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View Full Version : Gravetop Sundial Reveals Lost Civilization's Tech Savvy



skywizard
9th October 2013, 19:30
http://i.livescience.com/images/i/000/057/688/i02/3-Sundial-discovery-131004.jpg?1381166100
Archaeologists pose with a Bronze Age sundial dating back more than 3,000 years.


A carved stone found marking a Bronze Age grave in the Ukraine is the oldest sundial of its kind ever found, a new study reveals.

The sundial may have marked the final resting place of a young man sacrificed or otherwise marked as a messenger to the gods or ancestors, said study researcher Larisa Vodolazhskaya of the Archaeoastronomical Research Center at Southern Federal Universityin Russia. Vodolazhskaya analyzed the geometry of the tire-size stone and its carvings, confirming the stone would have marked the time using a system of parallel lines and an elliptical pattern of circular depressions.

The elliptical pattern makes the carving an analemmatic sundial. A traditional sundial marks the time using a gnomon, a fixed vertical that casts a shadow. An analemmatic sundial has a gnomon that must move every day of the year to adjust to the changing position of the sun in the sky.

Source: http://www.livescience.com/40227-bronze-age-sundial-grave.html


peace...
skywizard

music
10th October 2013, 01:44
Interesting, thank you. Stonehenge dates back 5000 years, and I think displays as much, probably more tech savvy than a sundial.