Although I previously have written about the Pleiades on RockArtBlog (Faris 2015) it is time to revisit the subject on the basis of additional information from Australia.
“In many Australian Aboriginal cultures, the Pleiades are a group of young girls, and are often associated with sacred women’s ceremonies and stories. The Pleiades are also important as an element of Aboriginal calendars and astronomy, and for several groups their first rising at dawn marks the start of winter. Close to the Seven Sisters in the sky is the constellation of Orion, which is often called ‘the saucepan’ in Australia. In Greek mythology Orion is a hunter. This constellation is also often a hunter in Aboriginal cultures, or a group of lusty young men. The writer and anthropologist Daisy Bates reported people in central Australia regarded Orion as a ‘hunter of women,’ and specifically of the women in the Pleiades. Many aboriginal stories say the boys, or man, in Orion are chasing the seven sisters – and one of the sisters has died, or is hiding, or is too young, or has been abducted, so again only six are visible.” (Norris 2020)
Astronomers
Barnaby and Ray Norris have traced indigenous myths about the seven sisters
back to a common source and dated it to as long ago as 100,000 years. “All modern humans are descended from people
who lived in Africa before they began their long migrations to the far corners
of the globe about 100,000 years ago. Could these stories of the seven sisters
be so old? Did all humans carry these stories with them as they traveled to
Australia, Europe, and Asia?” (Norris 2020)
When I look
at the Pleiades (which I do a lot, it is one of my favorites) I do not see
seven stars/sisters. With the naked eye I see six. “Careful measurements with the Gaia space telescope and others show the
stars of the Pleiades are slowly moving in the sky. One star, Pleione, is now
so close to the star Atlas they look like a single star to the naked eye. But
if we take what we know about the movement of the stars and rewind 100,000
years, Pleione was farther from Atlas and would have been easily visible to the
naked eye. So, 100,000 years ago, most people would have seen seven stars in
the cluster. We believe this movement of the stars can help explain two
puzzles: the similarity of Greek and Aboriginal stories about these stars, and
the fact so many cultures call the cluster ‘seven sisters’ even though we only
see six stars today. Is it possible the stories of the Seven Sisters and Orion
are so old our ancestors were telling these stories to each other around
campfires in Africa, 100,000 years ago? Could this be the oldest story in the
world?” (Norris 2020:5-6) So the Norrises
are assuming that the fact that these stories worldwide featuring seven sisters
dates the origin of them to back when the average human eye could actually
discern the seventh star (Pleione) which is now optically combined with the
star Atlas, which they date to 100,000 years ago.
A recent
paper by Tacon et al. interprets a rock art site in Australia as referring to
the Pleiades as well. “A large sandstone
rock art site, Marra Wonga, near Barcaldine, central Queensland, is the focus
of this paper. This 160-metre-long rock shelter is estimated to have over
15,000 petroglyphs, which are mostly animal tracks, lines, grooves and drilled
holes, as well as 111 hand-related and object stencils. There is also a cluster
of human-shaped foot petroglyphs on the floor of the shelter, some with six or
more toes. Unique compositions on the shelter wall include seven large,
engraved star-like designs with central engraved pits and large, engraved
snake-like designs running across and through other petroglyphs.” (Tacon et
al. 2022)
“The seven
star-like designs are in an area measuring 85.6 metres high by 213.5 cm wide. (I assume
this is a typo and the figures for high and wide are accidentally reversed) Each has lines that radiate out from
central pits. They vary in size with three in a row across the top, two below
in a second row and two more below these ones in a third. The largest are at
either side of the top row and the left side of the bottom row, while the
smallest is on the right side of the second row. The star designs are situated
amongst macropod and bird tracks, a small possum-like hand, other small designs
and a vertical row of six pits. There are also two engraved feet with five
toes, one just above and into a radiating line from the second star in the top
row and the second just above the left star in the third row and to the left of
the second row.” (Tacon
et al. 2022)
“While recording Marra Wonga on 11
September 2020, MW and PT found an eighth star-like design at the far right
(northern) end of the site just above the rock floor. It is only about 3m from
the end of the rock art panel and measured 23.2 cm high by 28.5 cm wide. It is
hidden, and was not noticed before, while the seven stars on the central part
of the wall panel were meant to be seen, even from some distance.” (Tacon
et al. 2022) Assuming that these symbols
are meant to represent stars then the eighth is likely to be unrelated to the
Seven Sisters.
Tacon interprets the star-like patterns in the light of Australian Aboriginal legends about the Pleiades. “The seven star-like designs are said to represent the Seven Sisters that feature in stories across Australia and are linked to the Pleiades star constellation. Most of the stories are associated with the creation of Country, through the Seven Sisters who were very beautiful and came down to earth. They were chased by a (sometimes said to be evil) man with a big penis who wanted to make the sisters his wives. All of the stories involve events that happened at certain places between the man (or sometimes two men, sometimes seven) and the women who are constantly trying to get away. The places were altercations occurred are where there are particularly pronounced features in the landscape, such as hills, claypans, waterholes and, on rare occasions, rock art sites. The different stories all have morals to them. Sometimes their pursuer rapes the older sisters and the other sisters have to heal her. The story then has imbedded important knowledge of which plants they used for healing.” (Tacon et al. 2022)
The work by Norris and Norris gives a believable explanation for why so many cultures see the Pleiades as seven instead of six stars. Additionally, with so many of them identifying the seven stars as Sisters, the explanation from Norris and Norris that the stories date back to a common origin 100,000 years ago can be seen as possible, even perhaps plausible. Now, thanks to Tacon et al., we have an impressive record of that legend in the rock art of the First Nations people of Australia.
NOTE: Some images in this posting were retrieved from the internet with a search for public domain photographs. If any of these images are not intended to be public domain, I apologize, and will happily provide the picture credits if the owner will contact me with them. For further information on these reports you should read the original reports at the sites listed below.
REFERENCES:
Faris, Peter, 2015, Native American Astronomy: The Pleiades – Or Not!, 23 May 2015, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com/search/label/Pleiades.
Norris, Ray, 2020, The world’s oldest story? Astronomers say global myths about ‘seven sisters’ stars may reach back 100,000 years, 22 December 2020, https://phys.org/news/1010-12-world-oldest-story-astronomers-global.html. Accessed on 28 December 2022.
Tacon, Paul S.C., Suzanne Thompson,
Kate Greenwood, Andrea Jalandoni, Michael Williams and Maria Kottermair, 2022, Archaeological and contemporary First Nations interpretations of one of
Queensland’s largest rock art sites, 20 July 2022, https://www.bradshawfoundation.com/rockartnetwork/marra_wonga.php. Accessed 3 January 2023.
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