The gate of the year

Figures above and below:

Bas-relief from the ceiling of a chapel dedicated to Osiris in the Hathor Temple at Dendera, dating to the Ptolemaic period (300-30 B.C.). In 1821 the sculpture was removed and donated to France, and now is exhibited in the Louvre Museum, Paris. The relief, which was put on the ceiling of the chapel, represents a complete map of the sky. At the center are identifiable the constellations around the Pole Star (the Big Dipper, represented by the leg of an animal, and the Little Dipper), around which are the twelve constellations/signs that still today compose the Zodiac (as evidenced in Fig. 2_bis). This astronomical system probably derives from Mesopotamia and is remained substantially unchanged until modern day astrology. In the picture, the beginning of the year is coincident with the constellation Aries (the Ram), corresponding to the spring equinox, as it was the case in Mesopotamia and subsequently in Greek and Roman astrological systems. The ancient Egyptian calendar, instead, began with the Nile flood, in summer, and was divided into three seasons, of four months each. The first one take its name from the Nile inundation, the second from the emergence of crops, and the third from the harvest period (Redford 2001).

[Immagini: http://www.waa.ox.ac.uk/XDB/tours/nile25.asp; http://saturniancosmology.org/sib.php]




Seasonal Cycles

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Figures above and below: Bas-relief from the ceiling of a chapel dedicated to Osiris in the Hathor Temple at Dendera, dating to the Ptolemaic period (300-30 B.C.). In 1821 the sculpture was removed and donated to France, and now is exhibited in the Louvre Museum, Paris. The relief, which was put on the ceiling of the chapel, represents a complete map of the sky. At the center are identifiable the constellations around the Pole Star (the Big Dipper, represented by the leg of an animal, and the Little Dipper), around which are the twelve constellations/signs that still today compose the Zodiac (as evidenced in Fig. 2_bis). This astronomical system probably derives from Mesopotamia and is remained substantially unchanged until modern day astrology. In the picture, the beginning of the year is coincident with the constellation Aries (the Ram), corresponding to the spring equinox, as it was the case in Mesopotamia and subsequently in Greek and Roman astrological systems. The ancient Egyptian calendar, instead, began with the Nile flood, in summer, and was divided into three seasons, of four months each. The first one take its name from the Nile inundation, the second from the emergence of crops, and the third from the harvest period (Redford 2001). [Immagini: http://www.waa.ox.ac.uk/XDB/tours/nile25.asp; http://saturniancosmology.org/sib.php]