Book Review: Light on Egypt: Pirámides, Templos y Estrellas: Astronomía y Arqueología en el Egipto Antiguo

Abstract

LIGHT ON EGYPT Piramides, Templos y Estrellas: Astronomia y Arqueologia en el Egipto Antiguo. Juan Antonio Belmonte Aviles (Critica, Barcelona, 2012). Pp. xiv + 464. euro26. ISBN 978-84-9892-386-5.Belmonte, an astronomer by training and an Egyptologist by avocation, is wellknown to readers of this journal, not least for his series of papers based on fleldwork in Egypt in which he and his colleagues succeeded in visiting and measuring the orientations of several hundred pyramids and temples - surely the most remarkable example of dedicated fleldwork in the history of archaeoastronomy. In this book he brings together the fruits of a decade's work in the Nile Valley. Using hieroglyphic sources such as astronomical papyri, along with star-clocks, celestial diagrams, and of course the archaeological sites themselves, he has set out to present to the reader how astronomy and its archaeological implications can lead to a better understanding of what the Spanish term the cosmovision of ancient Egyptians.In chap. 1 the author studies the beginnings of astronomy in Egypt and her Saharan environment, with particular emphasis on the formation of the solar cult. The chapter also discusses the forerunners of modern archaeoastronomical studies in Egypt, offering a vindication of the much-maligned Norman Lockyer.Chap. 2 is devoted to the civil Egyptian calendar of 365 days. Belmonte treats the various theories as to the origin of the calendar, and argues that the Nile had a key role in this. He considers the other calendars that were functioning independently, and suggests that the civil calendar reigned supreme in ancient Egypt alongside vestiges of an earlier lunar time-keeping system for festivals (rather as Easter survives alongside the modern Gregorian calendar).In chap. 3 Belmonte presents the conclusions he reached, in partnership with the Egyptologist Jose Lull, on the analysis of Senenmut's astronomical ceiling (the oldest complete symbolic representation of Egyptian skies) and the well-known Zodiac of Dendera. They propose an identification of the stars, asterisms and constellations that populated the skies of ancient Egypt, and discuss their use as star-clocks within the framework of a sophisticated astral eschatology.The most spectacular results of the Egyptian-Spanish Mission for the Archaeoastronomy of Ancient Egypt form the basis of chap. 4. The objective of the mission was to answer the question: were the ancient Egyptian temples astronomically orientated? The answer proposed by Belmonte and the other authors of the series of papers published in this journal was affirmative, but far from simple.Chap. 5 is an attempt to clarify the importance of the stars for the architects of ancient Egypt, particularly in the design, alignment and construction of the pyramids - a topic popular among the lunatic fringe. …