Ancient Sky
Astronomy is the first science of humankind as well as it was religious, mystical phenomena and a basis for clocks, calendars and used as a navigational compass.
The origins of astronomy emerged in the surprisingly complex and affluent societies of Egypt and Babylon.
Like any other civillization, patterns in the sky sparked the Egyptians’ creation for myths to explain the world they lived in and how the universe worked. They even constructed the oldest known astronomically aligned megaliths in Napta Playa, first discovered in 1974, was most probably a giant calendar to identify the summer solstice.
They built huge pyramids and temples based on astronomical positions. An example of this is the “Orion Correlation Theory” (OCT). Robert Bauval, wrote ‘The Orion Mystery’ in which he observed that the three stars in Orion’s Belt are not precisely in a straight line, and he noticed, that the Pyramids of Giza were not aligned. According to Bauval e Gilbert (1994), a coincidence exists between the mutual positions of the three stars of the Orion Belt and those of the main Giza pyramids, so that the latter would represent the monumental reproduction on the ground of that important asterism. This idea was widely discussed and critisized by many authors up to day.
Egyptian astronomy was not solely religious, but also practical.
Considering the importance of farming, lives of people were dominated by the cycles of the Nile and the flooding period. Solution to this unpredictability was found when they noticed that this flooding took place once the Sirius rose heliacally. So the heliacal rising of Sirius could be used as an anchor to their calendar.
Egyptian lunar calendar consisted of 12 months and about 11 days and they devised a calendar in which Sirius always rised in the 12th month. If any given year Sirius rose in the 12th month, it would rise again next year in the same month. However, the lunar year was 10–11 days shorter than the solar year, so if Sirius rose late in the 12th month, following year it would rise after the month had ended. To prevent this from happening, a 13th month was “intercalated” every everal years to keep the calendar in correspondance with their agricultural seasons.
This calendar was most probably more than enough for religious festivals or floods of the Nile, but it was not enough for the administration of such a complex and highly organized society. So they devised a “civil” calendar which consisted of exact 12 months, each of the weeks of 10 days and an additional 5 days in the end of the year.
The Egyptians were handicapped by the undeveloped geometric and arithmetic skills.
Primitive condition of their geometric and arithmetic skills prevented them from developing a deeper understanding of the subtle movements of stars. We know today that Egyptians’ calculations had small errors in the alignments. However, they were also highly affected by the Babylonian astronomy which was based on extremely complex calculations.
By the second century BCE, Babylonian astronomy and astrology had spread in Egypt and likewise Babylonians, Egyptians had started to produce (primitive version of the) horoscopes for the fate of the newborns. A recent study shows that Egyptians successfully computed the position of Mercury thanks to methods originated in Babylonia.
Babylonian astrologers created the foundation for what would become Hellenistic and Greek astrological practices.
Around 4000 years ago, Babylonians documented movements of sun and moon accurately. Even they are known to be the first to document Hailey’s comet. Remarkable achievements of Babylonians in astronomy were based on 2 things: First is the brilliant technique for arithmetical notation they inherited from Sumerians. Second is their detailed daily, monthly and yearly recording system.
Today we use decimal number system and we have numbers from 0 to 9 to count. They used a sexadecimal system (system with the base of 60 instead of 10 we use today) which gave them a unique accuracy and versality for their calculations. Even today we write angles in sexadecimal degrees and guess time in hours, minutes and seconds.
Detailed recording system of Babylonians was most probably developed by their court officials that were on alert of omens of all kinds.
Omens were a crucial piece of ancient Mesopotamian religious life, and these omens were viewed as prophetic messages that were received directly from deities. In the context of astrology, detailed lists of omens were created based on predictive astronomical events. They kept records of unfortunate events as much and as systematically as possible to learn from experience and warn the king about any possible unfortunate event.
If the omen occurred again in the future they would know that they got the warning so the appropriate ritual for the plenatary gods could be performed. Many of these omens were related to birth, so a primitive version of horoscopes was developed — even some of the ideas are the same with the horoscopes of 21st century. Here is an example of an omen:
“If it is a double foetus with one head, a double spine, eight feet, two necks and two tails, the king will enlarge his land.“
Two examples of omen tablets:
They also kept records of astronomical and meteorological phenomena.
For centuries they recorded the movements of celestial bodies. Hence, slowly, cycles in the movements of the Sun, Moon and planets began to emerge from records. Thanks to the help of their number system, the scribes devised arithmetical techniques to predict the future positions of the celestial bodies. For instance, to approximate the accelarating and deccalerating movements of the sun, they devised two techniques: One is 2 uniform speeds for the each half of the year and steady increase and decrease in the speed.
Unfortunately, only fragments of their astronomical accumulation had survived but Babyonian astronomy is considered as the first successful attempt to give computational meaning to astronomical phenomena and created the fundamentals for the Hellenistic, Islamic and Indian worlds.
References and Further Reading:
[1] Ancient Cultures and How They Shaped Astronomy.
[2] A consideration of Babylonian astronomy within the historiography of science
[4] Philosophy before the Greeks:The Pursuit of Truth in Ancient Babylonia
[5] The Relation of Babylonian Astronomy to its Culture and Society
[6] Babylonian-Assyrian Birth-Omens and Their Cultural Significance
[7] Babylonian Astrological Omens and Their Stars
[8] Nabta Playa and the Ancient Astronomers of the Nubian Desert
[9] Omens in the Stars: A Brief History of Babylonian Astrology
[10] A quantitative astronomical analysis of the Orion Correlation Theory
[11] The Orion mystery: unlocking the secrets of the Pyramids
[12] The Cambridge Concise History of Astronomy
APPENDIX
Omen tablets (Figure 5 and Figure 6).
Retrieved from www.mesopotamia.co.uk
Lines 8 to 26 read:
8. If a normal disk is very dark and its luminosity is very dirty: the king will not show mercy to his country, he will capture his people.
9. If a normal disk is present and one disk stands to the right: one from among the king’s relief troops will take the throne.
10. If a normal disk is present and one disk stands to the left: from the throne of your relief troops the king of Amurru will rebel.
If a normal disk is present and one disk stands to the right (and) one to the left: if the king treats the city and his people kindly for reconciliation and they become reconciled, the cities will start vying with each other, city walls will be destroyed, the people will be dispersed.
22. If seven disks rise: a village dweller will take the throne, the king’s country will rebel against him and he will be besieged and killed.
23. If on the first of Nisannu two disks come up, the king will die.
24. If on the eleventh of Nisannu three disks come up: a large army will perish.
25. If on the twelfth of Nisannu five disks come up, the king will go into exile.
26. If on the fifteenth or fourteenth of Nisannu five disks come up: business will be reduced.
Lines 2 to 8 read:
2. If in Nisannu the sunrise (looks) sprinkled with blood and the light is cool: rebellion will not stop in the country, there will be devouring by Adad.
3. If in Nisannu the normal sunrise (looks) sprinkled with blood: battles
4. If in Nisannu the normal sunrise (looks) sprinkled with blood: there will be battles in the country.
5. If on the first day of Nisannu the sunrise (looks) sprinkled with blood: grain will vanish in the country, there will be hardship and human flesh will be eaten.
6. If on the first day of Nisannu the sunrise (looks) sprinkled with blood and the light is cool: the king will die and there will be mourning in the country.
7. If it becomes visible on the second day and the light is cool: the king’s … high official will die and mourning will not stop in the country.
8. If the sunrise (looks) sprinkled with blood on the third day: an eclipse will take place.
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Thank you for reading.
