Bronze Disk and Oldest Observatory Discovered in Germany

Astronomy is an ancient science. In its earliest forms, the rising and setting of the Sun was used to mark time. Then when humans realized that the Moon had cycles, the roughly 29 days from one full moon to another was used to mark longer periods of time. Astronomical knowledge became intermingled with ceremonies and religion and both temples and ancient observatories have been built to honor the movements in the cosmos. We have now discovered what we believe to be the oldest observatory in the world an its connection to an artifact discovered nearby.

In a wheat field near Goseck, Germany lies a vast circle, the remains of an ancient observatory built 7,000 years ago: the oldest known attempts of humans to understand the cosmos. Built two millenia before Stonehenge, around 4900 BC, it is believed that Neolithic and Bronze Age peoples used it to measure the heavens. If so, it proves humans were sky watchers much earlier than we previously thought.

The circle is 75 meters (225 feet) wide and was spotted by airplane. Originally it consisted of four concentric circles, a mound, ditch and two wooden palisades about five feet tall. In the palisades stood three sets of gates facing southeast, southwest and north. On the winter solstice, from the center of the circles you could see the Sun rise and set through the southern gates.

Another discovery was a bronze disk discovered nearby which dates from 1600BC. Called the Nebra disk, the roughly 12 inch diameter bronze disk is the oldest realistic representation of the universe yet found. It depicts a crescent moon, a circle (probably a full moon) a cluster of seven stars (likely the Pleiades) and scattered other stars. An angle on the disk corresponds with the 100 degree span between the solstice gates at the observatory.

Also on the disk is three arcs in gold leaf. The two opposing arcs running along the rim are 82.5 degrees long and mark the Sun's position at sunrise/sunset. The lowest points of the two arcs are 97.5 degrees apart depicting sunrise/sunset on the winter solstice in Germany at that time. Likewise, the uppermost points mark sunrise/sunset on the summer solstice.

There is a third arc on the Nebra disk and this is open to much speculation. The arc may represent a boat used to carry the Sun every night. It was a puzzle to the ancients how the Sun could set in the west and rise in the east. The ancient Egyptians (and other cultures) devised a story for the sun. They believed a boat carried the Sun through the netherworld each night so that it would be reborn again in the east at morning. If the third arc on the disk does represent a boat, it will be the first evidence of the boat story in Europe.

In addition to marking the sunrise/sunset movements throughout the year, these ancient peoples also knew the positions of constellations. The Pleiades (depicted on the Nebra disk) would have appeared in their skies in the fall and disappeared in the spring, corresponding to planting and harvesting times.

One of the mysteries remaining at the observatory is the third gate which points not quite north. It may have no astronomical connection at all. There is evidence of other rituals taking place at the observatory. Archeologists have uncovered pottery shards, arrowheads, decapitated skulls of oxen (apparently displayed on poles) and parts of two human skeletons. Similar human skeletons have been found at other stone circles and archaeologists are unsure whether this represents human sacrifice or funeral rites. Nevertheless, such ceremonies anoint the site as a temple, Bertemes notes--and show that science was inextricably entangled with superstition since Neolithic times.

Constellations

The Solar System