THE SUN AT STONEHENGE.

Southern Cross, Volume 9, Issue 53, 22 March 1902, Page 2

THE SUN AT STONEHENGE.

Man is a carious animal —lie wants to know things. One thing he wants to know is, who built Stonehenge, and what was it built for, and what is its age F For years he has been worrying about it, and now Sir Noman Lockyer, Director of Solar Physics, South Kensington, says that it was built by sun-worshippers, as a temple in which to worship the sun, and that the stones were placed in position probably 1680 8.C., or, say, 3000 years ago. Stonehenge restored (on paper) seems to indicate a method in support of this theory, the sun cutting through an avenue of stones which hardly was so placed as the result of an accident. Tracing the affinity of the British sun-worship-ners to those of the East, the writer speaks of the ‘ orienting ’ of Egypt and Greece in the days of the solar temples, and refers to the cunning arrangement of the latter so that a concentrated shaft of light from the sun struck through the temple on a certain anniversary only. It will be remembered that the sun, owing to the tilt of the earth s axis, rises at a different point every day, moving slowly north and then slowly south of due east as the earth swings along on its orbit. All during April and May the sun is rising every day further towards the north until on June 21 it reaches the farthest point on its northward journey. It then begins its return journey southward. It will be seen, therefore, that it a tube or dark passage be pointed towards this most northern spot, the light of the aising sun will flash down it only on one morning of the year. The Egyptian priests, who were skilled in astronomy, knew this, and used their knowledge to produce an effect which must have seemed miraculous to the uneducated multitude.’ Stonehenge was built on this principle, and thus the mysterious monument which has been the subject of so much controversy is found to owe its origin to a definite purpose, the advocates of which would have flourished at the period named.