Layout and Location - The Stones and the Stars: Building Scotland's Newest Megalith - page 105

F IG . 5.1 Dr. (now Professor) Archie Roy ( right ), with Howie Firth, Direc-
tor of Orkney Press, at the launch of “Starfield,” edited by author (at rear)
(Photo by Chris O'Kane, October 1989)
Galloway. What steps will you take to establish a calendar, given
that…” It was a humorous session, punctuated by lines such as
“Pass me the chisel: I want to mark the position of Jupiter in Nor-
ton's Star Atlas ” and “Ach, Hamish, it is those astronomers from
the Mediterranean again: get out your claymore, man, they are
upon us!” But the exercise was to prove valuable 14 years later.
In following years, the interest was such that Dr. Roy orga-
nized class visits to the standing stones at Machrie Moor on the
island of Arran, where he had discovered the elliptical stone rings
(Chap. 4 ) [ 3 ]. For various reasons I was never able to go, though I
later visited the site by air (see Chap. 8 ) . In 1965, after more compre-
hensive lectures by Archie Roy, Dr. (later Prof.) Michael Ovenden
and Dr. Robin Green, I visited Stonehenge with my fellow-student