Archaeoastronomy in the British Isles - The Stones and the Stars: Building Scotland's Newest Megalith - page 61

North Circle and on the Beckhampton Avenue are oriented to
moonrise at furthest north and to midwinter sunrise, respectively.
As pointed out in Chap. 1 , Aubrey Burl's portrayal of ceremonies
there is spectacular and quite possibly correct. The dead chief-
tain may well have been laid in state within the Sanctuary or at
Beckhampton Cove until midwinter solstice, symbol of death and
rebirth, a propitious time to inter the old chief and anoint his suc-
cessor. “The King is dead, long live the King…” But the vision of
the Moon is wrong.
Going back to the experiences of our “observer on the real
Earth” (Chap. 2 ), let's suppose that he has established his solar
calendar and built a circle, perhaps with one or more outlying
markers, to commemorate the fact. Over a few years of continued
observation he has established that the lunar cycle does not fit
evenly into the solar one and, if there is a day-to-day lunar calen-
dar in force, then no doubt some compromise has been arranged,
like the assorted lengths of our months or the five “unlucky days”
at the end of the Egyptian and Mayan years.
Although Burl said “it was a time when there were no months
or weeks,” the Maya, the Egyptians and the Romans, from whom
we take our modern months, all had lunar calendars before solar
ones. Our days of the week are named after sky-gods, and counting
by the Moon goes back to the last glacial age and the hunters. By
the time the Neolithic farmers reached Britain, they probably had
the relationship between the solar year and the traditional lunar
calendar worked out, at least in general terms. But sunrise and sun-
set would need to be watched for the rituals to be timed correctly,
and at the major centers permanent markers would be set up.
Our observer, however, is compressing into one lifetime the
generations of experience the Neolithic priests had to draw on, so
this is all new to him, and he is still watching the Moon and count-
ing days. Whether or not he intended his circle to be an observa-
tory, it will function as one, and draw his attention to the fact that
wherever the Sun or Moon rises on the eastern horizon, it will set
at the corresponding point in the west. Starting from due east, at
the spring equinox, the Sun moves northward day by day until
midsummer solstice, then back to due east at the autumnal equi-
nox and onwards to the south until the midwinter solstice. The
Moon, by contrast, goes through a similar set of movements in