Archaeologists are studying a group of Harlan F. Stone that delineate up with the Sun at the solstices and equinoxes , and reckon it may represent the world ’s oldest astronomical lookout station . The Australian website is especially famed because it is only recently that archaeologists spot that the Indigenous citizenry of the area built permanent dwellings and practiced agriculture , rather than being nomadic hunting watch - collector , as previously assumed .
Although Stonehenge in the UK is the most spectacular and famous , many site were built by ancient the great unwashed to track the movement of the Sun and Moon , providing them with an denotation of when the season were turn and often used as sites for religious ceremonies . Some , such as Stenness in Orkney , an island off the glide of Scotland , were extraordinarily sophisticated , align to reveal events that bump onlyonce every 19 eld .
However , the seeking to bump the oldest such site may have been looking in the untimely place , focusing on locating in Europe and the Middle East , the quondam of which dates back 7,000 years . The hundred basalt rock that form the Wurdi Youang pit arrangement , west of Melbourne , have yet to be date accurately . However , Monash University’sDr Duane Hamacher , an expert on Australian indigenous astronomy , told IFLScience nearby structures have been date as 11,000 to 14,000 yr old , and the observatory may well be of a similar age .
The arrangement combines what Hamacher calls an “ bollock - shaped ” curvature of stones with two neat lines . jointly , these align with the setting Sun at the solstices and equinoxes .
The placement of the stones at Wurdi Youang and the stance where the Sun plant at the solstice and equinoxes . Norris et al / Rock Art Research
Traditional knowledge of the uses of the lookout , and possibly even of its universe , was lose when the Indigenous the great unwashed of the area were murdered or displaced in the 19th century . The existence of the stones was brought to light in a review of stone conjunction in the 1970s .
However , in a second round of forgetting , many documents related to the site were put in a mislabeled box , which has only just been rediscovered . Hamacher is excited about what he may find oneself in this “ treasure trove ” , possibly including audience with traditional elders .
Hamacher published a report on Wurdi Youang four age ago , but the recent discovery of the remains of buildings and factory farm almost on the stone ' threshold , taking advantage of the nearby lasting water , has reincarnate his interest .
He recount IFLScience that the placement of the stones might be dated either through thermoluminescence , which can reveal how long soil at a lower place has been harbour from cosmic ray , or by dating constitutive matter pin down under the stones . “ We ’re ship a team out there to see what is potential and then talk with elders of the Wathaurong people to see what they will permit , ” he said .
The name Wurdi Youang actually belongs to the high hill in the nearby You Yang mountain chain . Hamacher said that the original Indigenous name for the observatory itself is unknown . The accurate location has been kept hidden to preclude hooliganism , such asrecently occurredto endemic house painting .
Western Victoria has provided most of continental Australia ’s evidence for lasting architecture , admit advanced traps foreel farmingdating back 8,000 years . Hamacher evidence IFLScience that it is not do it whether the area was unequalled in this path , or if alike site remain unfound . Many more stone musical arrangement are known across Victoria , but Wurdi Youang ’s astronomical coalition is unique .
Some of the Isidor Feinstein Stone , with a backpack for size comparison . Ray Norris via Wikimedia Commons
[ H / T : ABC.net.au ]
