Excavations 2024


This is a temporary blog for presenting the excavations at Perdigões. Posts from 2011 to 2023 are available.

Saturday, 2 August 2014

061 – Here comes the Sun… or a comet


 
Some jump into the interpretation of a Sun representation. Others argue that some may represent comets.

I just listen to the arguments and start to be convinced that these depictions may represent a variety of astronomic events.

And this shard, from Perdigões Chalcolithic ditch 7 and collected yesterday, may very well sugest a tail and the shining (dots inside the circle) of a comet.

Found especially for you, Paulo.

3 comments:

  1. This is also my perspective António, that esteliformes may be related to a variety of celestial bodies or astronomic events and not just with our star as has been the norm. If we accept these depictions as the graphic expression of a specialized knowledge and practice it seems reasonable to expect that they should retain the invariants of these bodies or events that may allow us to identify what seem intentionally evoke.

    Unfortunately, in this case, fractures, especially of the right side of the centre seems to obliterate a part of esteliforme, hindering a global reading. However, its presence seems to ensure that many more will be found in Perdigões and that some of them will be complete. We were anxiously waiting for that lucky moment.

    best regards

    Paulo Lima

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  2. That is correct. But it is also interesting to stress that the lines in the top and bottom are fewer and much more separated than in the left side, and the dots in the circle, that are not common in the "solar" representations.

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    Replies
    1. You are right to stress the variations in shape and arrangement of traces around the elípitc center as well the points. Those characteristics do not seem to be there by chance, their shape and arrangement were manipulated, I am convinced, in order to establish a particular configuration that contains the clues to what they evoke. And yes… it seems to me an evocation of a comet and not of our star.

      Paulo Lima

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