moves around Sirius in an elliptical orbit that took 50 years. They said Sirius was incredibly
heavy and that it rotated on its axis and they further describe it as having a circle of reddish rays
around it that is ‘like a spot spreading but staying still’. Dogon oral traditions also quite
adamantly state that they have known for thousands of years that Jupiter had moons and Saturn
had rings around it.
Fig.52 Fig.53.
Initially the men did not see the astronomical importance of what they had been told by the
tribe and only offhandedly published the story in an obscure Anthropological journal. However
sometime later the information was noticed by several astronomers and deemed worthy of a
further, more detailed investigation.
What they discovered was that the Dogon had in fact, accurately described the three principal
properties of a white dwarf star: small, heavy and white and had also stated that Sirius is a binary
star, both of which we now know the Sirius system to be (fig.54). They are also absolutely correct
in their knowledge of its companions’ rotation as Sirius-B orbits Sirius-A every 49.9 to 50 years.
Their description of reddish rays is also quite remarkable as this space telescope photograph
reveals (fig.55) and perfectly describes the DNA type pattern that is made by the elliptical orbit of
the two stars rotating around each other as they travel through the sky (fig.56).
Fig.54 Fig.55 Fig.56
The Dogon people also use an extremely unorthodox calendar that is based on a 50 year cycle.
This cycle is uniquely unusual because it does not follow any cycles coinciding with any