Abstract
To understand the basic principles behind the techniques of archaeoastronomy, it is essential to have some idea about positional astronomy .
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Notes
- 1.
Light year is a measure of distance used in astronomy. It represents a distance covered by light in one year. It is equal to 9.46 × 1012 km (or, 5.88 × 1012 miles).
- 2.
In ancient times ‘moon’ used to be called ‘māsā’ and the full moon, i.e. ‘purna māsā’ used to indicate the completion of a month. The word ‘purnamasi’ has come from this and later ‘month’ used to be called ‘māsā’.
- 3.
‘Solstice’ means sun at stand still condition.
- 4.
‘Equinox’ means equal night and day.
- 5.
VE and AE means vernal (or spring) equinox and autumn Equinox , respectively.
- 6.
Refer to Appendix A for an introduction to spherical trigonometry and relation among various quantities.
- 7.
In the Indian system, the origin is a fixed point ‘Mesadi’ the first point of the sign Aries. The longitude in the Indian system is called ‘nirāyanā’. In the modern system, the longitude is ‘Sāyana’.
- 8.
That is why the plane is called the plane of ecliptic .
- 9.
The word ‘henge’ means a prehistoric monument consisting of a circle of menhirs or wooden pillars.
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Ghosh, A. (2020). Rudiments of Positional Astronomy and Archaeoastronomy. In: Descriptive Archaeoastronomy and Ancient Indian Chronology. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-6903-6_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-6903-6_2
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