it was discovered in 1979. Scientists used a process known as carbon dating to check the age of bone ash found next to the tablet. Carbon dating is used to determine the age of an old material by measuring its content of carbon 14. Results of carbon dating tests on the nearby bone ash suggested that the tablet might be between 32,500 and 38,000 years old. If correct, that would make it one of the oldest drawings of a human ever found.



Stone Age people. The tablet probably was carved by a member of the Aurignacian people. Little is known about Aurignacians, except that they moved into Europe from the east replacing the Neanderthals who had been living there.

Neanderthals were the original Stone Age "cavemen" who occupied Europe and parts of Asia and north Africa for 150,000 years before modern humans arrived. They made stone tools and other artifcats. Neanderthals now are an extinct human species.

Aurignacians were similar early humans. Like Neanderthals, they made stone tools as well as figures of stone and bone, graphic artwork, and clothing with adornment.

The Stone Age was a time when the earliest chipped stone tools were made, from about 750,000 years ago to about 15,000 years ago. That was a time when northern glaciers appeared and receded. Species related to humans were widespread. By the end of the period, numerous land mammals, such as mammoths, mastodons and saber-toothed tigers, had become extinct.

A tiny artifact. The ivory tablet is small, measuring a mere 1.5 x 0.5 x 0.2 inches. The archaeologists working with it say they think that was its original size and that it is not a fragment of a larger artifact.

A human figure with legs apart and arms raised is on one side of the tablet. The figure's waist is narrow and its left leg is shorter than the right. Between the legs may be a sword.





The human figure could be a person praying or dancing. It could be half-man, half-cat. It might represent a god. By the very definition of pre-history, archaeologists don't know the myths of those ancient peoples who lived before humans started keeping records — before they started recording history.

Orion. Orion is one of the most noticeable constellations in Earth's sky. Betelguese is one of two prominent stars in Orion. Ancient Egyptians identified their god Osiris with Orion. In fact, Orion has had special significance for many cultures throughout history.



The Orion constellation is known to stargazers today as "the hunter." Does the ivory tablet depict the constellation of Orion as it was 32,000 years ago? Did the Aurignacian people also call it the hunter?



Michael Rappenglueck sees in the proportions of the human figure on the table a pattern corresponding to the pattern of stars that form the Orion constellation. He points out the slim waist, which corresponds to a belt of three stars crossing Orion. And, the left "leg" of the hunter in the constellation is shorter. The sword, which may hang between the legs of the figure on the ivory tablet, might correspond with a feature of the Orion constellation.



Pregnancy calendar. The 86 notches on the tablet may relate to the human gestation period.



The number 86 might have two significant meanings:

First, 86 is the number of days that must be subtracted from a year to equal the average number of days of human gestation.





Second, 86 is the number of days that the Orion star Betelguese is visible. Could this have linked human fertility with gods in the sky in the minds of the Aurignacian people?



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------





Ice Age Map of the Night Sky Painted in French Cave





Lascaux Caves ancient painted star map

[Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies]

A painted map of the prehistoric cosmos is on the wall of a famous Ice Age cave at Lascaux in central France.



Cro-magnon man — distant ancestors of humans living much later than the earlier Neanderthals and Aurignacians — painted the Lascaux caves with drawings of bulls, horses and antelope some 16,500 years ago. Thus, the map may be 16,500 years old.



The Ice Ages were cold periods in ancient history when glaciers descended across the northern continents and then receded. The temperatures experienced by humans and their ancestors alternated between cold and warm. Scientists say there have been at least four Ice Ages. Today, when people speak of "the Ice Age," they usually refer to the most recent glacial period, which ended about 8,000 years ago.



Summer Triangle. The painted walls of the Lascaux caves were discovered in 1940. The sky map was identified year later in a region of the Lascaux caves known as the Shaft of the Dead Man. Painted on to the wall of the shaft is a bull, a strange bird-man and a mysterious bird on a stick.



Since it was in the time we call pre-history — before people started recording history — no one knows if a cave could have been used as a kind of planetarium where stars were charted.



European researcher Michael Rappenglueck, however, suggests that it is a map of three particular stars — Vega, Deneb, Altair — that astronomers today refer to the Summer Triangle. Those stars are among the brightest objects in the sky during the middle of a northern summer. Rappenglueck sees the eyes of the bull, bird-man and bird as representing Vega, Deneb and Altair.



More palaeolithic shamanistic cosmography. A map that looks like the Pleiades star cluster also has been spotted among the Lascaux frescoes. Another pattern of stars, drawn some 14,000 years ago, has been found in a cave in Spain.





--------------------------------------------------------------------------------





Oldest Lunar Calendar Painted in a Lascaux Cave





Lascaux Caves ancient painted lunar map

[Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies]

A dappled brown horse with dark mane painted on the wall of the prehistoric Lascaux caves in France 15,000 years ago might be part of the oldest lunar calendar.



German researcher Michael Rappenglueck has interpreted the painting as symbolic of the phases of the Moon. He sees groups of dots and squares painted by Cro-magnon man alongside images of bulls, horses and antelope as depicting the 29-day cycle of Earth's natural satellite.



Cro-magnon man. Cro-magnon man thrived during the Ice Age by living in the temperate Dordogne Valley while the rest of Europe was held in the grip of an ice age.



Dordogne is a river flowing from the Auvergne Mountains of south-central France 300 miles southwest to the Garonne River north of Bordeaux.



To protect the Lascaux caves from trampling by 21st century tourists, only a replica called Lascaux II is open to the public.



Phases of the Moon. One Lascaux painting of a deer is above a line of 13 dots. Rappenglueck sees those dots as picturing half of the Moon's monthly cycle. Thirteen dots would be one for each day the Moon can be seen in the sky. At the new Moon, when it vanishes from the sky, there is an empty square, symbolizing the absent Moon.



Beneath the dappled brown horse is a row of 29 dots — one for each day of the Moon's 29-day cycle as it passes through its phases in the sky. A series of dots that curve away from the main row might represent the time of the new Moon, when it disappears from the sky for several days.





--------------------------------------------------------------------------------





Seven Sisters are Mapped in a Lascaux Cave





Seven Sisters star map in Lascaux cave [Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies]

Dots near a drawing of a Bull in the Lascaux cave may chart the cluster of stars modern astronomers call the Seven Sisters. Inside the bull are more spots that may represent other stars found in the same region of the sky.



Is the bull significant? Modern astronomers say this part of the sky is the constellation known as Taurus the Bull. Could ancient relatives of humans also have seen a pattern of stars that looked like a bull in that area of the sky 14,000 years ago?



Ancient Spanish star map. A map that may depict the Northern Crown constellation is painted on the wall of the Frieze of Hands area of the Cueva di El Castillo cave in the mountains of Pico del Castillo in Spain.







--------------------------------------------------------------------------------





Moon Stone Lunar Map in Ireland



What may be the oldest map of the Moon ever made is inside a 5,000-year-old Neolithic burial mound at Knowth in County Meath, Ireland. The few who have seen them in modern times say the crescent shapes seen in the pre-historic tombs are images of the Moon.



The burial complex at Knowth is the largest ancient monument in Ireland with many stone engravings and artifacts. It has the largest collection of megalithic art in Europe, including the circular and spiral patterns that may be lunar symbols. The mound's two tunnels are the longest cairn passages in Europe.



A tall chamber at the heart of the mound houses the map of the Moon that is reputed to be ten times older than any other.



The Neolithic lunar map was etched in the stone, named Orthostat 47, by pitting the rock with a lump of quartz. Carved into the rock are dark spots like those seen on the face of the Moon with the naked eye.



Stars and crescents representing the Moon also are on a large stone basin in a recess off the central chamber.





--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Learn more:

Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies



Michael A. Rappenglueck, M.A.



The Cave of Lascaux



Paleolithic Shamanistic Cosmography: How is the Famous Rock Picture in the Shaft of the Lascaux Grotto to be Decoded? by Michael A. Rappenglueck, M.A.

Ancient Written Words Found on Shroud of Turin

POPE-SHROUD Jul-27-2009 (560 words) xxxi

Pope confirms visit to Shroud of Turin; new evidence on shroud emerges

By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI confirmed his intention to visit the Shroud of Turin when it goes on public display in Turin's cathedral April 10-May 23, 2010.

Cardinal Severino Poletto of Turin, papal custodian of the Shroud of Turin, visited the pope July 26 in Les Combes, Italy, where the pope was spending part of his vacation. The Alpine village is about 85 miles from Turin.

The cardinal gave the pope the latest news concerning preparations for next year's public exposition of the shroud and the pope "confirmed his intention to go to Turin for the occasion," said the Vatican spokesman, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, in a written statement July 27.

The specific date of the papal visit has yet to be determined, the priest added.

The last time the Shroud of Turin was displayed to the public was in 2000 for the jubilee year. The shroud is removed from a specially designed protective case only for very special spiritual occasions, and its removal for study or display to the public must be approved by the pope.

The shroud underwent major cleaning and restoration in 2002.

According to tradition, the 14-foot-by-4-foot linen cloth is the burial shroud of Jesus. The shroud has a full-length photonegative image of a man, front and back, bearing signs of wounds that correspond to the Gospel accounts of the torture Jesus endured in his passion and death.

The church has never officially ruled on the shroud's authenticity, saying judgments about its age and origin belonged to scientific investigation. Scientists have debated its authenticity for decades, and studies have led to conflicting results.

A recent study by French scientist Thierry Castex has revealed that on the shroud are traces of words in Aramaic spelled with Hebrew letters.

A Vatican researcher, Barbara Frale, told Vatican Radio July 26 that her own studies suggest the letters on the shroud were written more than 1,800 years ago.

She said that in 1978 a Latin professor in Milan noticed Aramaic writing on the shroud and in 1989 scholars discovered Hebrew characters that probably were portions of the phrase "The king of the Jews."

Castex's recent discovery of the word "found" with another word next to it, which still has to be deciphered, "together may mean 'because found' or 'we found,'" she said.

What is interesting, she said, is that it recalls a passage in the Gospel of St. Luke, "We found this man misleading our people," which was what several Jewish leaders told Pontius Pilate when they asked him to condemn Jesus.

She said it would not be unusual for something to be written on a burial cloth in order to indicate the identity of the deceased.

Frale, who is a researcher at the Vatican Secret Archives, has written a new book on the shroud and the Knights Templar, the medieval crusading order which, she says, may have held secret custody of the Shroud of Turin during the 13th and 14th centuries.

She told Vatican Radio that she has studied the writings on the shroud in an effort to find out if the Knights had written them.

"When I analyzed these writings, I saw that they had nothing to do with the Templars because they were written at least 1,000 years before the Order of the Temple was founded" in the 12th century, she said.

END

---

Copyright (c) 2009 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
CNS · 3211 Fourth St NE · Washington DC 20017 · 202.541.3250