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Origins of Megalithic Astronomy in Britain

By c. 3000 BC, in the late Neolithic, there had been a significant change in the way people materialized their cosmology across Scotland with the introduction of free-standing stones. These were erected almost until the end of the Bronze Age (Burl 2000, 1993). Significantly, a series of astronomical patternings have been empirically verified for many Bronze Age monuments that were erected between 1400-900 BC (Higginbottom et 14 al. 2013, 2003, 2001, 2000). Further, two series of complex landscape patternings associated with the same monuments and their orientations have been identified (Higginbottom et al. 2013 & Higginbottom 'in preparation' - Bronze Age megalithic monuments on the isle of Mull). However, when and where these patterns were first associated with standing-stone structures was unknown. Through innovative statistics and software we show that visible astronomical-landscape variables found at Bronze Age sites on the inner isles and mainland of western Scotland were actually first established nearly two millennia earlier, with the erection of the first 'great circles' in Britain: Callanish on the Isle of Lewis and Stenness on the Isle of Orkney. In particular, we introduce our new statistical test that enables the quantitative determination of astronomical connections of stone circles. It is seen that, whilst different standing-stone monuments were created over time (Burl 2000, 1993; 22 Higginbottom et al. 2013; Sheridan & Brophy 2012) with a mixture of landscape variables (Higginbottom et al. 2013), there are nevertheless highly relevant aspects that remained unchanged through these years. This suggests that there is some continuity of this cosmological system through time, despite the various radical material and social changes that occurred from the late Neolithic to the Late Bronze Age (Lynch 2000; Mullin 26 2001; Owoc 2001).