Alternative Cosmology
It was my birthday yesterday :). I turned 20 :S.
It feels really weird to be able to say that I'm in my twenties now!
The planet thought fit to celebrate the occasion by setting off a few earthquakes just off the coast.
I'd never felt my entire house rock until last night. At first I thought a really strong gust of wind had hit the house, except that the air was completely still. The shaking lasted a couple of seconds but afterwards I could hear it fading for a few more seconds.
My aunt in Wellington is perfectly used to earthquakes. They get them so often that if she doesn't feel one for a couple of weeks she starts to worry that maybe it's building for a bigger one. Wellingtonians may wonder what all Auckland's fuss is about, but the fact that we got 3 earthquakes in a row in the same place (along with two smaller ones in the same place back on January 30th) is highly unusual. It means something unusual is going on. And the fact that we share the Tamaki isthmus with some 50 volcanoes means when we feel an earthquake we can't help but uneasily glance at the nearest one!
This is the record from the seismometer up near Whangarei. Unfortunately I only got this off GeoNet at 7:10 tonight, so it isn't as clear as it was earlier, but you can still see the quake up in the top right hand corner, with the earlier one to the left of it and the third one (light purple) to the lower left of it. You can see why a lot of people felt the main one and not the other two.
Anyway, on to what this post is about. I'm warning you, this is going to be a long one!
I've been reading some stuff recently about an alternative view of the recent history of the Earth and the solar system. This view proposes that the ancient people are more qualified to tell us about what went on in the sky back then than we are, and that up until about 2700 years ago the solar system was radically different to what it is today. It also takes a very different view on the interpretation of mythology, on the basis that ancient mythology is written like a historical narrative - as though the ancients were relating things that they were actually seeing - and furthermore, mythologies around the world are disturbingly similar.
I’m going to write this as though everything that I am writing is true, but keep in mind that this is only an alternative view, and I’m only presenting it as an interesting curiosity to consider. It goes like this:
"The evidence of myth which points to Saturn having once occupied a position above Earth's north polar regions is voluminous. There is not a race on Earth that has not preserved at least one account which states as much. According to this evidence, Saturn occupied a central position in the north celestial regions."
"It rotated, and rotated widely; but, other than that, it was immovable. It did not rise, it did not set. It merely became brighter and more glorious each night as the Sun set. This state of affairs seems to have lasted for ages. It is the one single dictum of the ancients from which all other beliefs are derived."
-- Dwardu Cardona (1982)
The effect that this had on ancient civilisations is amazing. This period lasted from approximately 5800BC – 3100BC and was remembered as the Age of the Gods.
Before 5800BC Saturn was much closer to the sun than it is now and its orbit crossed those of the Earth and Mars. At some point in the distant past, Saturn passed above Mars and captured it. Mars was held in a position below the south pole of Saturn – attracted by Saturn’s gravity, but repelled by the electromagnetic charge build-up between them. Some time afterwards the same thing happened to the Earth. Saturn (with Mars in tow) passed above the Earth and captured it, too, below its south pole. The Earth was suspended probably about a million km or so below Saturn's south pole. Mars was suspended between the two. As a result of the close proximity of these three planets there was a massive, permanent, electric plasma discharge between the 3 planets.
Plasma is simply a flow of charged particles. Fire, electricity, St Elmo’s Fire, and lightening are all forms of plasma, as is the arc produced in arc welding. Plasma streams take 3 forms: “Dark mode” which involves the least energy and current and is invisible; “glow mode” – where the flow is visible, and “arc mode” – where the ionised particles are so energised that they release not only visible light, but also ultraviolet and x-ray light. There is currently a plasma stream between Jupiter and its closest major moon, Io. The strikepoint on Io can be seen, and was originally thought to be one of its many volcanoes.
It was at the time of Saturn’s capture of the Earth (or shortly afterwards) that the collective memory of ancient civilisations and their mythologies begins. This period is known as the primordial period before creation. The earth has been found to have been much warmer during this time, which would make sense if it had been connected to a plasma discharge from Saturn. We have never had such a mild climate since then. This was due to the plasma arc striking the Arctic Ocean (0r possible North Atlantic – I’ll get to that later) and evaporating large amounts of water, filling the upper atmosphere with steam (cf. the water above the firmament in the Bible). The plasma stream would have completely enveloped the Earth in a protective layer – protecting it from radiation and slowing the rate of heat loss to space, allowing steam to remain in the upper atmosphere. This combination of steam and plasma would have obscured the stars completely.
In 4200BC something happened – Saturn, under immense electrical stress, went nova. It developed a corona and lit up like a miniature sun (which it essentially was). The plasma discharge to Earth went from glow mode to arc mode with a bang. The noise it made is remembered by the Egyptians:
Amun initiated creation, in association with his sacred animal, the goose. He is called the Great Honker, who gave a great screech which stirred the inert cosmos into action. He is also called the Great Cackler…
--Ogdoad of Hermopolis
This is the noise the arc made as it was struck.
With the change in the electric potential of the Earth caused by this, the opaque plasma layer surrounding the Earth cleared, thereby unobscuring the skies. During this time Saturn first became visible. This event is generally associated with creation in mythologies (like the one above). The Greeks remember him [Saturn] as Chronos - the first god to rule the Earth – who overthrew his father Uranus (the god of the sky – who was originally the obscured sky itself) with his sickle (Saturn’s rings, appearing to swing around the planet as the Earth rotates). As a result Uranus (the obscured sky) was banished and Saturn/Chronos became visible, ruling the northern sky.
So the ancient people were met with a massive globe dominating the northern part of the rapidly clearing sky, never setting, lighting up the sky by night almost the way the sun lit it up by day (cf. the Bible when God created one light to rule the day, the other to rule the night). The Greeks remember this globe as Chronos. The Egyptians came to know it as the Eye of Ra - which appeared after creation and hovered in the northern sky, watching over and ruling the world.
This is a depiction of the Eye of Ra. The pupil is Mars, which could be seen between Earth and Saturn. The black bit hanging off to the bottom right is the plasma stream connecting to Earth. The eyebrow is Saturn’s rings (which appear to be 'above' Saturn during the day because the invisible part of the rings (cast by Saturn’s shadow) is on the opposite side to the sun. The curl off to the left is Venus, which was ejected from Saturn when it went nova (see this page [under the heading "Where Planets Come From - about halfway down if it doesn't take you straight to it] for an alternative model of planet formation) and orbits Saturn, connected by a plasma stream. The same idea can be seen in this picture of Ra:
That creature is an anthromorphised depiction of Ra. Notice what he’s wearing on his head. It's a depiction of what they really saw - the red circle surrounded by the yellow is the orb of Mars seen in front of Saturn (and much closer than Saturn). The curled snake head is Venus and its connection to Saturn. The rings aren't shown, although they are in some depictions (which, annoyingly, I can't find any of right now).
The plasma connection to Earth took on a number of fantastic shapes. Sometimes it looked like a massive river of water flowing from Saturn. It also looked like a tree occasionally. Plasma streams never look the same for long. I remember once seeing one on display at a science museum in Christchurch – it was constantly rippling and twisting. Different cultures gave different interpretations to this phenomenon - it was the snake which gnaws at the roots of the tree to bring down Valhalla, and the snake which nests in the Sumerian goddess Inanna's Huluppu tree. It was the entwined serpent-necked animals of the Palette of Narmer. It was the Peach tree of Chinese mythology, seen in the northeast. It was the Caduceus: two snakes climbing to a circular Heaven - a Heaven with outstretched plasma wings on either side. Nordic tales identify it as a tree atop of which the gods live.
Plasma streams tend to separate into bundles of either 28 or 56 individual streams near the contact point. This may explain the number of stones used in stone henges across Europe. Europe was much closer to the contact point (which was at the north magnetic pole) than the rest of the civilised world and would have been able to see the individual streams. The arc would have created an incredible noise – not only crackling and rumbling – but also as the atmosphere resonated and the crust resounded, there would have been amazing sounds transmitted over a lot of the world.
Hence the reason the gods are said to have taught man music. Also the reason Chinese legends apparently state that music originally came from thunder.
The gods are also credited with teaching man to build cities. Where the arc contacted the Earth (in the ocean) massive quantities of water were evaporated, recondensing to form a massive mountain of cloud at least tens of kilometres high, surrounded by auroras. This in turn was enveloped by the massive mountain of plasma (where the stream spread out as it neared the contact point) which stretched hundreds of kilometres high and was easily visible across the northern hemisphere. As happens with auroras, fluted areas would have developed around the outside of this ‘mountain’ giving the impression of terraces. This was the City of the Gods. Placed on earth by them. As one Sumerian source relates:
"The great gods created the structure of Unug, the handiwork of the gods, and of E-ana, the house lowered down from heaven. You watch over the great rampart, the rampart which An founded," (one manuscript has instead: "its great rampart, a cloudbank resting on the earth"), and continues, "the majestic residence which An established."
-- "Gilgamesh and Aga" Sumerian, ca 2800 BC
In China it was interpreted as the shell of a turtle which holds up the great celestial peach tree and supports the earth. In South America it was seen as the great mountain in the north full of caves from which humans came (humans entered South America from the north).
The Europeans had a close up view of it, and called it the great fortress Ys that floated on the ocean. They built barrows as a smaller scale replica of it (there is evidence that barrows weren’t used as graves until long after). The barrows from this period all face the north-west – the direction of the arc’s connection.
Other objects were seen in the sky as well. The moons of Saturn were seen orbiting it along with Venus. The Greeks remember these as the Titans (of which Chronos – Saturn – was one). It’s appropriate that modern astronomers have named the recently (re)discovered moons of Saturn after the Titans. All these objects milling around in the sky gave rise to the numerous ancient gods described in mythologies. It’s small wonder that the sky was seen as the home of the gods. (Keep in mind that the moon didn’t orbit the earth at this point and was probably nowhere near it). The plasma interactions between these bodies were interpreted as parts of their bodies – beaks, wings, claws and so on. It was very busy in the skies above Earth and gave rise to many tales about the primeval gods.
One of the requirements of a stable relationship between Saturn, Mars, and the Earth in these positions (stacked above each other with Mars in the middle) is that Mars needs to slowly oscillate between Saturn and Earth. It slowly approached and receded from the Earth numerous times over this period of history. Mars was the main conductor between the Earth and Saturn, and would have received most of the current coming from Saturn. It’s interesting that Mars’ northern hemisphere is pockmarked with anode blisters. These are today interpreted as massive volcanoes, but the problem is there is very little sign of lava flow. The shapes of the volcanoes are consistent with the craters left by lightening strikes on Earth though (but on a much larger scale).
Because of this, the charge on Mars would eventually build up, repelling it away from Saturn and towards the Earth, on which it would subsequently discharge. This discharge would weaken the electric repulsion and allow gravity to attract it back towards Saturn again. The Greeks recalled this as the regular visits of Ares to Earth (Ares is Mars in Greek).
Chronos/Saturn is also seen as the god of time. This is because when Saturn went nova and lit up like a sun (as described earlier) and the skies cleared, the light of the sun was clearly seen on the rings of Saturn. These appeared to rotate in a regular manner and were the first observable indication of the passage of time. [It would appear that the southern skies and the sun were still obscured from a northern hemisphere point of view. I'll cover that later].
It was also said that the gods taught man how to harvest crops. This may possibly be due to the ripples and patterns that could be seen in the 'golden fields' (the Elysian Fields?) of Saturn's rings which would have looked like fields of wheat on Earth waving in the breeze. It's possible that this caused people to see wheat fields as significant and eventually they figured out they could harvest them. The apparent motion of Saturn's rings around the planet would even suggest a scything motion!
Perhaps Saturn's rings even served as the inspiration for the wheel. I suggest that because all of man's significant advances during this period were attributed to the inspiration of the gods.
This time was known as the Age of the Gods. During this time the climate was warm, the weather mild, and in the northern hemisphere it was summer all year round (because the Earth was below Saturn and therefore the ecliptic and therefore the sun was always in the northern hemisphere – it would have been an eternal winter in the southern hemisphere – possibly the reason no ancient civilisations ever developed there). The air was full of music and the Eye of Ra was watching over the world. There was no such thing as deserts (even the Sahara was fertile during this period) and harvests were always bountiful. Chronos is also identified with the harvest for this reason. There were fascinating lightning and auroral displays in the atmosphere all over the world with the build up of charge in the atmosphere, and the mountaintops would have been perpetually glowing with St Elmo’s Fire. This might explain why many mountains have been found to have large quantities of congealed rock at their summits – rock that looks like it’s had an electric current passed through it.
Life was good.
Then, around either 3100BC or 2300Bc, depending on which chronology you believe, along came Zeus, who battled with Chronos and ended the Age of the Gods and brought the biggest disaster upon the world that it has ever seen. As the Sumerian King List says:
“And then the flood swept over.”
Back in those days Jupiter also orbited much closer to the sun than it does now, just like almost all of the gas giants found in other solar systems. Saturn’s orbit was highly elliptical and would have regularly crossed over Jupiter’s orbit. Unfortunately it was inevitable that one day it would do so as Jupiter also arrived. Saturn, with Venus, Earth, Mars, and possibly even Uranus almost literally “ran into” Jupiter. The Greeks remember it as the Battle of the Gods – when Zeus suddenly appeared and battled Chronos and overthrew him. The Egyptians remember it as the time Seth battled Osiris and overthrew him. Most of Saturn’s moons survived in orbit around the planet and are remembered as the Helpers of Osiris who attended him throughout the battle.
As the two planets closed in on each other, Jupiter (at almost 4 times the mass of Saturn was the heavyweight) flung bolts of lightening at Saturn in the greatest lightning display ever seen. Essentially a gargantuan plasma connection was established between them that would have lit up the sky.
At this point both the Earth and Venus were ripped away from the pull of Saturn by Jupiter, and flung far away into space. They assumed new, highly elliptical orbits with the location of the collision as a common point that they would repeatedly return to (but more on that later). Saturn and Jupiter probably circled each other, each hurling lightning at the other, looking like Olympian boxers in an almighty boxing ring from the point of view of the rapidly retreating Earth. The bands on Jupiter were clearly seen at this point and later became the banded headdress of the Sumerian god Marduk (who destroyed the other gods in a contest - exactly paralleling the stories of Zeus and Seth).
As Hesiod wrote of the battle:
"Hurling his lightning:
The bolts flew thick and fast
From his strong hand
Together with thunder and lightning,
Whirling an awesome flame."
This battle would have generated a massive amount of debris as entire moons (and possibly other planets that were known to the ancients but not to us) were ripped apart by the rapidly fluctuating (and very strong) gravitational and electromagnetic forces. This accounts for the large number of impact craters on planets and moons and asteroids throughout the solar system.
This confrontation between Jupiter and Saturn yanked them both from their orbits as they both mutually hurled each other out into space away from the sun. They were seen receding rapidly away from the Earth, still locked in an embrace, with Mars in tow. What happened to them I’ll get to later, because now a new problem had arisen for the inhabitants of earth.
The gravitational pull that Saturn had exerted from its position above the north pole of earth for over a thousand years had distorted the earth, and had pulled most of the water of the oceans into a great mound in the arctic ocean – the ultimate high tide. When Earth was wrenched away from Saturn, this gravitational influence suddenly disappeared. As a result the waters collapsed.
The initial waves would have stood kilometres high, and destroyed everything in their path. They washed over North America and Eurasia, and eventually dissipated, eventually receding back the way they came, the way waves do. But more followed. It was thanks to this initial wave that inland seas like the Caspian and Aral Seas have a salt content. The equatorial bulge of the earth was no problem for this initial wave, which thundered down the length of the Atlantic Basin (and across the Pacific Basin) and across Antarctica, meeting with an almighty bang at the south pole – which sent secondary waves hurtling back north again. Australia and India were completely inundated, and the waves struck the Himalayas, explaining why sea shells have been found near the summit of Mt Everest. South America and Africa were also completely inundated with water, as was eastern North America (again). The waves travelling back north up the Pacific were stopped by the narrowness of the Bering Strait and washed over Siberia, Alaska, and eastern Asia. They also poured over the Rocky Mountains in western North America and into the plains beyond, colliding with the waves from the east. As the waters settled, the entire sedimentary layer of the Earth’s surface was formed (sedimentary rock only forms under moving water) – essentially resurfacing the earth.
Into this were deposited all the lifeforms that had been killed by the mega-tsunamis. They were deposited in order depending on how easily they moved through water (I forget the proper name of it – it’s “hydro” something), as a result the smaller creatures were deposited first, starting with microbes and followed by plankton, small sea creatures and small plants, followed by larger sea creatures and small land creatures, along with larger plants and eventually followed by increasingly larger land creatures and plants and finally mammals (who are the least streamlined of all with their hair). These remains were rapidly fossilised over a period of weeks by the sheer weight of the water above them and constitute the fossil record as we know it. Not all creatures were fossilised, the remains of many of them were rapidly turned into coal by the immense pressure – a process that was replicated in Nazi Germany in the 30s.
Furthermore the loss of the plasma layer around the earth exposed the upper atmosphere to the freezing temperatures of space, causing the water vapour in the air to rapidly condense, leading to massive global downpourings of rain and hail, the like of which has never been seen since.
This was the flood of Noah, the flood of Gilgamesh, the flood of Deucalion, the flood that was described like this in a Meso-American tradition:
"When the Moon did not yet exist, a bearded old man named Botschika [Saturn and the plasma stream] taught the arts of agriculture, clothing, worship and politics to the people. His beautiful but malevolent wife was Huythaca [Jupiter]. She caused a flood in which most people perished. Botschika then turned her into the Moon." [The moon appeared after the flood but I’ll get to that later.]
A new era had begun in human history. The world was a colder, harsher place. It would be with sorrow that humanity would remember the tales of the former age. Saturn no longer watched over the world from his place in the northern sky. A new pantheon of gods, led by a new chief god, came into play, and the world’s woes were just beginning.
But more on that next time.
It feels really weird to be able to say that I'm in my twenties now!
The planet thought fit to celebrate the occasion by setting off a few earthquakes just off the coast.
I'd never felt my entire house rock until last night. At first I thought a really strong gust of wind had hit the house, except that the air was completely still. The shaking lasted a couple of seconds but afterwards I could hear it fading for a few more seconds.
My aunt in Wellington is perfectly used to earthquakes. They get them so often that if she doesn't feel one for a couple of weeks she starts to worry that maybe it's building for a bigger one. Wellingtonians may wonder what all Auckland's fuss is about, but the fact that we got 3 earthquakes in a row in the same place (along with two smaller ones in the same place back on January 30th) is highly unusual. It means something unusual is going on. And the fact that we share the Tamaki isthmus with some 50 volcanoes means when we feel an earthquake we can't help but uneasily glance at the nearest one!
This is the record from the seismometer up near Whangarei. Unfortunately I only got this off GeoNet at 7:10 tonight, so it isn't as clear as it was earlier, but you can still see the quake up in the top right hand corner, with the earlier one to the left of it and the third one (light purple) to the lower left of it. You can see why a lot of people felt the main one and not the other two.
Anyway, on to what this post is about. I'm warning you, this is going to be a long one!
I've been reading some stuff recently about an alternative view of the recent history of the Earth and the solar system. This view proposes that the ancient people are more qualified to tell us about what went on in the sky back then than we are, and that up until about 2700 years ago the solar system was radically different to what it is today. It also takes a very different view on the interpretation of mythology, on the basis that ancient mythology is written like a historical narrative - as though the ancients were relating things that they were actually seeing - and furthermore, mythologies around the world are disturbingly similar.
I’m going to write this as though everything that I am writing is true, but keep in mind that this is only an alternative view, and I’m only presenting it as an interesting curiosity to consider. It goes like this:
"The evidence of myth which points to Saturn having once occupied a position above Earth's north polar regions is voluminous. There is not a race on Earth that has not preserved at least one account which states as much. According to this evidence, Saturn occupied a central position in the north celestial regions."
"It rotated, and rotated widely; but, other than that, it was immovable. It did not rise, it did not set. It merely became brighter and more glorious each night as the Sun set. This state of affairs seems to have lasted for ages. It is the one single dictum of the ancients from which all other beliefs are derived."
-- Dwardu Cardona (1982)
The effect that this had on ancient civilisations is amazing. This period lasted from approximately 5800BC – 3100BC and was remembered as the Age of the Gods.
Before 5800BC Saturn was much closer to the sun than it is now and its orbit crossed those of the Earth and Mars. At some point in the distant past, Saturn passed above Mars and captured it. Mars was held in a position below the south pole of Saturn – attracted by Saturn’s gravity, but repelled by the electromagnetic charge build-up between them. Some time afterwards the same thing happened to the Earth. Saturn (with Mars in tow) passed above the Earth and captured it, too, below its south pole. The Earth was suspended probably about a million km or so below Saturn's south pole. Mars was suspended between the two. As a result of the close proximity of these three planets there was a massive, permanent, electric plasma discharge between the 3 planets.
Plasma is simply a flow of charged particles. Fire, electricity, St Elmo’s Fire, and lightening are all forms of plasma, as is the arc produced in arc welding. Plasma streams take 3 forms: “Dark mode” which involves the least energy and current and is invisible; “glow mode” – where the flow is visible, and “arc mode” – where the ionised particles are so energised that they release not only visible light, but also ultraviolet and x-ray light. There is currently a plasma stream between Jupiter and its closest major moon, Io. The strikepoint on Io can be seen, and was originally thought to be one of its many volcanoes.
It was at the time of Saturn’s capture of the Earth (or shortly afterwards) that the collective memory of ancient civilisations and their mythologies begins. This period is known as the primordial period before creation. The earth has been found to have been much warmer during this time, which would make sense if it had been connected to a plasma discharge from Saturn. We have never had such a mild climate since then. This was due to the plasma arc striking the Arctic Ocean (0r possible North Atlantic – I’ll get to that later) and evaporating large amounts of water, filling the upper atmosphere with steam (cf. the water above the firmament in the Bible). The plasma stream would have completely enveloped the Earth in a protective layer – protecting it from radiation and slowing the rate of heat loss to space, allowing steam to remain in the upper atmosphere. This combination of steam and plasma would have obscured the stars completely.
In 4200BC something happened – Saturn, under immense electrical stress, went nova. It developed a corona and lit up like a miniature sun (which it essentially was). The plasma discharge to Earth went from glow mode to arc mode with a bang. The noise it made is remembered by the Egyptians:
Amun initiated creation, in association with his sacred animal, the goose. He is called the Great Honker, who gave a great screech which stirred the inert cosmos into action. He is also called the Great Cackler…
--Ogdoad of Hermopolis
This is the noise the arc made as it was struck.
With the change in the electric potential of the Earth caused by this, the opaque plasma layer surrounding the Earth cleared, thereby unobscuring the skies. During this time Saturn first became visible. This event is generally associated with creation in mythologies (like the one above). The Greeks remember him [Saturn] as Chronos - the first god to rule the Earth – who overthrew his father Uranus (the god of the sky – who was originally the obscured sky itself) with his sickle (Saturn’s rings, appearing to swing around the planet as the Earth rotates). As a result Uranus (the obscured sky) was banished and Saturn/Chronos became visible, ruling the northern sky.
So the ancient people were met with a massive globe dominating the northern part of the rapidly clearing sky, never setting, lighting up the sky by night almost the way the sun lit it up by day (cf. the Bible when God created one light to rule the day, the other to rule the night). The Greeks remember this globe as Chronos. The Egyptians came to know it as the Eye of Ra - which appeared after creation and hovered in the northern sky, watching over and ruling the world.
This is a depiction of the Eye of Ra. The pupil is Mars, which could be seen between Earth and Saturn. The black bit hanging off to the bottom right is the plasma stream connecting to Earth. The eyebrow is Saturn’s rings (which appear to be 'above' Saturn during the day because the invisible part of the rings (cast by Saturn’s shadow) is on the opposite side to the sun. The curl off to the left is Venus, which was ejected from Saturn when it went nova (see this page [under the heading "Where Planets Come From - about halfway down if it doesn't take you straight to it] for an alternative model of planet formation) and orbits Saturn, connected by a plasma stream. The same idea can be seen in this picture of Ra:
That creature is an anthromorphised depiction of Ra. Notice what he’s wearing on his head. It's a depiction of what they really saw - the red circle surrounded by the yellow is the orb of Mars seen in front of Saturn (and much closer than Saturn). The curled snake head is Venus and its connection to Saturn. The rings aren't shown, although they are in some depictions (which, annoyingly, I can't find any of right now).
The plasma connection to Earth took on a number of fantastic shapes. Sometimes it looked like a massive river of water flowing from Saturn. It also looked like a tree occasionally. Plasma streams never look the same for long. I remember once seeing one on display at a science museum in Christchurch – it was constantly rippling and twisting. Different cultures gave different interpretations to this phenomenon - it was the snake which gnaws at the roots of the tree to bring down Valhalla, and the snake which nests in the Sumerian goddess Inanna's Huluppu tree. It was the entwined serpent-necked animals of the Palette of Narmer. It was the Peach tree of Chinese mythology, seen in the northeast. It was the Caduceus: two snakes climbing to a circular Heaven - a Heaven with outstretched plasma wings on either side. Nordic tales identify it as a tree atop of which the gods live.
Plasma streams tend to separate into bundles of either 28 or 56 individual streams near the contact point. This may explain the number of stones used in stone henges across Europe. Europe was much closer to the contact point (which was at the north magnetic pole) than the rest of the civilised world and would have been able to see the individual streams. The arc would have created an incredible noise – not only crackling and rumbling – but also as the atmosphere resonated and the crust resounded, there would have been amazing sounds transmitted over a lot of the world.
Hence the reason the gods are said to have taught man music. Also the reason Chinese legends apparently state that music originally came from thunder.
The gods are also credited with teaching man to build cities. Where the arc contacted the Earth (in the ocean) massive quantities of water were evaporated, recondensing to form a massive mountain of cloud at least tens of kilometres high, surrounded by auroras. This in turn was enveloped by the massive mountain of plasma (where the stream spread out as it neared the contact point) which stretched hundreds of kilometres high and was easily visible across the northern hemisphere. As happens with auroras, fluted areas would have developed around the outside of this ‘mountain’ giving the impression of terraces. This was the City of the Gods. Placed on earth by them. As one Sumerian source relates:
"The great gods created the structure of Unug, the handiwork of the gods, and of E-ana, the house lowered down from heaven. You watch over the great rampart, the rampart which An founded," (one manuscript has instead: "its great rampart, a cloudbank resting on the earth"), and continues, "the majestic residence which An established."
-- "Gilgamesh and Aga" Sumerian, ca 2800 BC
In China it was interpreted as the shell of a turtle which holds up the great celestial peach tree and supports the earth. In South America it was seen as the great mountain in the north full of caves from which humans came (humans entered South America from the north).
The Europeans had a close up view of it, and called it the great fortress Ys that floated on the ocean. They built barrows as a smaller scale replica of it (there is evidence that barrows weren’t used as graves until long after). The barrows from this period all face the north-west – the direction of the arc’s connection.
Other objects were seen in the sky as well. The moons of Saturn were seen orbiting it along with Venus. The Greeks remember these as the Titans (of which Chronos – Saturn – was one). It’s appropriate that modern astronomers have named the recently (re)discovered moons of Saturn after the Titans. All these objects milling around in the sky gave rise to the numerous ancient gods described in mythologies. It’s small wonder that the sky was seen as the home of the gods. (Keep in mind that the moon didn’t orbit the earth at this point and was probably nowhere near it). The plasma interactions between these bodies were interpreted as parts of their bodies – beaks, wings, claws and so on. It was very busy in the skies above Earth and gave rise to many tales about the primeval gods.
One of the requirements of a stable relationship between Saturn, Mars, and the Earth in these positions (stacked above each other with Mars in the middle) is that Mars needs to slowly oscillate between Saturn and Earth. It slowly approached and receded from the Earth numerous times over this period of history. Mars was the main conductor between the Earth and Saturn, and would have received most of the current coming from Saturn. It’s interesting that Mars’ northern hemisphere is pockmarked with anode blisters. These are today interpreted as massive volcanoes, but the problem is there is very little sign of lava flow. The shapes of the volcanoes are consistent with the craters left by lightening strikes on Earth though (but on a much larger scale).
Because of this, the charge on Mars would eventually build up, repelling it away from Saturn and towards the Earth, on which it would subsequently discharge. This discharge would weaken the electric repulsion and allow gravity to attract it back towards Saturn again. The Greeks recalled this as the regular visits of Ares to Earth (Ares is Mars in Greek).
Chronos/Saturn is also seen as the god of time. This is because when Saturn went nova and lit up like a sun (as described earlier) and the skies cleared, the light of the sun was clearly seen on the rings of Saturn. These appeared to rotate in a regular manner and were the first observable indication of the passage of time. [It would appear that the southern skies and the sun were still obscured from a northern hemisphere point of view. I'll cover that later].
It was also said that the gods taught man how to harvest crops. This may possibly be due to the ripples and patterns that could be seen in the 'golden fields' (the Elysian Fields?) of Saturn's rings which would have looked like fields of wheat on Earth waving in the breeze. It's possible that this caused people to see wheat fields as significant and eventually they figured out they could harvest them. The apparent motion of Saturn's rings around the planet would even suggest a scything motion!
Perhaps Saturn's rings even served as the inspiration for the wheel. I suggest that because all of man's significant advances during this period were attributed to the inspiration of the gods.
This time was known as the Age of the Gods. During this time the climate was warm, the weather mild, and in the northern hemisphere it was summer all year round (because the Earth was below Saturn and therefore the ecliptic and therefore the sun was always in the northern hemisphere – it would have been an eternal winter in the southern hemisphere – possibly the reason no ancient civilisations ever developed there). The air was full of music and the Eye of Ra was watching over the world. There was no such thing as deserts (even the Sahara was fertile during this period) and harvests were always bountiful. Chronos is also identified with the harvest for this reason. There were fascinating lightning and auroral displays in the atmosphere all over the world with the build up of charge in the atmosphere, and the mountaintops would have been perpetually glowing with St Elmo’s Fire. This might explain why many mountains have been found to have large quantities of congealed rock at their summits – rock that looks like it’s had an electric current passed through it.
Life was good.
Then, around either 3100BC or 2300Bc, depending on which chronology you believe, along came Zeus, who battled with Chronos and ended the Age of the Gods and brought the biggest disaster upon the world that it has ever seen. As the Sumerian King List says:
“And then the flood swept over.”
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Back in those days Jupiter also orbited much closer to the sun than it does now, just like almost all of the gas giants found in other solar systems. Saturn’s orbit was highly elliptical and would have regularly crossed over Jupiter’s orbit. Unfortunately it was inevitable that one day it would do so as Jupiter also arrived. Saturn, with Venus, Earth, Mars, and possibly even Uranus almost literally “ran into” Jupiter. The Greeks remember it as the Battle of the Gods – when Zeus suddenly appeared and battled Chronos and overthrew him. The Egyptians remember it as the time Seth battled Osiris and overthrew him. Most of Saturn’s moons survived in orbit around the planet and are remembered as the Helpers of Osiris who attended him throughout the battle.
As the two planets closed in on each other, Jupiter (at almost 4 times the mass of Saturn was the heavyweight) flung bolts of lightening at Saturn in the greatest lightning display ever seen. Essentially a gargantuan plasma connection was established between them that would have lit up the sky.
At this point both the Earth and Venus were ripped away from the pull of Saturn by Jupiter, and flung far away into space. They assumed new, highly elliptical orbits with the location of the collision as a common point that they would repeatedly return to (but more on that later). Saturn and Jupiter probably circled each other, each hurling lightning at the other, looking like Olympian boxers in an almighty boxing ring from the point of view of the rapidly retreating Earth. The bands on Jupiter were clearly seen at this point and later became the banded headdress of the Sumerian god Marduk (who destroyed the other gods in a contest - exactly paralleling the stories of Zeus and Seth).
As Hesiod wrote of the battle:
"Hurling his lightning:
The bolts flew thick and fast
From his strong hand
Together with thunder and lightning,
Whirling an awesome flame."
This battle would have generated a massive amount of debris as entire moons (and possibly other planets that were known to the ancients but not to us) were ripped apart by the rapidly fluctuating (and very strong) gravitational and electromagnetic forces. This accounts for the large number of impact craters on planets and moons and asteroids throughout the solar system.
This confrontation between Jupiter and Saturn yanked them both from their orbits as they both mutually hurled each other out into space away from the sun. They were seen receding rapidly away from the Earth, still locked in an embrace, with Mars in tow. What happened to them I’ll get to later, because now a new problem had arisen for the inhabitants of earth.
The gravitational pull that Saturn had exerted from its position above the north pole of earth for over a thousand years had distorted the earth, and had pulled most of the water of the oceans into a great mound in the arctic ocean – the ultimate high tide. When Earth was wrenched away from Saturn, this gravitational influence suddenly disappeared. As a result the waters collapsed.
The initial waves would have stood kilometres high, and destroyed everything in their path. They washed over North America and Eurasia, and eventually dissipated, eventually receding back the way they came, the way waves do. But more followed. It was thanks to this initial wave that inland seas like the Caspian and Aral Seas have a salt content. The equatorial bulge of the earth was no problem for this initial wave, which thundered down the length of the Atlantic Basin (and across the Pacific Basin) and across Antarctica, meeting with an almighty bang at the south pole – which sent secondary waves hurtling back north again. Australia and India were completely inundated, and the waves struck the Himalayas, explaining why sea shells have been found near the summit of Mt Everest. South America and Africa were also completely inundated with water, as was eastern North America (again). The waves travelling back north up the Pacific were stopped by the narrowness of the Bering Strait and washed over Siberia, Alaska, and eastern Asia. They also poured over the Rocky Mountains in western North America and into the plains beyond, colliding with the waves from the east. As the waters settled, the entire sedimentary layer of the Earth’s surface was formed (sedimentary rock only forms under moving water) – essentially resurfacing the earth.
Into this were deposited all the lifeforms that had been killed by the mega-tsunamis. They were deposited in order depending on how easily they moved through water (I forget the proper name of it – it’s “hydro” something), as a result the smaller creatures were deposited first, starting with microbes and followed by plankton, small sea creatures and small plants, followed by larger sea creatures and small land creatures, along with larger plants and eventually followed by increasingly larger land creatures and plants and finally mammals (who are the least streamlined of all with their hair). These remains were rapidly fossilised over a period of weeks by the sheer weight of the water above them and constitute the fossil record as we know it. Not all creatures were fossilised, the remains of many of them were rapidly turned into coal by the immense pressure – a process that was replicated in Nazi Germany in the 30s.
Furthermore the loss of the plasma layer around the earth exposed the upper atmosphere to the freezing temperatures of space, causing the water vapour in the air to rapidly condense, leading to massive global downpourings of rain and hail, the like of which has never been seen since.
This was the flood of Noah, the flood of Gilgamesh, the flood of Deucalion, the flood that was described like this in a Meso-American tradition:
"When the Moon did not yet exist, a bearded old man named Botschika [Saturn and the plasma stream] taught the arts of agriculture, clothing, worship and politics to the people. His beautiful but malevolent wife was Huythaca [Jupiter]. She caused a flood in which most people perished. Botschika then turned her into the Moon." [The moon appeared after the flood but I’ll get to that later.]
A new era had begun in human history. The world was a colder, harsher place. It would be with sorrow that humanity would remember the tales of the former age. Saturn no longer watched over the world from his place in the northern sky. A new pantheon of gods, led by a new chief god, came into play, and the world’s woes were just beginning.
But more on that next time.
posted by David | 8:01 pm
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