An investigation of an Aberdeenshire ritual landscape: a site of human sacrifice associated with Venus.

A group of intervisible prehistoric monuments delineate a ritual landscape of 10 kilometres near Hatton of Fintray, Aberdeenshire. They act as back and foresights on solar and lunar horizon rising and setting extremes when viewed one from another. The identities of the local deities, syncretised as...

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Publicado en:Scottish Geographical Journal Vol. 137; no. 1-4; pp. 173 - 210
Autor principal: Nance, David Alexander
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Taylor & Francis Ltd Mar-Dec 2021
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Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
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      dt: Mar-Dec 2021
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        atl: An investigation of an Aberdeenshire ritual landscape: a site of human sacrifice associated with Venus.
      aug:
        au: Nance, David Alexander
        affil: Department of Geography and Environment, School of Geosciences, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, UK
      su:
        Human sacrifice
        Iron Age
        Bronze Age
        Ritual
        Landscapes
        Venus (Planet)
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        subj:
          Human sacrifice
          Iron Age
          Bronze Age
          Ritual
          Landscapes
          Venus (Planet)
      keyword:
        northern Britain
        ritual landscape
        ritual murder
        Skyscape archaeology
        Venus alignment
      ab: A group of intervisible prehistoric monuments delineate a ritual landscape of 10 kilometres near Hatton of Fintray, Aberdeenshire. They act as back and foresights on solar and lunar horizon rising and setting extremes when viewed one from another. The identities of the local deities, syncretised as parish saints, an ethnographic analogy with pre-Christian Irish chieftains and an oral tradition that one of the monuments, the Gouk Stone (Old English for 'cuckoo'), marks the location where a 'general' of that name was slain, support the hypothesis that local chieftains, titled after the bird and 'married' to the local goddess of sovereignty that personified Venus, were tied to the stone and ritually sacrificed. This occurred on the culturally significant day of Samhain at eight-year intervals from the Bronze Age until the late Iron Age. The interval coincided with the extreme evening setting of Venus at Samhain. In support of this hypothesis the stone acted as a horizon foresight for Venus setting extremes which occurred within a few days of Samhain and as a back sight with sunset behind a stone circle on Samhain. Place-names indicate the location remained an assembly/judicial site until the Medieval Period.
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    language: English
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      custom: Copyright of Scottish Geographical Journal is the property of Taylor & Francis Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.
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