Archaeologia Baltica

Apart from being a status marker with strong ritual connotations it is suggested that the horse in prehistory is a liminal agent between sea and land. As gender he represents land. The ship is as female as the sea. But the gender is contextual and culture specific. The connections of the horse with the ship are attributed to the opposition between the two elements. Since this opposition belongs to maritime cultures in the North the structural “cosmology” in question may have filtered over also to inland agrarian conditions. Symbols are polysemic and may even have represented different things to different social classes, like in recent times.

This work extends to Mesoamerica researches on archaic geometry previously performed on architectures of the “Old World”. CAD (Computer Aided Design ) tools are used to fit theoretical forms to spatial segments on archaeological plans. The analyses provide quantitative information on the forms, on the numbers involved and on the units of length used. Everywhere, numbers appear mainly to be multiples of 9, 10 and 13, rather than pertaining to Squaring Triads, although these are nonetheless attested in all regions. Three units of length are found: a “Teotihuacán unit” t ≈ 0.58 m, a “Monte Albán unit” ma ≈ 0.50 m and a “Chichen Itza unit” ci ≈ 0.66 m. Units t and ma clearly appear to be linked to the distances between the main monuments, associated with the Tzolkin calendrical numbers 13-20 at Teotihuacán and with the Haab calendrical numbers 18-20 at Monte Albán.

Characteristics of Andean huacas are summarized with examples from Urubamba, Machu Picchu, Llactapata, and Chankillo. We identify the pillars on the ridge above the town of Urubamba as a marker of June solstice sunrise to be viewed from the Palace of Huayna Capac. Both ends of the sightline connecting the pillars and the Palace appear to have been huacas. The large carved Intiwatana stone in the Urubamba canyon symbolically ties together Machu Picchu and the nearby ceremonial center of Llactapata. The astronomically complex site of Chankillo includes evidence for ceremonial observations of the solstices and shamanic ritual, set within a large-scale geometry established by June solstice sunset/December solstice sunrise.

The paper suggests that The Book of Esther contains astronomical and chronological information associated with the reign of Artaxerxes II. It further investigates a play on dates concerning an intercalary 12th Hebrew month and the eve of Passover, and possible mathematical references to Ancient Near Eastern and Jewish calendars.