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Hawkins was one of the first researchers to use a computer to examine the architecture of Stonehenge, setting the stage for much of the archaeoastronomical practices in place today. In his work, he felt he had revealed 165 key markers in the giant monument, including major alignments with risings and settings of the Sun and Moon. He first published these finds in an article in the journal Nature in 1963. In 1965, his book Stonehenge Decoded was published, and a follow-up, Beyond Stonehenge, was later published in 1973.

Hawkins eventually moved on past Stonehenge studies and worked on interpreting the layout of the Nazca lines in Peru and proposing a set of rules for the study of archaeoastronomy. In his later years, he was absorbed with outlining Euclidean implications and interpretations of crop circles. It is no surprise that his work has generated a lot of controversy over the years, as many more professional archaeologists and astronomers have joined the emerging field of archaeoastronomy. Several research scientists have challenged Hawkins' methods, credibility and results but cannot refute the fact that his early books brought the nascent field of archaeoastronomy into the public eye. Hawkins was passionate about his work and defended it until his death.

Germany's Sky Disk seen as key for archaeoastronomy
This article can be found at Daniel Fischer'S COSMIC MIRROR website. Until a monography with all the results of the archaeological investigations comes out next spring, probably not much more will become public.

Much more has been learned about the mysterious bronze (age) disk unearthed in Germany, now that the actual context of the discovery has been revealed: The perpetrators of the illegal dig have surrendered themselves to the police in July, the exact site has been located and professional excavations have begun on August 20. And while only a small fraction of the extended site on a hill near the town Nebra in Saxony-Anhalt has been investigated so far, it is already being hailed as a German Stonehenge in some circles.

While much cannot be seen there by the untrained eye, the local archaeologists now describe a circular wall of about 200 meters diameters, surrounded by a complex system of trenches - a site which, according to some artefacts found so far, has been in use for a thousand years (i.e. from about 1600 to 700 BC). The only direct astronomical clue is the geographical location: From the hill (Mittelberg) the Sun sets at the summer solstice directly behind the important Brocken mountain 80 km away. And many names of landmarks in the area carry astronomical-sounding names.

On the Mittelberg site the Sky Disk (the new offical name being "early bronze age bronze disk with a representation of the sky from Nebra") had been buried for unknown reasons but with care. Thanks in part to the ongoing criminal investigation we even know its original orientation in the ground, which yields some clues for the interpretation of the celestial phenomena and geometrical figures put onto the disk (the authenticity of which is no longer in any doubt, thanks to several physical lab investigations):

There are two arcs, opposite to each other, of 82.7¡Z each - exactly the distance between the northern- and southernmost points of sunset and sunrise from Saxony-Anhalt in the bronze age. Thus we have a mathematical clue as well that the disk belongs to the Nebra area.

The short arc in between the two big ones was on the bottom of the disk in the orientation it was found: This supports the interpretation as a "sun barge" travelling between sunset and sunrise. Another interpretation had been that we are dealing with a particularly bright section of the Milky Way.

The meaning of the two largest objects is uncertain: the Sun and the Moon or rather the Full Moon and a lunar crescent? Astronomers favor the latter view: It would have been too big an act of abstract thinking for our bronze age artist to visualize the Sun in a sky full of stars.

Seven of those stars form a tight pattern, the only one on the whole disk. While this could equally well mean the Plejades and the Praesepe star cluster or the small constellation Delphinus, preference is given to the Pleiades: In contrast to the other interpretations this asterism plays a significant role in ancient texts.

The other stars are distributed on the disk in as random a fashion as possible when one actively tries to avoid the formation of any pattern - this has actually been demonstrated by experiments at Bochum University. A true random distribution with Poisson statistics would look much more clumpy.