Astronomy and The Anceint Egyptians

Astronomy as we know it would not exist if not for the work of ancient Egyptians. Ancient Egypt was home to many of the first few great scientific minds and did many great things in the field of astronomy. Stars and many other constellations were believed to be the gods of the Egyptians, this was the basis of how many constellations were formed. For example, the constellation that we consider to be Orion the Hunter, was known as Osiris the God of death, rebirth and the after life. The Milky Way was believed to be the birth of the sun God Re from the Goddess Nut. From these beliefs the Egyptians mapped out of sky and we still use some of the mappings and recognizing of the constellations that they used. Much of the work that the Egyptians did became the framework of many of the breakthroughs and basis of the movement of stars and many other beliefs in the field of astronomy.

Ancient Egyptian Priests, who were also astronomers helped use astronomy to give humans and understanding of the timing of the seasons as well. Egyptian astronomers realized that the all important flooding of the Nile always occurred at what we know as the summer solstice. Using this information the priests were able to predict the annual flooding of the Nile. This also gave the entire human race one of their first calenders. From their information they were able to create our very first three hundred and sixty five day calender which consisted of twelve, thirty day months with a five day feasting period.

Egyptians even built building according to some of the things that they viewed in the sky. Temples of certain religion would be oriented to having sunlight shine in a certain point of the temple at a certain time of year. Even the great pyramids were aligned in different ways according to the stars. The 2 of the edges of the pyramids are aligned directly north and south, and it is believed that the Egyptians used constellations that we know very well today as the Big and Little Dipper. to help with this orientation. Orientating the pyramids this way was believed by Egyptian mythology to give the deceased access to the northern sky. Also, it is theorized that the positioning of the pyramids is directly correlated to the orientation of Orion's belt. This would make much sense, since Orion was believed to be Osiris the Egyptian God of death, rebirth, and the afterlife. From the interest that the Egyptian had in the stars it would not come as much of a surprise if the pyramids did have such an orientation.


http://www.egyptologyonline.com/astronomy.htm
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/planetearth/stars_pyramids_wg_001116.html
http://www.robertbauval.co.uk/articles/articles/gizaorion.html