The Observatory of Chichen Itza. To modern eyes, the decayed remains of this rounded dome shaped structure looks very similar to todays domes that housed a telescope. Of course there were no telescopes in 4th century. However, but there is plenty of archaeological evidence suggesting that this building was used as an observatory..... a lookout for the heavens, perhaps.
Yucatan peninsula's landscape is very dense with trees. The terrain is as flat as a tortilla (or chapati). This made sky watching and star gazing impossible without some way to rise above the tree canopy. The dome shaped tower on top of the base sits high on a four-cornered but not quite square platform and gave excellent unobstructed views of the skies and surrounding landscape. In particular, the openings around the dome seemed to be carefully aligned with the motions of planet Venus. Venus had tremendous significance for the Mayans. This bright planet, which was easily visible to the naked eye, was considered the sun’s twin and also a god of war. Mayan kings used the changing position of Venus to plan appropriate times for wars, raids and battles.
The grand staircase that marks the front of the structure is aligned 27.5 degrees out of line with the other buildings at in old Chichen Itza. But! this angle is an almost perfect alignment for the Venus’s most northerly position in the sky. Also, a diagonal formed by the northeast and southwest corners of the building aligns with both the summer solstice sunrise and the winter solstice sunset. Folks who watch(ed) Ancient Aliens would know the significance of this alignment (not that those idiots are right). Most of the religions buildings and ceremonial structures in most of the ancient cultures (Egyptian Pyramids, Temple of Abu Simbel, Stonehenge, Konark Sun Temple, Angkor Wat, Carnac stones... just to name a few) have some strong connection to Venus and are aligned to create some kind of special effects during summer and winter solstices. Is this a coincidence? It is fascinating how similarly these ancient civilizations evolved despite being independent of each other. I doubt if humanity will ever be able to solve all the puzzles left by our ancestors. But if we can learn anything from this is that we all are very similar. Does not matter if you are an atheist, agnostic, spiritual, or religious. Does not matter if one lived in 5th century or 21st century. We all look up to the stars. Space is and will always be our final frontier. We humans always strive go where no one has ever gone before.
aaaaaaaaand that is why Star Trek is million times better than Star Wars! :P
Dif-tor heh smusma.
)
Originally posted by Adam 
Post #1 by uday029
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