An Age of Magic

How ancient astronomers used their rocks.

If you spend a day at an astonomy gathering, or go all out and attend a solar eclipse somewhere in the world, the one thing you will notice is how seriously amateur astonomers take their hobby. This is one pastime that can become a time consuming and all encompassing passion.  On view will be telescopes and lens that come in all shapes, sizes and designs. Some that people even put together themselves, others that have paid a fortune for their equipment. And all for looking up at the stars.

Ancient man did all this but without the fancy rigging. And they knew a lot more about the stars than many of us know and learn’t it all the hard way. A stone formation, The Hurlers, on Bodmin Moor in England has been baffling visitors, and scientists, for many years. The Hurlers were placed in a pattern 1500 years ago and it seems an amateur astonomer has been the one person who has solved their mystery. The Hurlers are formed in a pattern that mirror the belt of Orion and it is believed it was used as a calendar by inhabitants of the area at the time.

This is when local people were going from being hunter-gatherers to being farmers and used the Hurlers as a way to monitor the changes in season.

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