Re: Sky & Telescope article

[Dennis <ixohoxi@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Dan Moonhawk Alford wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 5 Oct 2000, Rene Zandbergen wrote:
> 
> > The Dendera zodiac is quite famous. I may have an illustration of it
> > somewhere but can't quickly find it. Now unless I am much mistaken, it
> > is circular so its starting point may not be obvious. And in AD 30 the
> > starting point for the zodiac should really still be Aries.
> 
> In the last part of the last degree? People must've already been singing
> "This is the dawning of the Age o-of Pisces" in the streets! ;-)

	Or,

	"What rough beast, his hour come round at last,
	"Slouches towards Eridu to be born?"  

	Incidentally.  Scholars, over the last ten years, have
discovered that the Mithraic cult of the middle to late
Roman empire originated from the discovery that the sky
was going from the Age of Taurus to the Age of Pisces. 
I'm not good on astronomy, but the star Perseus sits in
the sky such that Perseus could be the star/god
responsible for the end of the Age of Taurus.  At that
time it would have been seen as Perseus' moving the
very axis of the universe.  The scene in the Mithraic
temples show The Slaying of the Bull by Perseus, with
animals for the other signs of the zodiac.  So a whole
religion of the god Perseus formed around this!

	ObVMs:  The folks at S&T could see as well as us that
later hands could have added the zodiac symbols in the
middle, but I don't recall their commenting on this.

Dennis