Does Oldest Written Text Reveal a 30,000 year old Cult that Worshipped the Prediction of Eclipses?
Earlier this month we reported on evidence to suggest that the oldest known writing system was based on geometric form in connection with astronomical phenomena. Now in an incredible new study published today in the journal Midnight Science, researcher Dr Derek Cunningham has found that identical astronomical features are present on two figurines separated by location and by around 30,000 years.
(Img. Dolni Vestonice Astronomical Alingments - The circular shapes of the hips match the expected apparent size of the moon at Apogee and Perigee)
It is widely known that ancient monuments such as Stonehenge and even the Pyramids of Giza show positive alignments to the solstices. It is also widely known that many associate ancient Pagan religions with night time worship. The unanswered questions are: Were these early Pagan priests just mindless blood-thirsty barbarians, sacrificing people to instil fear in the populace, as ancient accounts routinely tell us? Or were they early astronomers with an unexpected advanced knowledge of the motion of the moon and the planets? Or perhaps they were a mixture of both the above, with Stone Age politicians simply taking advantage of the fear of the ignorant to use science to control the populace? New data suggests the latter.
The recent discovery of Stone Age writing has now produced a new breakthrough – the existence of a late Stone Age religion based on the prediction of eclipses. The key discovery is the presence of two "identical" statues that are separated in age by circa 25,000 years. Despite the substantial difference in age, both figurines contain three common features. These are the presence of astronomical-aligned writing, the existence of a simple V-shaped linear pattern placed on the torso of the statue that align to the sidereal month value, and third is the presence of hips of dissimilar size that are drawn to the expected ratio for the moon when viewed at Apogee and Perigee, the size of the moon appears smaller when it is the furthest point from earth.
The Circa 5,000 year old Lemba "Lady", of Western Cyprus contains the exact same data.
Dr Cunningham explained: “the choice of astronomical values is important. The specific values used makes the various simple linear marks a codified book, which contains an entire encyclopaedia of astronomy, knowledge of navigation, map making and also a study of advanced mathematics. As such the marks can be considered to be a form of compressional writing”.
Dr. Derek Cunningham argues that for similar statues to be found in Cyprus and the Czech Republic, some 25,000 years apart by any other an organized religion must have existed in the Stone Age. It is just impossible for any Kingdom, no matter how powerful, to have exerted strong control over a populace for 20,000 years, or for the artwork to be simply related to the work of independent astronomers. The astronomical values found on the Czech Republic, and Cyprus art pieces are similar to that seen on the circa 5,000 year old Orkney Venus found in Scotland. Though not drawn on a Venus figurine, the exact same astronomical values are also found on the 30,000 year old linear Leshango and Lebombo Baboon Bones, and also a 30,000 year old encased stone found at Shuidongguo Paleolithic site in China. This suggests that, not only was a coherent astronomical writing system employed 30,000 years ago, but a lunar religion may have extended from Africa all the way through Europe to Eastern Asia during this period.
The complete theory, and other thoughts on the ancient past is presented in the author's book ‘The Long Journey: 400,000 Years of Stone Age Science’.
