Babylonian Astronomy – The Indo-Assyrian Roots
Indian themes in Assyrian history
Some 175-146 years after Hammurabi, the Assyrian throne passed onto his grandson, who ascended the throne of Babylon – and took a very Buddhist name. This is apparently a 1000 years before Gautama Buddha – as per Western dating fix! Known in history as Ammisaduqua /Ammisaduqa (1646-1626) – अमिष, amish in Sanskrit means truth and honesty + duqa = suffering, pain. Was Ammisaduqua one of the earliest Bodhisattvas, or one of the earliest followers of Buddha.
Western dating gone completely awry?
In the heavens …
Apart from commissioning an authoritative study on planet Venus (‘probably the earliest example’ of astronomy), Ammisaduqua /Ammisaduqa /Ammizaduga is known for cancelling debts. Was he named Ammisaduqua /Ammisaduqa because he understood the ‘true suffering’ of the people.
The discovery of clay tablets at the Kuyunjik mound in mid 19th century, at Sippar, in modern Iraq, (ancient Niniveh), in the palace of Ashurbanipal (668-635 BC), in the 19th century, was the most complete set of tablets recovered, of the study first commissioned by Ammisaduqua. The name of the scribe of these tablets has been variously deciphered as Ku-Aya, Nur-Aya, Ipiq-Aya – and most interestingly, ‘in all probablity, the scribe was called’ Kasap-Aya, the same as the famous Indian rishi Kashyapa, ऋषि कश्यप.
Enuma Anu Enlil
Enuma Anu Enlil, the 70 clay tablet series, by astronomer-astrologers in Mesopotamia, recovered from the ruins of Ashurbanipal’s Library, at Niniveh, contains ‘careful records of celestial events for centuries’ – with an inventory of 7000 omens.
Enuma-Anu, could also be spelt as Anumaanu. And अनुमान anumana, which in Sanskrit is, estimate, infer, deduce, close (not exact) calculation. Enlil is the Assyrian God of Winds and Skies. Anil अनिल is also the modern Sanskrit word for air, wind.
What Enuma Anu Enlil, then means is Calculation of the Winds and Skies – which is what it is. It has been noticed that there is “evidence that the earliest layers of this vast collection go back to lunar eclipse omens from the Dynasty of Akkad and Ur III late in the third millennium.”
Cuneiform tablet with the Atrahasis Epic - The British Museum
To the seas …
The earliest extant account we get of the Flood, (pralaya प्रलय in Indian texts) Atra-hasis is also ascribed to the Ammisaduqua reign – which can be gauged by the scribal colophon marks. The Atra-hasis is the world’s first account of the Flood (as per Western history) – which is recounted also in the Bible. This account of the Flood, the Atra-hasis, written by Atra, possibly by a scribe named after Rishi Atri, ऋषि अत्रि, one of the writers of the Rig Veda. The scribe writes, “at-ra-am-ha-si”, which in Sanskrit will read as अत्री अम्हसी “Atri am I”.
Since (deciphered) Akkadian language, in which these tablets were composed, works on presumptive vowels, (deciphered) vowels are a matter of guesswork, opinion and such. To give the benefit of doubt, most Assyriologists have little or poor knowledge of Indian texts and Sanskrit, which comes in the way of making some of these connections.
Eye in the sky …
But wonder turns to puzzlement, when one comes to a Babylonian king called Kandalanu (647-627 BC) – or alternatively, Kundalin(i). Kundali कुण्डली in Sanskrit means circle – of seasons, life, fortune, etc – and janam kundali is made. The measurements of Saturn during Kandalanu’s reign of 20-odd years are important to understanding Mesopotamian astronomy. Saturn in Indian astronomy is Shani शनि. In Indian astrology, Shani casts a dark and baleful shadow on which ever zodiac sign it moves into.
Ashurbanipal
It is speculated that the Kandalanu was the throne name for Ashur-bani-pal – at whose library the above clay tablets were found. Historians have have mixed opinions about Kandalanu and Ashurbanipal being the same person.
Its gotta be the Greeks …
Oh no! Not again!!
Babylonian astronomy (encompassing Assyrian, Mesopotamian, Sumerian, Akkadian) is closely allied with Indian developments in direction, purpose and history. This challenges modern history, caught between the ‘Greek Miracle’ as history school, which has stuck to the Egypt->Greece->Rome->Europe–>West-Is-The-Greatest Axis. For long, the West has systematically suppressed Indian achievements in various spheres – largely for reasons of colonial propaganda.
Western historians trace Indian own significant achievements in astronomy to ‘import’ from Babylon – via Greece! David Brown, an ‘expert’, on Mesopotamian astronomy and astrology, goes further and asserts that the “evidence for transmission to Greece and thence to India in the Hellenistic period was overwhelming.” (from Learned antiquity By Alasdair A. MacDonald, Michael W. Twomey, G. J. Reinink).
What is this ‘overwhelming’ evidence that he presents? Nothing, but the usual dating mix ups. Considering “it unlikely that it was the work of one person’ , analysts are surprised, ‘considering its internal consistency”.
Worried, Mr.Brown? There is more, where this from, Mr.Brown.
Surely, if Indians needed to learn, would it not have been easier and simpler, Mr.Brown, for Indians to have learnt this directly, from the Babylonians – instead of getting of it second hand from the Greeks.
2ndlook 
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Your polite astonishment at the Western presumption that Greeks invented mathematics and astronomy – and presentation of the logical possibility the path was India – The Rig Veda – Babylon – Egypt (?) Greece; makes sense, to me.
Congratulations on your suggestions on language – links to Sanskrit in this context. (Enlil is the Assyrian God of Winds and Skies. (e.g.,. Anil अनिल is also the modern Sanskrit word for air, wind).
Modern Western Christian practice sits at the end of the long trail; and appears to reproduce a relics of debased residues of lost exact science – repressed and forgotten astronomical knowledge in which stars, planets, and nodes, reappear, de-ified, as Gods. (As they do, in Indian pantheons).
Tibetan sand mandalas likewise, appear to offer the Babylonian circular version of the square astronomical records of the Vedas; Tibetan gods tell the similar stories.
I find some comfort in the realisation of at least 30,000 years of catacyclysms, wars; and repetitive re-discovery of prior broad knowledge of, the working of the universe.
The recent imaging and subsequent reconstructions of the Antikythera Mechanism, for example; a bronze hand-cranked clock-calendar-computer to predict planetary moves, eclipses and festivals, excited some degree of Greek amazement, as it was built about AD 70 – perhaps in the life time of Archimedes, and was perhaps made in his home-town – (21 Centuries ago) a good 5 centuries before the supposed Western invention of the clock.
The tooth count of the bronze gears use Metonic and Saros cycles and were built to serve both Egyptian and Greek calendar needs. A revolutionary device; as it would tend to reduce the value of Brahminic-style astroomical mathematical temple-calendar and eclipse-predictiion scholarship.
A disruptive technology, for sure.
CORRECTION: I meant to write The tooth count of the bronze gears use Metonic and Saros cycles and were built to serve both Egyptian and Greek calendar needs. A revolutionary device; as it would tend to REPLICATE ( or RE-PRODUCE) the (EARLIER-CREATED) valueS of Brahminic-style astronomical mathematical temple-calendar and eclipse-predictiion scholarship.
A disruptive technology, for sure.
Rig Veda – Babylon – Egypt (?) Greece
Instead of Rig Veda – Babylon – Egypt (?) Greece, which you seem to takeaway from my post, I am proposing that it was India+Assyria=Babylon -> Whole World path.
I am continually amazed at what was achieved in Babylon – which seemed like a intellectual ‘free-port’.
I like this thought!
The Antikythera ‘legend’ is another classic case of thin data – and massive fiction, speculation, and propaganda.
Look at the subsequent history of astrolabes – which were similar to the Antikythera. These were made in the arc of Middle East and India. Greek was the lingua france of the Byzantine Empire till the 15th century – and for a Byzantine astrolabe maker /mechanic to construct the Antikythera using Greek language would be but natural, naturales, naturel, 自然 (Japanese), 自然的;有关自然界的 (Chinese).
The Native Greeks never displayed such a fine sense of mechanical construction – but is abundant in the Islamic Middle East. The Islamic Middle East did cater to the Greek language users of the Byzantine Empire.
Would a Japanese Toyota car, discovered in Saudi Arabian ruins, after 500 years, using Arabic numerals, become a ‘marvel of Saudi engineering’?
The answer to the Antikythera is in the accompanying artefacts. I have not found any discussions anywhere in the last 4 years, about the ‘companion’ artefacts of the Antikythera.
On a detail, I disagree with you that the:
“The Antikythera ‘legend’ is another classic case of thin data – and massive fiction, speculation, and propaganda”.
Two weeks ago I saw a working reproduction, built in Australia from plans compiled from the Athens Museum team, after the millimetre by millimeter layer-imaging.
You write: ‘Look at the subsequent history of astrolabes – which were similar to the Antikythera. These were made in the arc of Middle East and India. Greek was the lingua france of the Byzantine Empire till the 15th century – and for a Byzantine astrolabe maker /mechanic to construct the Antikythera using Greek language would be but natural, naturales, naturel, 自然 (Japanese), 自然的;有关自然界的 (Chinese).
I have seen a reproduction Antikythera mechanism made in Sydney, Australia.
My reading supports your India+Assyria=Babylon -> Whole World path theory. If the locus of the Antikythera invention – which appears connected to Smyrna, and Archimedes; and, which came from a Roman trading vessel full of artworks in bronze, metals, and marble, at a time of a peak of sea-trade, and transport of wheat from Egpyt and loot (and ideas), of wide-spread Roman-invasions – to Rome; then, I would argue the shipplng of a SINGLE calendric and navigation-device on a ship, makes sense. Did Cook take a box-load of sextants when he crossed the Pacific? If we found one sextant in a wreck, would we call that “thin data”. I think not.
Who needs a box-load of Antikytheras? I would argue the Antikythera was too-strategic a device, to mass-produce. (If Bill Gates had been there at the time, perhaps Antikythera factories would prove the next step). But, it was near the begining of the decline of Roman rule; and, the rise of Christianity, as a mass-movement in Europe. Roman culture had split, and Rome itself near that time recorded sporadic years of famine near this time, when wheat harvests failed in Egypt.
The wreck was reported, as looted itself, in advance of its “discovery” by sponge-divers, on an island on the sea-route to Rome. It was designed for Roman needs; as it gave dates for Roman festivals.
If the (school-of) Archimedes was the builder; then, looking at the history of Smyrna; Archimede’s father was also an astronomer-mathematician. Smyrna, a centre of military-device invention; and, Archimedes a Greek under Roman rule, a living treasure to the Romans, due to his ability to design seige-weaponry.
The record tells Archimedes was in the middle of diagram in the sand (‘Don’t step on my circles), when killed by a rogue Roman.
How to build an Antikythera
The builder of the Antikythera in circa AD 70 did NOT wake, one day, and say:” Mmmm. After I have my yoghurt, I think I will build a thing today which counts planetary moves, allows ships to locate themselves in the open ocean, counts Saros Cycles, computes nodes of the Moon, and predicts eclipses, Roman festivals and what-not, for my Roman overlords”‘.
The arrival of device like the Antikythera – takes generations and generations and generations of record-keeping, know-how and failed experiments. I have seen similar simpler bronze calender devices in old metals markets in South India.
To build the Antikythera needed metals and wood-working workshop, with fine tools. It needed a long-standing tradition of metal working; accumulations of maybe thousands of years or more of data-collection; much mathematics and theorising – its a work of generations of record-keeping and calculations; records, once controlled by “priests”, in “temples”.
Turned into a portable device, the Antikythera meant political and social dynamite.
In short, my reading supports your premise of the transmission of ideas India+Assyria=Babylon -> (then, in this case Greek – >Roman, Antikythera) Whole World path theory.
The fact that the Antikythera was, perhaps MADE by a Greek in a Roman city, for Roman needs, simply demonstrates application of a time-stream of knowledge, passed-on by invasion, or invention funded by current tax-collecting social class of the era – The Romans.
Inventors don’t care where knowledge comes from. But may need financial sponsorship, and devices – as, great leaps of ideas – come after generations of mentoring in a stable civilisation. But, can pass from one civilisation to another. Or stop at one inventor, if records get destroyed, hidden, or stolen. Or, if working models and prototypes get sunk beneath the sea. Or one civilisation fades – or say, volcanic events, tsumanis, or ice-dam-break sea-level rises or dam-breach flood-catastrophes remove whole centres of learning, in one go.
How does this make it Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Babylonian – anything at all? Am I missing a point?
I value your reading and informed agreement.
Now this connection is what bothers me! How did this connection come about? There is no ‘evidence’ except some pretty solid ‘mythic’ modelling.
14th-16thcentury Italian sculptures and bronze statues were pretty Greco Roman – going by appearances. So, to assign dates basedon ‘appearances’ and ‘design schools’ is suspect methodology.
On what basis was the Antikythera dating done? On what basis was this identified as a Roman ship? Any radio carbon dating? The fact that this was from a Roman trading vessels – does not make it Greek. Did you notice the complete lack of coverage for the other artifacts in this ship? Did you notice the funding for this project comes from the Leverhulme Trust of Britain? Does the propaganda motive occur to you as ‘credible’?
The Romans did trade with the Byzantine Empire – and could have easily bought a Antikythera mechanism in Istanbul bazaars.
Largely agree.
Where did I imply, state that every ship would need to carry many Antikytheras.
Most probably, it was made by skilled craftsmen, one-at-a-time. Roman buyers possibly ponied up advance payments – and collected the mechanism 6 months – 1 year later.
Greco Roman festivals were common – and if it was made in the Byzantine city of Istanbul, it still does not clash with my alternative.
If .. If .. If .. then Bob’s my Uncle! Completely and purely speculative.
Never before did the Greeks or Romans make any such finely crafted mechanical device. To imagine, that the school Archimedes acquired these skills to make one such fine crafted device – and promptly lost these skills. It is a lot like Hannibal’s elephants.
Am I imagining the contradiction? So, where did these skills disappear? How come no other mechanical contrivance (of alternative functionality) have ever been found?
The use of Greek language makes the Antikythera origin from India improbable – though Bactrian coin manufacturers could be prime suspects, if one wants to make ‘artificial’ case.
Which the Greeks or Romans did not possess.
While I welcome your openness to the Indo-Assyrian Babylonian Theory, I think Antikythera had very little ‘Indian’ and Babylonian contribution. There is however significant Byzantine origin logic.
Romans as buyers of the output? Yes! As manufacturers, there is no evidence – of anyone in any culture of making a mechanical device of the Antikythera complexity in 70BC-70AD period. It is clearly a 700 AD product.
I am not so sure on your statement;
“there is no evidence – of anyone in any culture of making a mechanical device of the Antikythera complexity in 70BC-70AD period. It is clearly a 700 AD product”
…as it had a wood cabinet. which I believe was carbon-dated. But on another matter – for your interest:
Just read 4000 years Under the Sea, an exploration record, by French marine archaeologist, Phillipe Diolie, (Pan). This 1954 paperback reprint , I found in a second hand book shop. The edition had technical appendices, omitted.
Diolie wrote of two ancient “roads” to India from the Mediterranean. (the Red Sea and Persian Gulf). One had incense trade dated in Eqyptian records, to 28 C BC. In this he quotes Freya Stark, Southern Gates of Arabia. He also writes Tamil records of 3rd and and fourth C records of visits by sea-traders; (Yona, Yavaka, Yavona). Later the Tamil King Pandya ”sent an “embassy to Augustus”.
Diole reported how a marine view of submerged Mediterranean harbours and wrecks , of ancient history, differed from land-based history. His marine view of Mediterranean history presumes large lost knowledge trade with India. “There is no such thing as the ‘Arab miracle”.. there are survivals, many of which are due to the sea.”
In the penultimate chapter he writes of ancient trade routes and surveys of ancient ports – long covered, by sea-level rise. Shore based “Arabs” – a genetically mixed enigma, he argues, took over the Mediterranean shores, with “lightning speed” in the 7th Century; and Tamil and Gupta nautical know-how was re-badged as “Arab”.
Nautical technologies and Tamil divers traded in junks on the 11th and 12 and “nautical science seem to have spread out from the port of Barygaza, a shi building port to the the north of Bombay… near Surat …near the modern Broach, not far from Ouijjian, where the Gupta culture came to full flower at the meeting-point of Iranian, Scthyian, Graeco-Roman and Far Eastern influence…”to the Mediterranean island of Kishm..’
Diolie argued this made it “possible for the the Caliphate of Bhagdad.. for one brief moment of civilisation, to act as the trustee of civilisation…all these things, mustered under the banner of Islam.. made the slow round of the Mediterranean.. and to wake the West.”
Welcome back Levuka.
To carry from where we left last time. I would be seriously interested in a reference of radio-carbon dating of the Antikythera. Searched I have – but haven’t found any.
Your observation reveals your view of India. You seem to be following the Karl Marx-Max Mueller-Matthew Arnold version – where India was a passive economy and Indians were intellectual recipients. You could have said “two roads from India.”
Max Mueller, cleverly wrote, mixing his hooks and punches, how
Karl Marx wrote in London, Friday, June 10, 1853 on India, for the New-York Herald Tribune thus
Matthew Arnold wrote how, India, a ‘nation of philosophers’, from
“The East bowed low before the blast
In patient, deep disdain,
She let the legions thunder past,
And plunged in thought again.”
Matthew Arnold’s influence in Indian education can be gauged by the fact that Indian-English language poetry was for long called derisively as “Matthew Arnold in a Saree”. Just before 1857 War, the works of another ‘influential’ poet, John Keats, became popular. In his hubristic haze, Keats wrote how,
The kings of Ind their jewel-sceptres vail,
And from their treasures scatter pearled hail;
Great Brahma from his mystic heaven groans,
And all his priesthood moans,
Before young Bacchus’ eye-wink turning pale.
Much of modern history’s debates and questions were born during this time – verily created to wage a propaganda war against India – and the world. India’s cultural stature in the pantheon of world’s societies was reduced to a minimal role – and the Greek Miracle was born.
This one line has been the most curious that I have seen in history. Many Western historians have said that Pandion was in fact Porus!! Or Pandyan, depending on what suited them!!
I am always a little suspicious of these ‘instantaneous’ conversions – by Alexander in India or of the Arabs. For, instance, we have Brigadier General, Sir Mortimer Wheeler, declaring,
Such ‘instant’ and ‘lightning speed’ social transformations are fig leaf to cover ‘inconvenient’ facts, which don’t fit the pat theories of some historians with vested interests. I would be more comfortable with the Arabs being significant traders – and owe their craft from the Phoenicians. The Sindbad Tradition of storytelling, mythology and history, is indicative of this.
This possibly is due to actually two usually not credited sources. The Roma Gypsies, who brought gun-powder to the West, during the Hussite Wars, and the arrival of what the Arabs called the Hindsa – arabic numerals. Gun-powder enabled Spain to loot the New World (giving them unbelievable) riches and this liquidity funded the Rise of the West.
I have covered these aspects in some previous posts – which are linked in bold letters.
Greetings Anuraag
It’s the winter solstice in my part of the world. In honour of that – some chat on winter solstice in the Early Bronze Age, and the Atikiythera device.
Who ever made the Antithkera device – it was for Greek use – as it calculated dates for the Olympic Games, with the use of astronomy, and also they knew metal working to to a high degree, with high-level die-casting, and had a source of copper and tin to make bronze – which is one part of copper added to one part in ten of tin. To combine these they needed a lot of fuel – maybe the makers used the oil which bubbled up in that area? Or it was, farewell,O cedars of Lebanon!)
Copper needs 1,083C to smelt and tin 232C. And, if the device had springs it also needed phosphor in the bronze.
“So where did this knowledge come from? How was it transmitted?
Traditional history records the Greeks got it from the Middle East; they got it from Chaldean or Babylonian- Sumerian civlisations, who in turn got it from Egypt – a location immune to the earthquakes and volcanoes of the middleast.
Ancient India forms a missing part in this history. See excerpt below ” “The (winter solstice) name in the Hindu zodiac is kumbha “water-pitcher”, showing that the zodiac reached India via Greek intermediaries.”
“Aquarius “The Water-Pourer” represents Ea himself, dubbed “The Great One” in the MUL.APIN. It contained the winter solstice in the Early Bronze Age. In the Greek tradition, he became represented as simply a single vase from which a stream poured down to Piscis Austrinus. The name in the Hindu zodiac is likewise kumbha “water-pitcher”, showing that the zodiac reached India via Greek intermediaries.”
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998JBAA..108….9R
Looking at the impact of the earthquakes this year in North Japan and New Zealand – one can see how a cataclysimic event can end a whole civilisation and leave just rubble and relics behind. The Anitikythera was found at a critical siesmic point – th junction of three plates. Maybe the boat was enroute to Rome, and dumped by an earthquake tsumani.
Excavation of milliemiums of mud and dust – from parts of what we now call Iraq, reveals Chaldean – Babylonian- Sumerian relics from days with a different climate and different sea levels.
At some time these record-keeper civilisations stayed steady enough to count the rise and fall of the stars and the movement of planets and the moon, over thousands of years. They also used metal in sophisticated ways. They had a sources of copper and tin.
“Copper probably first came into use as the earliest non-precious metal employed by the Sumerians and Chaldeans of Mesopotamia, after they had established their thriving cities of Sumer and Accad, Ur, al’Ubaid and others, somewhere between 5,000 and 6,000 years ago. These early peoples developed considerable skill in fabricating copper and from these centres the rudiments of craftsmanship spread to the river-dwelling people of Egypt, where it continued to flourish for thousands of years long after their own civilization had degenerated”.
“Sumerian city states had a system of writing, an art which the Egyptians only acquired late in their history. They made surveys, kept exact land records, and were capable mathematicians. If we accept the chronology which is favoured at present by the British Museum, their greatest period ranged between 2800 and 2000 B.C. Bronze pots and mixing trays have been found at al’Ubaid, near Ur (c. 2600 B.C.), also silver ones of the same date, besides silver-spouted bronze jugs, saucers and drinking-vessels which were probably used for ceremonial purposes”.
“The Sumerians were masters of sculpture and some splendid examples of their art may be seen in London. Thin copper sheets were beaten and shaped on a wooden background with a bitumen lining-a favourite design was a bull’s head. These figures were attached by copper clamps to the walls of buildings, notably at al’Ubaid (c. 2800 to 3000 B.C.); sometimes they were fastened by nails or copper wires set in bitumen”.
“Even at such an early date, these people adopted the practice of burying under the foundations of buildings a record concerning the builder. Small bronze or copper figurines were likewise buried there at the same time. One such record, in the form of a copper or bronze peg 12 in. long, ( comment – a cubit meausure?) relates to a king of the First Dynasty at Ur.”
A more remarkable one shows a god holding a peg about 6 in. long; this came from the temple at Ningursu (c. 2500 B.C.).
The Babylonian star catalogues entered Greek astronomy in the 4th century BC, via Eudoxus of Cnidus and others. A few of the constellation names in use in modern astronomy can be traced to Babylonian sources via Greek astronomy. Among the most ancient constellations are those that marked the four cardinal points of the year in the Middle Bronze Age
* Taurus “The Bull”, from GU4.AN.NA “The Steer of Heaven”, marking vernal equinox
* Leo “The Lion”, from UR.GU.LA “The Lion”, marking summer solstice
* Scorpius “The Scorpion”, from GIR.TAB “The Scorpion”, marking autumn equinox
* Capricornus “Goat-Horned”, from SU?UR.MA· “The Goat-Fish”, marking winter solstice. It is a mythological hybrid depicted on boundary stones from before 2000 BC.
“Aquarius “The Water-Pourer” represents Ea himself, dubbed “The Great One” in the MUL.APIN. It contained the winter solstice in the Early Bronze Age. In the Greek tradition, he became represented as simply a single vase from which a stream poured down to Piscis Austrinus.
The name in the Hindu zodiac is likewise kumbha “water-pitcher”, showing that the zodiac reached India via Greek intermediaries”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylonian_star_catalogues Primary source http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998JBAA..108….9R
x
In the sky-map of ancient Babylon, constellations had two different roles, and thus developed into two overlapping traditions. This is the primary source for the wiki item:
“One set of constellations represented the gods and their symbols; the other set represented rustic activities and provided a farming calendar. Many constellations were shared by the two traditions, but in some regions of sky there were alternative divine and rustic figures. These figures developed in stages from ~3200 BC to ~500 BC. Of the divine set, the most important (although the last to be finalised) were the twelve zodiacal signs, plus several associated animals (the serpent, crow, eagle, and fish), which were all transmitted to the classical Greek sky-map that we still use today. Conversely, the rustic constellations of workers and tools and animals were not transmitted to the West. However, a few of them may have survived in Bedouin Arab sky-maps of the first millennium AD.
“http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998JBAA..108….9R
Lord Vishnu lies asleep on the ocean of all causes….
No, not a 700AD product! The core concepts were known 2000 years before the dated wreck of the ship. Which lay there for another 2000 years. Hard to imagine – as I may not live past 100; but we all play our small part.
I would argue – as it appears ‘Chaldean’ astronomy, appears in
Levuka –
New research shows this to be based on Babylonian astronomy – or Chaldean as you put it. Since, they are anyway so close to each other.
The latest papers by James Ewans seems to suggest that the gear systems were simpler than the complicated British models made and displayed earlier.
Link to the Ewans paper – http://goo.gl/ijjkS
nature.com has also covered Ewans reading of the Antikythera mechanism http://goo.gl/0pO0I. You can download a PDF of this article from this link here http://goo.gl/3WfHR
Another post on this – http://goo.gl/5ahke
The point seems to be that this mechanism was based on Babylonian astronomy and models. It is being assumed that this was also then made in Babylon. I would continue to posit that the provenance of this mechanism is less than 1500 years old – most probably in the post Babylonian-pre-mongol Byzantine industrial clusters.
[…] yogi and Socrates, which was mentioned by Aristoxenus – and recalled by Eusebius. Or the Indo-Assyrian collaboration which is known as Babylonian astronomy – […]
What’s particularly odd about all this is that Greek Latin English are all new languages (ranging from 1500 BC to 6th BC) Vedic literatures (Bhagavad Gita, Mahabharata, Vedas) Vedic astronomy, Sulba Sutras predate by a good 2000 years. If the “Sumerian Gods” all have Sanskrit origin names – well, where is Sherlock when you need him? & thanks to commenter who noted that ancient Hindu temples existed all along Pacific Islands as well as Buddhist east and west of India. Ancient as in thousands of years to centuries older than Christian temples & the Koran was written in 700 AD & first Hebrew literatures came into existence in 1200 BC. Hinduism was dominant in all of India since 3000 BC!
Krishna’s writings& Bhagavad Gita, his temples reside in the city of Dwaaraka which has recently been uncovered.
Even in Vedic literatures you will see India’s formal numerical system (ek dho theen) & Sanskrit is written in same script as modern Hindi (Devanagari). See also Scientific Verificaition of Vedic Knowledge videos as well as Aryan Invasion Theory Proven False videos (proof of continuity in these areas: cultural, linguistic, genetic, religious for India’s religion & Vedic texts)
http://india_resource.tripod.com/indian-languages.htmlArticle above explains how Tamil and Sanskrit are sister languages, and closer than Sanskrit is to other branches of Indo European..both share same syllabic placement, alphabet to writing/spoken structure (Greek is very different in this regard as are others outside of India), same Subject noun verb placement.
Encyclopedia Brittanica (in Search Dravidian languages)The presence of Dravidian loanwords in the Rigveda implies that Dravidian and Aryan speakers were, by the time of its composition, fused into one speech community in the great Indo-Gangetic Plain, while independent communities of Dravidian speakers had moved to the periphery of the Indo-Aryan area (Brahui in the northwest, Kurukh-Malto in the east, and Gondi-Kui in the east and central India).
From article in Google, copy and paste whole paragraph to view
‘In this view, the early Indus Valley civilization (Harappa and Mohenjo Daro) is often identified as having been Dravidian. [6]. Cultural and linguistic similarities have been cited by researches such as Finnish Indologist Asko Parpola as being strong evidence for a proto-Dravidian origin of the ancient Indus Valley civilization. Remember there is no other genetic race in INDIA, Dravida refers to language group.
There is no other genetic race in India whoever created Indus Valley civilization: this much is fact &proven: TAMIL SANGAMS were present (Dravida is a term Brit gave to S. Indians language group” to divide India light north dark south- SEE PROOF OF THIS BY TYPING TAMILS MAHABHARATA WAR into Google, same time of Indus Valley Civilization -Vedic culture was dominant in south &north India then &now, See TAMIL SANSKRIT LINK INTO GOOGLE, THESE ARE SISTER LANGUAGES
The Romans used to cremate up until the6th Century..only in the Bhagavad Gita are cremation ceremonies outlined.
http://library.thinkquest.org/26602/ceremonies.htm
& Remember Italian, Greek, Latin, and German are all very new languages. In high school books it is taught per Indian history, that Aryans “civilized” the Dravidian population.. yet, again, the Vedic texts (Krishna’s verses), Vedic culture were present in all of India and India only, and no where else-
the precise position of the stars and planets were noted in the writing of Bhagavad Gita, this is how we are able to date it to about 3000 BC (birth of Krishna).
Interesting article on Vedic astronomy: http://www.crystalinks.com/indiastronomy.html
and here is article that provides evidence re: dates of Bhagavad Gita
http://www.bhagavad-gita.org/Gita/intro.html
“That proof of the date 3102 B.C. can be verified by any knowledgeable indologist in India based on the fact that this was the year when the Pandava King Yudhisthira ascended the throne and was coronated as emperor of the Earth. Also according to the Aihole inscription of Pulakesin II, the Battle of Kuruksetra took place in 3102 B.C. with Lord Krishna reciting the Bhagavad-Gita before its commencement. As well precise information of the positions of the constellation at the commencement of the Battle of Kuruksetra have been given in the great historical epic Mahabharata itself, which is based on the 26,920 year astronomical cycle known as the precession of the equinoxes which is the time it takes our solar system to revolve around the central sun.”
See Indian mathematics Wikipedia and Indian Astronomy as well
what people dont also see is that babylonians were Kashi and called themselves children of Kush. Now the race of Kush came to prominence only with Buddha. The dynasty of babylone is same as Ikshvaku king list. Everything resolves if we reconsider the dating of Buddha the date given by Indian history is 1900 BC.
Since (deciphered) Akkadian language, in which these tablets were composed, works on presumptive vowels, (deciphered) vowels are a matter of guesswork, opinion and such.
What is today accepted as Kush could even be Kashi – or Akush, Ekush, Ukush, Kusha, Akusha, Ukusha, Ukashi, or Kashi. After all some around 500 BC, even Pythogoras is supposed to have come to Kashi to learn mathematics.
And the Kassites – coud also be from Kashi.
You bring this very relevant element into the discussion.