astronomy: introduction 123FURTHER READING
John Boardman, Greek Art, 4th ed. (London: Th ames and Hudson,
1996).
France Borel, Th e Splendor of Ethnic Jewelry: From the Colette and
Jean-Pierre Ghysels Collection, trans. I. Mark Paris (New York:
Harry N. Abrams, 1994).
Richard Brilliant, Roman Art from the Republic to Constantine
(London: Phaidon, 1974).
David S. Brose, James A. Brown, and David W. Penney, Ancient
Art of the American Woodland Indians (New York: Harry
N. Abrams in association with the Detroit Institute of Arts,
1985).
Dominique Collon, First Impressions: Cylinder Seals in the Ancient
Near East (London: British Museum Press, 1987).
Roy C. Craven, Indian Art: A Concise History, rev. ed. (New York:
Th ames and Hudson, 1997).
Digital Arts and Sciences, Ancient Egyptian Art (CD-ROM) (San
Francisco, Calif.: Chronicle Books, 1995).
Abeer El-Shahawy and Farid Atiya, Funerary Art of Ancient
Egypt (Cairo, Egypt: American University of Cairo Press,
2005).
Gabriele Fahr-Becker, ed., Th e Art of East Asia (Cologne, Germany:
Konemann, 1999).
Fergus Fleming, Heroes of the Dawn: Celtic Myth (New York: Time-
Life Books, 1996).
Mark D. Fullerton, Greek Art (New York: Cambridge University
Press, 1999).
Miranda Green, “Th e Sun Gods of Ancient Europe.” In Th e Sun:
Symbol of Power and Life, ed. Madanjeet Singh (New York:
Harry N. Abrams, 1993).
George M. A. Hanfmann, Roman Art: A Modern Survey of the Art of
Imperial Rome (New York: W. W. Norton, 1975).
John Henderson and Mary Beard, Classical Art: From Greece to
Rome (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001).
George Kubler, Th e Art and Architecture of Ancient America: Th e
Mexican, Maya, and Andean Peoples, 3rd ed. rev. (London:
Penguin Books, 1984).
Jean-Pierre Mohen and Christian Eluère, Th e Bronze Age in Eu-
rope, trans. David Baker and Dorie Baker (New York: Harry
N. Abrams, 2000).
Robin Osborne, Archaic and Classical Greek Art (Oxford, U.K.: Ox-
ford University Press, 1998).
Esther Pasztory, Pre-Columbian Art (New York: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1998).
Nancy H. Ramage and Andrew Ramage, Roman Art: Romulus to
Constantine, 4th ed. (Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Pren-
tice Hall, 2005).
John Malcolm Russell, Sennacherib’s “Palace without Rival” at
Nineveh (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991).
Rebecca Stone-Miller, Art of the Andes: From Chavín to Inca (New
York: Th ames and Hudson, 1996).
Richard F. Townsend, ed., Th e Ancient Americas: Art from Sacred
Landscapes (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1992).
Richard F. Townsend, ed., Hero, Hawk, and Open Hand: American
Indian Art of the Ancient Midwest and South (New Haven,
Conn.: Yale University Press in assoc. with the Art Institute of
Chicago, 2004).
Susan Walker, Roman Art (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University
Press, 1991).
Mortimer Wheeler, Roman Art and Architecture, rept. ed. (New
York: Th ames and Hudson, 1985).
Richard H. Wilkinson, Reading Egyptian Art: A Hieroglyphic Guide
to Ancient Egyptian Painting and Sculpture (London: Th ames
and Hudson, 1994).
Leonard Woolley, Th e Art of the Middle East Including Persia, Meso-
potamia, and Palestine (New York: Crown Publishers, 1961).▶ astronomy
introduction
Astronomy was probably the fi rst science that ancient peoples
pursued. Th ey looked heavenward and recognized that the
objects they saw in the sky seemed to move with great regu-
larity. Th e sun rose each morning and set each evening, and
the moon appeared in predictable patterns. Th ey also noticed
that stars seemed to form groups that had particular shapes,
such as the Big Dipper. From these observations, they tried
to infer the cosmology (the branch of thought that deals with
the origins of the universe) they lived in.
In time, ancient peoples began to understand that they
could use this regularity for their own purposes. Th ey no-
ticed, for example, that they could predict the shortest day of
the year, knowing then that the days would become longer,
and lengthening days signaled the start of the growing season.
Th ey could use this information to predict, for example, when
rainy and dry seasons would arrive. Since prehistoric people
attributed natural phenomena to the will of the gods, they
came to attach their astronomical observations to religious
beliefs. Th us, the harvest at the end of the growing season,
when the sun was lower in the sky, was as much a religious
event as it was an agricultural one. Similarly, a momentous
event such as an eclipse, the appearance of a comet, or the
appearance of a supernova (making a star visible for the fi rst
time) was believed to be the manifestation of will of the gods.
Such events could create great fear among people.
Astronomy served a number of purposes other than just
to mark the passage of time or tell farmers when to plant.
Kings and other rulers encouraged astronomers to study
the regularity of the heavens. In this way they could pre-
dict events, demonstrate their divine knowledge, and retain
their power. In this vein, horoscopes and zodiacs enabled
shamans, priests, and others to “predict” events based on
the movements of the stars, similarly giving them authority
and power while at the same time making life a little less
uncertain for people.
Astronomy and architecture were also strongly con-
nected. Architects used astronomy to site the foundations of
buildings, and in turn buildings, because of their orientation
to the sun, moon, star constellations, the points of the equi-
noxes and solstices, and the like, could be used as astronomi-
cal observatories. Th ey could also function as calendars by
marking, for example, the summer solstice or the autumn
equinox. It is believed that many ancient stelae, or upright