A 5,355 YEAR-OLD ANCIENT IRISH RECORD OF AN ECLIPSE – OR NOT?

Cairn "L", Loughcrew, County Meath, Ireland. Online image public domain.

Recently reports have surfaced about carvings on stone panels in a Neolithic passage tomb known as “Cairn L,” on Carbane West, at Loughcrew, outside Oldcastle, in County Meath, Ireland which supposedly record an eclipse that happened in 3340 BC. I think this is another huge over-reach in interpretation, but you can read below and make up your own minds.

In 2013, Dr. Frank Prendergast completed a detailed study of the monument and found no reason to assign any such significance to any of the carvings.

Chamber of cairn "L", Loughcrew, County Meath, Ireland. Online image public domain.

“The chamber and passage are orientated east-south-east. There are no apparent distinctive topographical or monumental features on the horizon in this direction. This could suggest an alternative imperative for the orientation of the tomb. The summary astronomical investigation presented here was undertaken as part of a national survey of passage tombs undertaken by the writer. From that, the measured passage orientation (azimuth or direction relative to true north), the horizon altitude and the geographical location of Tomb L were used to calculate the indicative astronomical declination (δ). From δ, the likely dates of sunrise for the north and south azimuth limits of the tomb/passage and the central axis were determined. Although the azimuths were derived from compass bearings, above data are sufficiently accurate to allow for a determination of the dates and date ranges of solar illumination within the tomb to an accuracy of a few days. These should be consistent with what would be seen by an observer located in the chamber.” (Prendergast 2013)

 “In assessing the significance and meaning of tomb orientation, numerous criteria/factors (including astronomical) can explain any possible intentionality and, thus, deliberate axial alignment. There is also the possibility that tomb orientation can be random. In the case of Tomb L, and in the apparent absence of any indicative/distinctive natural or built horizon feature that might have acted as a focal target, the tomb may have been simply built to face the rising sun.” (Prendergast 2013) Notice Prendergast’s conclusion that the tomb was built to face the rising sun, but not aligned with any specific landscape features.

“These phenomena are interpreted by the writer as not having had any calendrical significance in the prehistoric past and popular ideas of Tomb L being aligned towards the mid-quarter dates of November 5/February 4 are thus challenged here for several reasons. Although sunlight will penetrate to the edge of cell 6 around these dates, any claim for the alignment of the passage axis being calendrically significant in an early prehistoric context has little basis in fact. Tomb L was built in the Neolithic and, as such, predates (by almost three millennia) any late Iron Age/early Medieval evidence for calendrical subdivision of the solar year.” (Prendergast 2013) Prendergast found no significant archeoastronomical orientations at Tomb L. He also made no mention of any of the stone carving supposedly portraying an eclipse. Prendergast’s conclusion is that this tomb, and thus its carvings, have no celendrical significance. Brennan (1983) conducted an extensive study of Irish Burial Mounds, including Tomb L, and found numerous carved images that he identified as lunar images.

'Eclipse' stone in the chamber of cairn "L", Loughcrew, County Meath, Ireland. Online image public domain.

But then, the theory popped up that the carved boulder at the end of the passage in Tomb L portrays the earliest known record lf a solar eclipse. “Our ancient Irish ancestors carved images of an ancient eclipse into giant stones over 5,000 years ago, on November 30, 3340 BC to be exact. This is the oldest known recorded solar eclipse in history.” (Hayes) I believe that this extraordinary claim can be first attributed to Dr. Philip J. Stooke, Philip J. (1994) who stated “The historian Diodorus Siculus (writing shortly before the time of Christ but quoting Hecataeus, some five centuries earlier, 'and certain others') wrote of the 'Island of the Hyperboreans' ... ‘there is also on the island both a magnificent sacred precinct of Apollo and a notable temple which is adorned with many votive offerings and is spherical in shape... They say also that the moon, as viewed from this island, appears to be but a little distance from the Earth and to have upon it prominences, like those of the Earth, which are visible to the eye. The account is also given that the god visits the island every nineteen years....’ The nineteen year period is presumably that between almost identical eclipses.” (Stooke 1994)

Close up of 'eclipse' stone in the chamber of cairn "L", Loughcrew, County Meath, Ireland. Online image public domain.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and I have been unable to find any explanation of this claim except Stooke’s reference to Diodorus Siculus who had never, of course, visited Ireland. Another citation sends us to “Irish archaeo-astronomer Paul Griffin has announced the confirmation of the world's oldest known solar eclipse recorded in stone, substantially older than the recordings made in 2800 BC by Chinese astronomers. This finding was made at the world's oldest lunar eclipse tracking multi cairn site at the Loughcrew Cairn L Megalithic Monument in Ireland, and corresponds to a solar eclipse which occurred on November 30, 3340 BC, calculated with The Digital Universe astronomy software.” (Colomba 2020) Now I do not doubt that there was an eclipse then if astronomers agree on it, I just doubt that these petroglyphs have anything to do with it.

I have written a few times on RockArtBlog about eclipses (check the cloud index at the bottom). The thing that is really unique and impressive about a solar eclipse is that most partial eclipses would have been missed, the sun is partially eclipsed but it is still too bright to look directly at so all the viewer would notice is the world around him is not as bright for a while. A total solar eclipse, on the other hand, is a tremendously impressive with its blackout and the ring of fire. It is my belief that the ring of fire, by far the most impressive part of a solar eclipse, is what would be shown by someone recording the event. To see a record of a total solar eclipse I would expect to find an empty circle with no internal details, but externally some rays or markings could represent the solar coronal glow and discharge. These markings at Cairn L just don’t look right to me to be a record of a total solar eclipse. And I have been unable to find any explanation of that claim. Now concentric circles just might represent a sun, but not one being eclipsed.

Transit of Venus panel in the chamber of cairn "L", Loughcrew, County Meath, Ireland. Online image public domain.

But this is not the most extreme claim made for the astronomical symbolism at Cairn ‘L.’ ”Just on the left, as you enter the chamber, is a lovely little design of nested arcs, some 13 in all, radiating out and down from what seems to be a rising heavenly body. Close by is another smaller set of nested arcs. Martin Brennan has suggested that this image may represent an image of a transit of Venus.” (Fr. O’Flanagan History Center) Now we are supposed to accept that 5,355 years ago ancient Irish astronomers made naked eye observations of a transit of the planet Venus in front of the sun’s disk? To believe that they could see that is even more preposterous than the eclipse claims. The first transit of Venus recorded in history was on 4 December 1639 by English astronomer Jeremiah Horrocks (Naeye 2012) so I have to be skeptical about the Cairn ‘L’ claim to that as well. All in all these claims appear to be a whole load of fantasy with apparently no proof to back them up.

NOTE 1: I contacted the Fr. O’Flanagan History Center asking for clarification and information but I have received no reply. I have also failed to find Irish Archaeo-astronomer Paul Griffin’s paper that apparently leads to the conclusion involving the portrayal of an eclipse. My search for that paper online leads to a dead end every time. My negative conclusions are based on a lack of confirming data.

NOTE 2: 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:

Ancient Pages, 2015, Ancient Irish Were First To Record An Eclipse – 5,355 Years Ago, 31 July 2015, https://www.ancientpages.com. Accessed online 12 May 2023.

Brennan, Martin, 1983, The Stars and the Stones, Ancient Art and Astronomy in Ireland, Thames and Hudson, Inc., New York.

Columba, Iona, 2020, Ireland in History Day by Day, 30 November 2020, https://irelandinhistory.blogspot.com. Accessed online 26 July 2023.

Fr. O’Flanagan History Center, The art within Cairn L at Loughcrew, Old RIC Barracks, Cliffoney, County Sligo, Ireland, http://www.carrowkeel.com/sites/loughcret/cairnlart.html. Accessed online 11 June 2023.

Hayse, Cathy, Loughcrew (Irlande): Ancient Irish were first to record an eclipse – 5,355 years ago, http://www.archeolog-home.com. Accessed online 30 June 2023.

Naeye, Robert, 2012, Transits of Venus in History: 1631-1716, 1 June 2012, https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/transits-of-venus-in-history-1631-1716/. Accessed online 30 July  2023.

Prendergast, Frank, Dr., 2013, Tomb L, Carnbane West, Loughcrew Hills, County Meath – an archaeoastronomical assessment, 18 January 2013, Unpublished internal report available on www.academia.edu. Accessed online 12 May 2023.

Stooke, Philip J., Dr., 1994, Neolithic Lunar Maps at Knowth, https://knowth.com/lunar-maps.htm. Accessed online 13 November 2022.

 

 

 

 

 

THE WORLD'S OLDEST LUNAR MAP?

Image from usgs.gov.

From before the origin of the Hominin lineage the Earth’s sun was the arbiter of the passage of time and the pace of life for each day. “The sun’s rhythm may have set the pace of each day, but when early humans needed a way to keep time beyond a single day and night, they looked to a second light in the sky. The moon was one of humankind’s first timepieces long before the first written language, before the earliest organized cities and well before structured religions. The moon’s face changes nightly and with the regularity of the seasons, making it a reliable marker of time.” (Boyle 2019) The sun is pretty much invariable in the sky, it looks much the same today as it did yesterday, or last week. The moon, on the other hand, changes from day to day in a repeating cycle, a perfect conception for the passage of time.

“It’s an obvious timepiece,” Anthony Aveni says of the moon. Aveni is a professor emeritus of astronomy and anthropology at Colgate University in Hamilton, N.Y., and a founder of the field of archaeoastronomy. “There is good evidence that [lunar timekeeping] was around as early as 25,000, 30,000, 35,000 years before the present.” (Boyle 2019) By projection then, if they practiced lunar timekeeping did they represent that concept in pictographs or petroglyphs?

Cairns "S" and "T" at Loughcrew ("T" is in the background). Online image, public domain.

In 1980, Brennan and Roberts experienced a rising sun alignment at a County Meath, Ireland, mound called Cairn T. On March 17, 1980, Martin Brennan and Jack Roberts saw a beam of light from the rising sun illuminate a carved stone at the back end of the rock-lined passage in the great mound called Cairn T at Loughcrew, County Meath. Two weeks later, on the evening of the first of April, Brennan and his colleagues watched the rising moon from the same spot. As the moon appeared over the horizon a shaft of light was projected along the passage and onto the same carved stone.” (Stooke 1994)

Aerial view of Knowth, County Meath, Ireland. Image courtesy of Wikipedia.

Having experienced these alignments at Cairn T, Brennan looked to the great passage mound of Knowth to see if this phenomenon was general. “The great passage mound of Knowth, also in Meath, contains two rock-lined assages, one facing east, the other west. Brennan observed the setting sun shine into the western passage on September 13, 1980. Attempting to observe sunrise on the following day, he found that the view of the rising sun from the eastern passage would be blocked by trees and the current level of the ground. Nevertheless, it seems likely that the eastern passage was also originally intended to be penetrated by light from the rising sun and moon. Although solar alignments have been described at many neolithic sites in Western Europe, less attention has been paid to lunar alignments, despite the fact that at certain times the moon can rise or set at any location on the horizon which may be occupied by the sun.” (Stooke 1994)

“Artistically, Knowth contains a vast amount of megalithic artwork, ranging from the "typical" ancient Celtic symbols of spirals and lozenges (diamond or rhombus shapes), both usually believed to represent the cycle of the sun or seasons. Once more, due to these pre-Christian geometric patterns—ones that have been frequently uncovered in pagan Celtic spaces—a correlation between the movement of the sun and the use of the mound seems likely. The ogham writing of the early Irish people also abounds on the megaliths, though these writings are from about two thousand years after the geometric shapes were likely carved. Not only do these inscriptions reveal the site was returned to and once again valued, but it was between the period of spirals and lozenges and the ogham writings (the Neolithic period and early Iron Age, respectively) that Knowth went through its most significant transformation.” (Winters 2022) A large number of the stones at Knowth have carvings including the kerbstones and large stones in the passage and interior chamber.

In 1994 Stooke did a study of the astronomical implications of Knowth and found a lunar connection. “Brennan's experience, described in his 1983 book ‘The Stars and the Stones,’ suggested that these Irish neolithic sites might have had some connection with the moon as well as the sun. I have identified another connection, previously overlooked by Brennan and others working at Knowth. If moonlight were to shine on the back stone of the eastern passage at Knowth, it would illuminate a map of the moon itself, the world's oldest known depiction of the lunar maria.” (Stooke 1994) So, Brennan posited  astronomical references in the Knowth carvings. Indeed, in his study of a number of Neolithic Passage Tombs at locations in Ireland Brennan (1983) basically identified every arc and curved line as a lunar symbol. In 1994 Stooke added the concept that the stone at the end of the passage portrayed lunar maps. This concept was never brought up by Brennan.

Orthostat 47 with its markings highlighted. Image courtesy of carrowkeel.com.

Closeup of orthostat 47 with its markings highlighted. Image courtesy of bbc.co.uk.

“The carved stone which forms the end wall of the eastern passage was called Orthostat 47 by George Eogan, who excavated Knowth in the 1960s. The design has three sections, superficially similar but oriented differently. The right-hand section appears to be nothing less than a map of the lunar maria, as becomes clear when it is compared with a naked-eye map of the moon. At least a dozen points of correspondence are immediately obvious.”  (Stooke 1994) Now I would expect a map of the lunar maria to be blobs spaced inside a circle and roughly corresponding with their placement on the moon itself, not arcs. Stooke is suggesting that the original carver of the stone portrayed not the static lunar maria, but the arcs that they describe over the hours as the moon arcs across the sky. Would this artist have portrayed, not a bird but the arc of his path across the sky, or not a fish but the line of its path through the water. To me, this concept just doesn’t fit right.

Stooke's diagram illustrating his idea that the carvings represent a lunar map. Illustration from Stooke, 1994.

Stooke (1994) explained that in this way. “The remaining two sections of the carving are simpler but crudely similar to the first, sharing the overall arc shape of the maria surrounding the lunar central highlands as well as an isolated spot representing Mare Crisium. Why were they carved in different orientations? I believe they depict the apparent rotation of the maria on the disk of the full moon as it crosses the sky in the course of a night. Watch the full moon one night. The arc of maria opens to the right (like a letter C) as the moon rises, opens downwards (to a northern hemisphere observer) as the moon crosses the meridian, and opens to the left at moonset. The disk appears to rotate like a wheel, an illusion caused by our motion on a rotating Earth. We compare the moon with our apparently fixed horizon, but the plane of the horizon actually rotates with the Earth to trace out a cone in space.” (Stooke 1994)  So the question is, why would the carver wish to portray the arcs of the movement of the maria instead of just showing the maria themselves? And where are the circles representing the outline of the moon itself? Stooke argues that the outlines were done in paint or chalk although no traces of such remain. While his thesis is possibly true I am not convinced that it is accurate. As I said, it seems more likely to me that the Neolithic or Iron Age carvers would have portrayed the moon as a circle with blobs for the maria in their proper places when not portraying the moon as a crescent. I fear I have to be skeptical of this claim, but this still represents an example of the fascination rock art provides – the room for many theories.

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:

Boyle, Rebecca, 2019, Ancient Humans Used the Moon as a Calendar in the Sky, 9 July 2019, https://www.sciencenews.org. Accessed online 13 November 2022.

Brennan, Martin, 1983, The Stars and the Stones, Ancient Art and Astronomy in Ireland, Thames and Hudson, Inc., New York.

Stooke, Philip J., Dr., 1994, Neolithic Lunar Maps at Knowth, https://knowth.com/lunar-maps.htm. Accessed online 13 November 2022.

Winters, Riley, 2017, Mystifying Megaliths: Knowth, Keeper of Ancient Tombs, 30 September 2017, https://ancient-origins.net. Accessed online 13 November 2022.