urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:barbaracarterbarbaracarterbarbaracarterbarbaracarter2008-11-08T20:05:09Zurn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:barbaracarter:829ancient calendars the sequani calendar2008-11-08T20:05:09Z2008-11-08T20:05:09ZWell, I have finally finished working up the Sequani Calendar for another year's publication. It is a great pleasure to see this calendar come together every year. This is the eighth year that we have published it. The knowledge of the sky that these people had has shown itself to be more extensive, the more we work on it.<br /><br />Now since we are in the eighth year, we can see that at the end of this year, Venus is making its eight year return. Venus comes back to where it was when we started eight years ago.<br /><br />We have also been keeping closer watch on the forces of nature as they are shown on the calendar in the "lucky and unlucky" months noted by Mat (lucky) and Anm (unlucky). It has been amazing to see that these ancients knew when the weather was going to be stronger.<br /><br />So we do have only one example of a "western" lunar, solar, stellar calendar. But we are lucky that it is such a fine one. We are still happy to be working it.urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:barbaracarter:675gaul reconstruction2007-08-23T12:18:50Z2007-08-23T12:18:50ZI am one of the translators of the coligny calendar known as the sequani calendar. We called it the Sequani Calendar in order to distinguish it from other translations of the coligny calendar. When I first got a hold of the work that had been done on the Coligny Calendar, I recognized it immediately as a lunar calendar which was also very mindful of tracking the sun. There was one more very distinct marking on it that reoccurs almost monthly -- the PINNI LOVD and the PRINI LAG's. They were not the sun and not the moon, so what were they looking at? Well, since all the other information so far had come from the sky, (and I am trained as an ethnographer) what else were they looking at in the sky. Night after night, I sat with a planisphere looking for what they were watching. Finally it all hit all at the same time: they are looking at the fifteen brightest stars in the sky.<br />Then I sat with the rhythm of these Prinni Lovd's and Prini Lag's trying first of all the celebration of Samhain and all the other cross quarter nights. None would fit. Finally, the Winter Solstice came to mind after reading a great tribute to a great astrologer Al Morrison. A friend of his (another great astrologer Zane Stein), said that he said, "it is now clear that in Neolithic times when the carvings were done at Newgrange, older than the pyramids of Egypt, older than Stonehenge, 0 Capricorn was considered to be the beginning of the solar year. That's the one that fits the rhythm and that's the one that fits the stories of the stars in the sky. Those are our references: the stars and their stories.