Programme Schedule

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Wednesday, November 17th 2021. 4.00 pm GMT

Brian Hayden: Secret Societies and the Origins of Astronomy.

Abstract

The origins of detailed astronomical observations and modeling of celestial movements is obscure at best and often associated with early elite attempts to predict the future. I would like to suggest that such observations and models begin long before civilizations developed, and even long before Neolithic structures were built with astronomical alignments. I think complex astronomy began in some locations in the Upper Paleolithic among complex hunter/gatherers located in resource rich areas. Ethnographic and archaeological evidence indicates that this was probable. Even more importantly, I think tribal secret societies emerged in this same time period and were largely responsible for the development of detailed astronomical observations and models of celestial movements as part of their esoteric knowledge which was only accessible to the highest ranking members. There is substantial evidence of secret societies having used the painted caves in the Upper Paleolithic, and good ethnographic documentation of astronomical knowledge held by secret societies. I would also suggest that similar secret societies existed in the Neolithic and were responsible for some of the major astronomical observation centres like Stonehenge.

Biography

Brian Hayden is an Honorary Research Associate in the Department of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia and a professor emeritus of archaeology at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia (Canada). He has had a longstanding interest in understanding what artifacts from the past can tell us about the societies and cultures that left them in the archaeological record. His latest study has been of tribal secret societies and their role in culture change. He is the author of numerous books and articles, including: Shamans, Sorcerers, and Saints: A Prehistory of Religion, Archaeology: The Science of Once and Future Things, The Power of Feasts, and The Power of Ritual in Prehistory: Secret Societies and the Origins of Social Complexity.

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Wednesday, December 15th 2021. 4.00 pm GMT

Bernadette Brady, Darrelyn Gunzburg and Fabio Silva: The Sun’s light at Michaelmas and the Cistercians of Britain and Ireland.

This talk has been postponed to May 25th 2022, see below.

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Wednesday, January 26th 2022. 4.00 pm GMT

Efrosyni Boutsikas: Light, darkness and religious experience: Cognitive interpretations of ancient Greek Mystery cults.

Abstract

Reconstructions of ancient religious performances within a specific time and place can inform us on ways in which the manipulation of natural light or observation of the night-sky may have been used to enhance religious experience and shape ancient cosmovision. This paper focuses on the nocturnal elements and later eschatological concerns of the cult of the Eleusinian Mysteries, in order to demonstrate the role of the chronotope to the study of ancient religious practice and experience. Through the analysis of relevant mythology, astronomy, archaeological remains and ancient literature, the paper exemplifies the cognitive impact of nocturnal rituals and how this staging assisted in fulfilling the spiritual aims of these cults.

Biography

Efrosyni Boutsikas is Senior Lecturer in Classical Archaeology at the University of Kent. She is a member of the Council of the International Society for Archaeoastronomy in Culture (ISAAC), of the editorial board of the Journal of Astronomy in Culture and a co-director of the University of Kent Interdisciplinary Centre in Spatial Studies (KISS). Her research focuses on ancient Greek religious experience, memory, myth and the role of time, space and landscape in ritual performance. She has directed research projects in Greece, Cyprus, Sicily and Turkey funded by the British Academy, the Society of Antiquaries (London) and the Royal Society of New Zealand. Published in a range of classical, archaeological, and archaeoastronomical journals, Efrosyni has written and co-authored papers on the role of astronomy and catasterism myths in shaping ancient religious experience and ritual practice. She is the author of The Cosmos in Ancient Greek Religious Experience: Sacred Space, Memory, and Cognition (Cambridge University Press, 2020) and a co-editor of Studies in Cultural Astronomy in Honour of Clive Ruggles (Springer, 2021).

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Wednesday, February 9th 2022. 4.00 pm GMT

Susan Greaney: Relations with the upper world in late Neolithic Britain: square-in-circle timber monuments and orientations at monument complexes.

Abstract

Square-in-circle, or four-post, structures are a type of timber monument built across Britain in Ireland in the later part of the Neolithic period. They consist of four large upright posts, a pair of entrance posts or pits, usually surrounding palisade or ditch. These were places where Grooved Ware pottery, animal bones, flint tools, antler picks and sometimes human cremations were deposited. Some of these structures became elaborated over time to form complex concentric monuments, such as the Southern Circle at Durrington Walls in Wiltshire. Others were enclosed within stone circles, such as those at Machrie Moor on Arran, and at Stanton Drew in Somerset. Such square-in-circle structures have been interpreted as temples or shrines in the form of monumental houses. This talk will present preliminary work on the orientation of these structures, with entrances aligned principally towards the south-east and suggest that the positioning of the four posts may relate to solstitial directions and wider late Neolithic quartering principles.

Biography

Susan Greaney is an archaeologist with a specialist interest in British prehistory, particularly Neolithic and early Bronze Age monuments. She works as a Senior Properties Historian for English Heritage, working on interpretation schemes and exhibitions at their historic sites, particularly Stonehenge. Susan is also nearing completion of her PhD at Cardiff University focusing on complexes of Neolithic monuments in Britain and Ireland. She has excavated at sites in the Outer Hebrides, Orkney and Wiltshire. Additionally, Susan works as a freelance public engagement consultant, and is passionate about sharing archaeology.

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Wednesday, March 30th 2022. 4.00 pm BST

Timothy Darvill: Making time at Stonehenge?

Abstract

Advances in understanding the phasing of Stonehenge highlight the integrity of the sarsen structures. This lecture explores the idea that the numerology of the sarsen elements materialize a perpetual calendar based on a tropical solar year of 365.25 days, starting at the winter solstice. The indigenous development of such a calendar in north-west Europe is possible, but a source in the eastern Mediterranean is also considered. The adoption of a solar calendar, perhaps a replacement for an earlier lunar calendar, was associated with the spread of solar cosmologies during the third millennium BC and was used to regularize festivals and ceremonies.

Biography

Tim is a prehistorian with a strong international public profile. He leads research projects and publishes widely on the archaeology of early farming communities in northwest Europe, and on archaeological resource management. He has undertaken pioneering research into the history and development of Stonehenge and other related Neolithic monuments. His research takes him to many parts of Europe, and he has directed projects in Germany, Russia, Greece, Malta, England, Wales, and the Isle of Man. His research focuses on two main themes: the Neolithic of northwest Europe, in particular the early development, use, and meaning of monumental architecture; and archaeological resource management, especially the role of the tangible and intangible heritage as sources of social capital, cultural enrichment, personal well-being, and the social construction of knowledge.

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Wednesday, April 13th 2022. 4.00 pm BST

Timothy Pauketat: Sky Gods and Climate Change: Alignments of Earth, Water, and the Moon from the Caddo to Cahokia.

Abstract

Distinctive wind and rain gods emerged in multiple regions across 9th to 11th century North America during an era of global climate change. From eastern Texas to Illinois, these gods accompanied the adoption of maize and the construction of new ceremonial precincts that now included circular platform mounds and linear causeways. Lunar alignments, water shrines, and pole ceremonialism were built into the unusual urban design of Cahokia in the early 11th century, seemingly imparting to it, and the continent as a whole, a distinctive history susceptible to the next wave of global climate changes that followed in the 14th century.

Biography

Timothy R. Pauketat is the Director of the Illinois State Archaeological Survey, Illinois State Archaeologist, and a professor of Anthropology and Medieval Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He previously held positions at the University of Oklahoma and the State University of New York, Buffalo. Professor Pauketat has published extensively on his research at Cahokia and other Mississippian sites, and has written or edited 17 books, including The Archaeology of Ancient North America (Cambridge 2020), Chiefdoms and Other Archaeological Delusions (AltaMira 2007), and Cahokia: Ancient America’s Great City on the Mississippi (Penguin, 2009). His current interests include the relationship of global history and humanity to matter and affects, with a focus on the Medieval Warm Period.

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Wednesday, May 25th 2022. 4.00 pm GMT

Bernadette Brady, Darrelyn Gunzburg and Fabio Silva: The Sun’s light at Michaelmas and the Cistercians of Britain and Ireland.

Abstract

This talk will build on research published in 2016 when our team set out to investigate the sun's role in the churches of the eleven extant Cistercian Abbeys in Wales. Our intention was to understand the skyscapes of all extant Welsh Cistercian monastic sites by treating each abbey within its setting, rather than ignoring the landscape around it as previous similar studies had done. The results of that project left open the question of whether they showed that the focus of orientation of Welsh Cistercian abbey churches to sunset on Michaelmas and Saint David’s Day was specific to Wales, and hence more likely to be to Saint David’s Day, or were instead part of wider Cistercian narrative. This talk will complete that research by looking at Cistercian abbey churches in England, Scotland, and the island of Ireland. By using a combination of live and virtual fieldwork, as well as a significance testing approach. Our findings indicate that the English abbey churches have an even greater appetite for this alignment to Michaelmas/Saint David’s Day than Wales. The logical conclusion from this is that it is highly unlikely that the Cistercians would be celebrating the patron saint of Wales. We will conclude by discussing Saint Michael in the Middle Ages and his possible role among the Cistercians.

Biographies

Bernadette Brady holds a PhD in Anthropology (2012) and MA in Cultural Astronomy and Astrology (2005). She is currently a tutor in the Sophia Centre for the Study of Cosmology in Culture at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David, UK. She is also a student in Egyptology at Manchester university and was the course director for the 2019 BSS at Luxor on Egyptian Astronomy and has lectured widely on this subject.

Darrelyn Gunzburg has a PhD in History of Art (2014) from the University of Bristol and a BA Hons (Open) (2007) from the Open University. Since 2009 she has taught on the distance learning MA for the Sophia Centre for the Study of Cosmology in Culture at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David where she contributes the visual art historical expression of the sky in culture. Her most recent works are 'Reflecting on Mary: the Splendor of the Madonna in the Lower Church of Assisi' in Medieval Franciscan Approaches to the Virgin Mary: Mater Sanctissima, Misericordia, Et Dolorosa, edited by Steven J. McMichael and Katie Wrisley Shelby (Brill 2019), Grief, A Dark Sacred Time (Flying Horse books 2019), and co-editor of Space, Place and Religious Landscapes: Living Mountains (Bloomsbury Academic 2020).

Fabio Silva is Senior Lecturer in Archaeological Modelling at Bournemouth University and co-founder and co-editor of the Journal of Skyscape Archaeology. His primary research interest is how societies have perceived and conceived their environment and used that to time and adjust social, productive and magico-religious behaviours.

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Each Zoom session will consist of two 45 minute lectures, each followed by questions from the audience and the schedule is as follows:

Each lecture will last for approximately two hours. All sessions will be recorded and you will have access to the recordings for a month afterwards (useful if you can't join live).

The cost is £10 per session or £50 for all six.

For booking, please click here.

Please join us for a great chance to find out about skyscape archaeology worldwide.

With our best wishes

The Journal of Skyscape Archaeology is the only academic journal in the world to explore the relationship between archaeolgical sites and the sky, stars and planets, including archaeoastronomy. The journal’s advisory board includes senior academics and researchers from across the field.

The Sophia Centre for the Study of Cosmology in Culture is a research and teaching centre at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David. It examines the relationships between cosmology and culture through history, anthropology philosophy and archaeology. and teaches the Master’s degrees in Cultural Astronomy and Astrology and Ecology and Spirituality.