| Popis: |
The central themes of archaeoastronomy are the relationships that people have seen between themselves and the heavens and the ways in which these relationships have been reflected in archeological remains. The related study of ancient astronomy needs to be integrated with all available relevant information on myths and religious practices in as clear a cultural context as possible. In many cases, myths provide a descriptive account of astronomical processes or events, related to behavioral patterns of the particular group. We have found that the purposes of ancient astronomy tend to fall in the general areas of calendrics, navigation, and astrology. In this section, we draw attention to notable similarities and differences among cultures around the world and offer some interpretations of the patterns we recognize. The major difficulties of interpretation lie in deciding what material is relevant. If we try to interpret a myth astronomically when it had no astronomical referent, we distort both the myth and our perception of the culture. If a myth has a deliberate astronomical component and we do not study it, we lose culturally important information. Similarly, we know that many cultures created structures with deliberately incorporated astronomical alignments, sometimes with a high degree of precision, and sometimes loosely. We also know that there is great variation in the degree of interest in such alignments in different cultures, and that there are a tremendous number of possible alignments. |
