Senmut and Phaeton M G READE D.S.C., formerly in the Royal Navy and for many years a marine navigator. The "astronomically objectionable" Senmut ceiling is here inspected: with a new identification of some of the constellations, it is found to give strong support for a past inversion of the earth's axis. It is interpreted, moreover, as pointing to a celestial spectacle of such religious significance that it was mythologised and enshrined in permanent record on Egyptian monuments. Students of Dr Velikovsky's Worlds in Collision will be aware that he cites the astronomical ceiling decoration of the tomb of Senmut, architect to Queen Hatshepshut of Egypt, as part of the evidence that the world was at some time "upside down" by comparison with its present day orientation (1). His comments appear to have been based almost exclusively on the description of this ceiling published by A. Pogo in a 1930 issue of the magazine Isis (2). Pogo's principal relevant comments were that the design of the Senmut ceiling was "astronomically objectionable" (p. 306) and that "Orion, the most conspicuous constellation of the southern sky, appeared to be moving eastward, i.e. in the wrong direction" (p. 316). Pogo also makes comparisons with two other Egyptian astronomical ceilings, those of Seti I and of the Ramesseum (the mausoleum of Rameses II). He finds the Seti ceiling design "astronomically correct, so that Orion precedes Sirius in the westward motion of the southern sky" (p. 315). The Ramesseum ceiling shares his objections to the Senmut one and could equally well have been cited by Dr Velikovsky in support of his point; as Pogo puts it: "Mythologically, both the Senmut-Ramesseum and the Seti traditions may be equally valuable; astronomically, the Seti representation is far more satisfactory." (p. 316) It does not take a great deal of inspection of the layouts of these ceilings to suggest that all three have a great deal in common and that the similarities between them considerably outweigh the dissimilarities. They differ in detail but they nonetheless clearly share a common inspiration. The dating of these ceilings by Velikovsky's revised chronology (3) is approximately as follows: Senmut ca. 940 BC Seti I ca. 650 BC Ramesseum ca. 610 BC It can be noted in passing that the tomb of Senmut is reported to have been inaccessible to the later ceiling designers but this may not be of great significance, a later publication of Pogo's having identified fragments of an appreciably earlier (pre-Hyksos) coffin lid as bearing at least portions of the same general design (4). It would appear, moreover, that the original source on which all designers drew to at least some extent must have been considerably more ancient even than this. Many later Egyptian monuments also display variations of the same theme (5 & 12). The Alignments Pogo's principal reason for declaring two of the ceilings to be astronomically objectionable appears to have been their actual geographical alignment in their respective tombs. Actually, the only significant difference of alignment between the "acceptable" Seti ceiling and the "unacceptable" Senmut/Ramesseum ones appears to be that certain near-human figures on the Seti ceiling are arranged with their heads directed towards the central panel whereas the corresponding figures on the other two ceilings are turned the other way up. The present writer feels little doubt that it was the curvature of the Seti ceiling which dictated this change; had these figures been arranged as on the other two ceilings, they would have appeared to be hanging head downwards in Seti's tomb, with unfortunate aesthetic consequences. Pogo does also adduce some rather involved arguments about the alignment of northern and southern panels and whether they have to be inspected by an observer facing north or south but the present writer finds these more confusing than informative. Nevertheless, there is plenty of other evidence that all three ceilings do actually portray an "upside down" situation. Before going into the detail of this, however, it should be observed that Pogo could have been mistaken in his supposition that the northern panel of the Senmut ceiling depicts the orthodox or right-side-up northern sky (and, by inference, the northern panels of the other ceilings as well). Velikovsky took up this point, which is incidentally very widely repeated in other Egyptological works and which was first mooted long before Pogo's time, deducing from it that the Senmut ceiling, at least, must depict a "before" and "after" situation. The present writer considers the identification of northern constellations only partially correct and Velikovsky's inference thereby invalidated. The detail of this will be further developed below. It is difficult to be absolutely sure on every issue, as the basic layouts of the "northern" and "southern" panels are fundamentally rather different (though similar on all three ceilings); but it could be maintained that they are simply an ordinary circular star map presented in flat strip form, as on some modern star charts. If the two panels really were intended to be two separate views of the night sky, uncomplicated by mythological features, then they would show essentially the same patch of sky viewed in the same direction at two seasons of the year, approximately 6 months apart. It will be suggested later that the northern panel could actually depict a daytime scene, however, in which case there would be no need to place the two "views" more than a few hours apart. There is in any case an obvious mythological content to the designs and it could even be claimed (with some reservations) that they depict stages in an exchange of positions between Scorpius and Orion, and between Venus and Sirius, in which case the northern panel would depict the "before" situation and the southern one the "after" situation (the opposite of Dr Velikovsky's inference). Actually, the ceilings probably combine more than one of these functions, for there is also a strong indication that the designs as a whole are essentially an artist's pictorial representation of a legend rather than a straightforward "photographic" representation of the sky as it actually was at any particular instant, though there are elements of both photographic precision and artist's licence present, such that it becomes almost impossible to determine with any real certainty just where fact ends and where fiction or myth begins. The 'Upside-down' Features At this stage, it may be as well to list the fairly compelling evidence for an "upside-down" situation on all three ceilings, as supported by Pogo's geographical alignment arguments for two ceilings out of three. Firstly, Sirius towers above Orion on the southern panels; this is only possible when the world is upside down (except in so far as a modem visitor to Antarctica could see something very similar if he were to look out to the northward and upwards at an appropriate time and season). Secondly, though Pogo claims that Orion is the most conspicuous constellation of the southern sky, travellers to central Africa will be aware that this assertion is not necessarily correct; the present writer would certainly rate Scorpius a more conspicuous constellation than Orion, as seen from these latitudes. At Thebes (25° 42' N latitude) Scorpius currently reaches a maximum altitude of about 20-40° above the southern horizon (the range of values is due to the considerable vertical spread of Scorpius when it is on the meridian); should the world turn upside down, however, it would pass almost exactly overhead and Scorpius is actually found at the extreme top centre of the northern panel of the Senmut ceiling, exactly where it should be if the world were upside down. (Note: The precession of the equinoxes has a small but potentially important effect on the precise location of Scorpius, particularly as to whether it is to be assessed as passing marginally to the north or marginally to the south of dead overhead at Thebes; there is also a small potential margin of position error due to the circumstance that the earth would be unlikely to retain exactly the same orbit through a capsize). However, there can still be some dispute, even confusion, as to whether the goddess depicted at the top of the northern panel was always associated with Scorpius. A case can be made for associating her with Spica instead (6). Spica is not very far distant in the sky from Scorpius (a bare 50° of arc measured along the ecliptic) and the effects of recognising Spica at this point, rather than Scorpius, are comparatively slight. They will be referred to again later, in the concluding parts of this article. Thirdly, given this upside down situation, the ecliptic would pass slightly below Orion. (It passes above Orion for a northern hemisphere observer in a right-side-up world). The planets always appear to move along the ecliptic, and on the Senmut ceiling (southern panel) they are distinctly shown as floating along at a level slightly below that of Orion, exactly where they should be if the world were upside down. Given this same upside-down situation, the ecliptic would also pass close below Scorpius on its southern side. On the northern panel of Senmut, we find a bull-like animal floating along extremely close below Scorpius. It is clearly on or near to the ecliptic and it seems reasonable at least provisionally to accept Dr Velikovsky's claim that bull- or cow-like animals in the sky will be representations of Venus as a comet, especially as this one appears to be in the act of being struck down by a god-like figure. Moreover, the bull is clearly depicted as moving from right to left close under and slightly to the south of Scorpius, and this is the correct direction of movement for a typical planet or comet moving along the ecliptic when the world is upside down and rotating in the opposite direction to normal. (Note: It will be shown later that the figures on the other panel are not wholly aligned as required by this postulated upside down situation; see also note 7.) It may be noted in passing that the god-like figure could actually be a representation of Sagittarius in his traditional pose of aiming an arrow at Scorpius; in that case, it would seem rather a strange accident that a bull had unaccountably interposed itself between Sagittarius and Scorpius, exactly along the line of aim of the arrow (8). The present writer's preference is actually for a figure other than Sagittarius (presumably Horus or some other local representation of Zeus-Jupiter) deliberately aiming a weapon at the bull in mid-flight (and also actually striking it in the case of the Senmut ceiling). The usual interpretation of the hieroglyphic lettering attached to the figure appears to be "Horus the warrior An" but, for reasons which will become apparent later, too much reliance should probably not be placed on the inscriptions, all of which must be presumed to be considerably more "modern" than the events which they are attempting to record. The bull has what Pogo describes as "reins" attached to its tail; he interprets the bull as Meskheti, or Ursa major, and the reins as a representation of the meridian stretching down to the northern horizon, but this seems a very dubious interpretation, especially as his analysis appears to involve an assumption that the artist had forgotten to include one of the more conspicuous stars of Ursa major (Eta) in his drawing. One can only suggest, very tentatively, that the "reins" could actually be a cometary tail attached to the "bull" (or Venus). The actual layout of the "reins" varies from ceiling to ceiling but their representation on the particularly ancient fragment of coffin lid supports this interpretation rather better than most of the others (a bundle of 6 "rays" spreading out in typical "split tail" fashion); one or two of the more modern depictions are also more than usually suggestive. Origins of the Plough This identification of a cometary tail in a particular sector of the sky has major implications for co-relation of the legend with other and not dissimilar legends of antiquity (such as those described by Malcolm Lowery in his "Kugler" article (9)), there also being reasonable ground for identifying the particularly large animal to which the "reins" always lead (the "Bear" or "Hippopotamus") with the constellation Arcturus/Bootes, which some other of the ancients also describe as "the bear". There is apparent confusion between Bootes, Ursa major and Ursa minor in at least some Graeco-Roman classical accounts (10) and there seems good ground for supposing that the original bear of the northern sky may not have been the modern Ursa major at all. Given the postulated upside-down orientation of the world at the era which these ceilings depict, Bootes would indeed be close to the southern horizon at Thebes, standing more or less upright but essentially upside down by comparison with what we usually see; Ursa major itself would be just below this horizon at the time when Scorpius was up. In this connection, the author hopes one day to present a detailed account of how the hippopotamus eventually came to be seen as driving a plough, drawn by the bull (whence the common name of "the waggoner" for Bootes), and how this plough came to acquire a place of its own in the sky. The detail of how the ancient Egyptians could just have seen the handle of the plough (Eta Ursae Majoris) projecting above the ground is of itself both critical and fascinating: the precession of the equinoxes has a considerable effect on just how far the "handle" shows above the horizon at any particular era and this has to be balanced against the effects of refraction (which raises the handle), the type of horizon against which it was inspected and the altitude above sea level from which the priestly observations were made. (The higher the observing point and the lower the horizon, the more easily would the "handle" have been seen.) It is of course also of importance whether particular observations were made from Thebes or from some other observatory in a different latitude; Heliopolis, Memphis or even the Great Pyramid at Giza actually seem more probable as the source of the original observations. It may also be noted that Ursa major is variously known to moderns as the plough, the great bear and the dipper; to the ancient Egyptians of the Middle Kingdom and subsequently, however, it was always "the foreleg of the bull" - Meskheti (Mshtyw, or abbr. Ms) - their explanation being that Horus had chopped off one leg of the bull and transferred it to another part of the sky where it could be properly guarded and prevented from ever again running amok (5). Amongst the precautions they envisaged was chaining of the severed leg to a mooring post situated close to the feet of the hippopotamus (now also in the northern celestial hemisphere), which suggests that there may have been more than one tradition as to how Ursa major acquired its present position in the northern sky. That it and Bootes would get there in a single step if the earth became inverted (i.e. turned to at least substantially its present day orientation) during or shortly after the striking of the celestial bull by Horus seems much the simplest and the most direct explanation. For the sake of completeness, and to help those who are not already familiar with the many potential manifestations of Ursa major, the following account of it by Sir William Peck (11) is offered: "The Egyptians called it the hippopotamus (the bear being unknown in Egypt), but it was recognised as a bear by the Greeks, Persians, &c., and when America was first discovered, the Northern Indians knew it as the (Polar) bear, showing that they had either independently recognised it for themselves, or had been in some way connected with the Eastern world". The present writer suggests that what the Egyptians, the North American Indians and the rest recognised as a "great-bear" was not Ursa major at all but an upside-down presentation of near-by Bootes; few people who have actually looked at Ursa major in the sky will be likely to quarrel with the suggestion that it must have looked somewhat different in ancient days to qualify for universal acceptance as the likeness of a bear. Phaeton One could go on in this same rather complex and conceivably hypothetical vein for quite a long time yet (e.g. the positioning and orientation of the conspicuous "wedge" of the Hyades on the ceilings alone offers enough material for a lengthy dissertation) but maybe enough has been said in support of Pogo's "astronomically objectionable" orientation to show that he was quite possibly correct in his deduction, even if one can criticise some of the arguments which he himself used in support of it. There is still a major snag, however, and this is what makes it a near certainty that the ceiling layouts are artistic representations of a legend and not drawings from life. If the world is upside down, Sirius towers above Orion, but it must always appear to the right of it and not to the left of it, whatever the geographical location of the observer or the postulated direction of motion (or the direction of rotation) of the earth. This also applies in the case of the modern observer in Antarctica (but not an ancient observer in Antarctica, for whom the above remarks require some further qualification). Similarly, Arcturus/Bootes must appear to the left of Scorpius and not to the right of it, as actually represented on all three ceilings (but not on some of the related Egyptian monuments, several of which show a reversed orientation of the bull and the hippopotamus (12)). The 'northern group' as they appear on the ceilings of Senmut The "northern group" as they appear on the ceilings of Senmut (1), Seti (2), the Ramesseum (3), Hermopolis (4) and Pedamenope (5). The inference would seem to be that the legend was already an ancient one, even in 940 BC (or earlier, by other chronologies), and that some of the finer detail had become garbled with the passage of time. Also, the first record of the appearance of the celestial bull in Egyptian skies currently appears to date from at least 1000 years before Senmut's time, more likely 2000 years (13), so that we are almost certainly concerned here with an extremely remote era, probably the period described by Dr Velikovsky in Chapter 1 of his Ages in Chaos as "the first interregnum" (the period of the seventh to the tenth Egyptian dynasties, subsequent to the construction of the pyramids, prior to the blossoming of the "Middle Kingdom"), though an even earlier era is not entirely excluded. It may also be noted that the period around examine all the possibilities as exhaustively as may one 2200 BC is often reported to have been one of intense observational activity by the ancients, probably the time when many of the presently visible constellations were first listed and named (14). This inference also leads to an interpretation that the Gods of the Underworld (themselves presumably fallen stars) were lined up by the artist along the bottom edge of the northern panel so that they might witness the striking down of the bull, the calling of their attention to the incident itself being quite powerfully indicated by the small central figure who points upwards at the bull. Thus, a suitable sub-title for the northern panel could be "The celestial bull fight"; a corresponding sub-title for the southern panel would appear to be "A star catalogue for the neighbourhood of the celestial equator", the suggestion being that the ancient Egyptians tended to focus their attention on the celestial equator, whilst the Babylonians attached more importance to the ecliptic as the principal "base line" of the celestial universe. The principal difference between the two panels is that the southern one represents a sort of wide-angle panoramic "photograph" (up to 20 hours of right ascension, or 300, but probably considerably less), whilst the northern one covers only a somewhat narrower sector of the sky (either 4 or 10 hours of right ascension, 60° or 150°, depending on whether certain arguments connected with the timing of particular incidents depicted on the northern panel, still to be presented, are accepted or not). The southern panel is also said to be usable as a star clock (5 & 15) but this application appears to be quite "modern" by comparison with the legendary part of the ceiling. The direction of viewing appears to be essentially same for both panels (southwards, or upstream of the Nile from Thebes). Some Further Considerations In a short article of this type, it is clearly impossible to examine all the possibilities as exhaustively as may one day be desirable, but it is hoped that this introduction to the quite far reaching potentialities of these ceilings will prove useful and stimulating. There are one or two further points about them which appear to be worthy of comment at this stage. Firstly there is the obvious inference that planets were provided by the artist with boats in which to float about the sky; this requires the term "planets" to be extended to include Orion and Sirius, which poses some intriguing possibilities, especially when it is appreciated that Scorpius is closer to the centre of the galaxy than ourselves but that Orion and Sirius, diametrically oppositely placed in the sky to Scorpius, are out towards the edge of the galaxy (16). Then there is the not unimportant question of whether the moon is represented on the ceilings or not - the correct answer to this appears to turn on whether the "empty boat" which can be seen ahead of the ram on two of the ceilings is properly the conveyance of the moon or not; representations of the moon in ancient Egypt presented in The Dawn of Civilisation by G. Maspero suggest that his is a possibility (17 & 18). Maspero's book can be highly recommended as containing a great deal of further information on the legends which are probably touched on in these ceilings. The representations of the ram, apparently known to the Egyptians as "Chnum" or "Khnumu"*, are also of interest in that they are located at precisely the point where a Chaldean astronomer-astrologer would have placed the ram Aries (though not where it would presumably have belonged in the legendary era, for capsizing the world automatically interchanges the positions of the vernal and autumnal equinoxes); Maspero discusses the relative antiquity of Egyptian and Chaldean representations of the divisions of the heavens without commenting on this one feature which appears to be common to both, the representations of the Lion and the Bull on these ceilings appearing to have nothing in common with the Lion and the Bull of the Chaldean zodiac (except as further qualified below). [Footnote: * The equation of the "ram" of the ceilings with Khnum should be approached with care. On the Senmut ceiling the animal covers three decans, the central one being Seret, meaning "ewe"; its full spelling, as given by Budge (The gods of the Egyptians, Open Court/Methuen, 1904; Dover, 1969; II, 306), includes the determinative for "sheep", which is identical with the hieroglyphic sign for Khnum and the beast on Senmut's ceiling. Aries, as represented on the circular "zodiac" of Denderah, is much more a ewe than a ram, being pictured hornless and reclining (couchant regardant). On the other hand, Khnum, the ram-headed god of the First Cataract at Elephantine, would not be totally out of place here as the god of birth and fertility (associated with the source of the Nile and seen as a potter shaping infants), he might be considered justified in taking a place amongst the spring constellations. But then, the Egyptian season of "Growth" fell (in the pharaonic calendar, and effectively until the building of the Aswan dam) during our winter, beginning four months after the start of the Inundation around the summer solstice . . . - R.M.L.] Orientation of the heavens as seen from Earth at the time of the Phaeton episode Probable orientation of the heavens as seen from Earth (northern hemisphere) at the time of the Phaeton episode. (Note: The zodiac and the heavenly bodies, including Phaeton, rotate anti-clockwise on this diagram as the day advances. The earth and the direction of south, which is tied to the longitude of Thebes, remain stationary. The presentation is a mirror image of normality because the world is upside down and contra-rotating.) A Potential Variation It was mentioned earlier that a marginally different interpretation of the scene depicted on the northern panel is possible; it may even be preferable in some respects. Should Spica be substituted for Scorpius at the top centre of the northern panel, retaining the postulated upside-down and contra-rotating earth, the bull would already have passed Scorpius before reaching Spica and would be seen to be flying nearly level at an altitude of 50 - 55° above the horizon, possibly climbing slightly (the angle of ascent would depend, amongst other things, on the apparent velocity of the bull). A principal advantage of the Spica interpretation is that Bootes is just about as far to the right of Spica as it is to the left of Scorpius, so that the objection to the representation of the hippopotamus to the right of the bull no longer applies. (Sirius still remains on the wrong side of Orion on the southern panel, however.) A further advantage of this interpretation is that the position of the lion on the northern panel would then correspond with the position of Leo in the Chaldean zodiac, though Leo would actually be upside down by comparison with his traditional Chaldean representation. Leo to the left and Bootes to the right, with the bull appreciably higher in the sky than either, is actually a very satisfying representation, though it could probably only apply to a later stage of the action, when Scorpius was already quite well removed from the centre of attention (further developed below). This modification makes no difference at all to the recognition of the northern panel as an artist's impression of the knocking down of Phaeton out of the sky, only to the point in the sky at which the bull was finally intercepted. This modification also has an incidental advantage in that the plough, though essentially under the horizon (it does not rise perceptibly out of the ground throughout the 24 hours during this era), is then more satisfactorily located between the hippopotamus and the bull. Absolute finality in every respect is unlikely to be reached at this stage, particularly as the ceilings do appear to have been designed to crowd as much mythological information as possible into a single frame, and it is hoped that the present account, even if still somewhat open ended, will assist members to develop their own ideas even further. Some of the questions which might be worth some further probing, for instance, are: Was Phaeton struck down by day or by night? If by day, how was its location along the ecliptic determined with such apparent precision? Was there perhaps some uncertainty as to whether Phaeton was struck whilst in line with Scorpius, in line with Spica, or somewhere between the two? Is it reasonable to suppose that the ceiling design may incorporate incidents which were not quite simultaneous (a cometary tail stretching from the bull to Bootes when the bull was generally near to Scorpius, a somewhat later arrival of the bull between Leo and Bootes followed by an even later striking of the bull by Jupiter)? Is there any evidence at all of a discrimination between morning and evening stars on these ceilings? Other points which are worth bearing in mind when attempting to interpret the more ancient legends include one that the vernal equinox would have been in this area of the sky if the world were actually upside down (between Scorpius and Spica, or in Scorpius prior to about 2400 BC). Apart from the possible disturbing effects of capsize and contra-rotation on the rate and direction of precession, however, the possibility of a subsequent interference by later catastrophes - Exodus, Joshua etc.- must also be taken into account (see note 14). Pre-Phaeton legends could also be expected to include at least some reference to the Southern Cross, for this relatively small kite shaped and jewel-like constellation would have been a conspicuous object in the northern skies when the world was upside down. A Possible Synthesis There still remains plenty of scope for estimation of the possible positions of the sun (bearing in mind that cometary tails are always directed away from the sun) and of Jupiter, not to mention the moon, at the time of the Phaeton incident. The author's present assessment is that the northern panel of the Senmut ceiling shows a time between 1 and 3 ½ hours (approx.) after sunrise on a day close to the midsummer solstice. Different parts of the panel probably relate to slightly different times of day as the artist was almost certainly trying to depict a dynamic rather than a static scene. The sun would have risen at 0515 (L.M.T.) on a bearing of approx N. 65°W and would be in the sign of Capricorn. The comet would probably be first seen quite well to the south of the ecliptic, possibly even slightly to the south of the celestial equator and the distance between it and the earth would be closing rapidly (probably narrowing at a rate of between 3 and 4 earth diameters per hour, on the basis of the Venus models cited in Note 13). It is none too clear whether the comet was actually headed to pass inside or outside of the earth's orbit but if it was clearly seen to be drifting from Scorpius towards Spica (the direction of travel indicated on Senmut's ceiling but the rotation of the earth alone might suffice to create an illusion of travel in this direction), then it was probably headed to pass outside (i.e. along the side of the earth facing away from the sun). If the southern panels can be trusted at all, the moon was probably new, in Capricorn or Aquarius, and due to rise very shortly after the sun. Orion and Sirius would have been prominent in the sky of the previous night, culminating at around 9.30 pm. How Jupiter could have been seen anywhere near the bull is more difficult to explain. If there is any way of showing that Jupiter was also in the sign of Capricorn, well and good, but it seems more likely that the bull would have come into near alignment with Jupiter quite soon after passing Spica (its apparent speed of travel would be increasing quite sharply at this stage, for it would be getting very much closer to the earth and it would also be moving against the rotation of the earth). This conjunction with Jupiter should have been invisible from Thebes, however, at least until such time as the smooth rotation of the earth had become very grossly disturbed. What the Theban (or other Egyptian) observers possibly saw was Jupiter (and/or Saturn) coming up from the eastern horizon (close to S 65°E, apparently specially to attack Phaeton, presenting a spectacle which they could well have assessed as being of exceptional theological significance and thus worthy of permanent record. (Jupiter would have been below and to the right of Orion when Phaeton was above and to the right of the same constellation - see note 19. It should also be noted in this connection that Jupiter and Saturn, as well as Sirius, are depicted on the wrong side of Orion on the southern panels of the ceilings. The present hypothesis requires that these panels are aligned back-to-front by comparison with the true situation at this era. They were evidently aligned in conformity with the general arrangement of the heavens at the time when the ceilings were constructed, though with at least one super-posed "deliberate error" - actually more than one, though the number varies from ceiling to ceiling - which enabled Pogo to spot that two of the ceilings were "astronomically objectionable".) The present indication is that the Jupiter incident occurred at just about 0845 L.M.T. (principally on the basis of an as yet not very securely established supposition as to what the Asyut coffin lids depict). This would imply that the comet must first have appeared low in the western sky soon after midnight and it is difficult to suppose that it could have been altogether invisible at this time, its distance from the earth then being generally similar to that of the moon. The ceilings unfortunately just do not seem to offer any indication of what was going on in the earlier hours of that morning; even if there was something abnormal about, it was presumably rated of no great theological interest and therefore not worth a permanent record (bearing in mind that the production of permanent records was probably no light task some 4,500 years ago, especially if they had to be produced in the environment of chaos which would have immediately followed the Phaeton incident). It may be helpful to comment that the accompanying hour angle diagram on which this presentation is sketched out is consistent with a dating of about June 15th (modern style) in 2300 BC, but that it takes remarkably little modification to adapt the diagram to dates which differ by several centuries, should other evidence favour such a change. This provisional dating could still prove to be considerably in error but it seems unlikely, though not impossible, that the incident could have occurred later than about 2150 BC. It is easy to see it as early as 2700 BC, if not earlier still. The diagram is actually drawn for a time of 0615 L.M.T. (i.e. one hour after sunrise - such diagrams must unfortunately always present the time of day, the day of the year and the year itself with a sharply declining order of precision; each zodiacal sign marks off 2 hours of a 24 hour day, 30 days of a 360 day year or 30.4 days of a 365 day year, and 2150 years of the current precessional cycle). The plane of the diagram is essentially that of the celestial equator, but it should not be overlooked that there is an appreciable variation in the apparent "tilt" of the celestial equator at the different epochs involved - 2300 BC, 940 BC and the present day; see also notes 19, 20 & 21. This diagram can also suggest why there should be so many different depictions of the same theme, none of them entirely satisfactory. All (or almost all) the ceiling designers appear to have known that a bull crossed the heavens, moving from right to left, but none of them appears adequately to have understood (or been able to depict) a bull which actually travelled tail first, to some extent even sideways and inclined at a seemingly unnatural angle. This picture must remain somewhat tentative for the present and it would certainly have to be drastically modified if future discoveries were to upset the basic assumptions on which it rests (namely, that the world was initially upside-down and contra-rotating, that Scorpius was on or somewhat to the west of the meridian, that the vernal equinox intersection of the ecliptic and the celestial equator was between Spica and Scorpius, and that the "bull" had a cometary tail stretching towards Bootes). A final inference from the many anomalies of the southern panel unfortunately seems to have to be that Senmut was not really all that much better informed as to the true date of the Phaeton episode than his successors were. For him, presumably, the significance of the scene depicted was less the destruction of Phaeton than the marking of the start of a new era, or "Great Year"; he could well have deemed the subsequent catastrophes of this era to be trivial by comparison with this one. The present author certainly supposes that the Phaeton incident marks the most recent inversion of the earth though not, probably, the only one. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES AND REFERENCES 1. Velikovsky: Worlds in Collision (1950), I, v: "East and West" and II, vii: "Poles Uprooted". 2. Pogo, A. "The Astronomical Ceiling-decoration in the Tomb of Senmut", Isis XIV (1930) 301-325. The serious student will also need to inspect Ludlow S. Bull's description and illustration of the Seti ceiling, published in Isis VII (1925) 262-263, as well as the large collection of not dissimilar depictions assembled by Neugebauer & Parker (see note 5, below). 3. Private communication from Peter James.(Note that some researchers into Velikovsky's work prefer other datings.) The present writer lays no claim to authority on such matters but the most widely accepted conventional view is probably that presented by Sir Alan Gardiner in his Egypt of the Pharaohs (Oxford University Press, 1961). The dates which he cites, but which he describes as "conjectural", are as follows: Hashepsowe (co-aeval with Senmut) 1490-1468 BC; Sethos I (= Seti I) 1309-1291 BC; Ramesses II (= Rameses II) 1290-1224 BC. 4. Pogo, A.: "The Astronomical Inscriptions on the Coffins of Heny", Isis XVIII (1932), 7-13. 5. Neugebauer, O. and R.A. Parker: Egyptian Astronomical Texts III. Decans, planets, constellations and zodiacs (Brown University Press and Lund Humphries (Publishers) Ltd., London, 1969). Vols. I and II of this Magnum Opus, published in 1960 and 1964 respectively, also contain much relevant material. 6. The goddess is firmly identified as Serket (also spelt Serqet, Selqet or Selket) who is often known as "the scorpion goddess". It is very common for a representation of a Scorpion to be included as part of the spelling of her name (as on the Senmut ceiling). She is slightly differently located in the sky on some of the other Egyptian monuments and the possible connection with Spica, rather than Scorpius, is both tentative and involved. It may also be noted that, contrary to the opinion of Dr Velikovsky, many authorities consider Scorpius to be one of the few constellations which do bear a resemblance to their names. It is certainly quite distinctive in appearance and the much famed "sting" is easily recognisable; given the proposed upside-down orientation and contra-rotation of the earth, it is very plausible that the ancients should have seen Phaeton as having been frightened by the upraised sting of the scorpion, for it was distinctly turned towards the bull as it approached Scorpius on the orbit described in the concluding parts of this article (see also note 8 below). 7. The connection between an "upside-down" and a "contra-rotating" world is dealt with in greater detail in the article "Poles Uprooted" by M.G. Reade, published in Vol.I, No.1 of this magazine (SISR, January 1976, pp. 18 - 19). This article can also be consulted for basic information on the changes of alignment of the heavenly bodies which occur when the world turns upside-down. Non-technical readers may need the additional information that the ecliptic is defined as the apparent track of the sun (and, to a large extent, of the moon and the planets as well) through the sky and that it is mapped by projecting the line of sight from the earth to the sun on to the background of stars behind the sun. This is the principal reason why the ancients devoted so such attention to observation of the heavens at times close to sunrise and sunset, when the stars and the sun could be observed more or less simultaneously. (Modern instruments, especially timing devices, have eliminated the need for simultaneous observations.) The line of the ecliptic through the stars can remain unchanged even though the world turns upside down; this event would cause a very marked apparent displacement of both the stars and the ecliptic as seen from the earth. including some apparent change in their relative positions, but no actual displacement of the line of the ecliptic through the stars (that is, so long as the orbit of the earth was not quite prodigiously disturbed in the course of the capsizing process). It may also be desirable to draw attention to some peculiarities which are special to Orion. (a) It looks much the same upside down as it does right side up. Left and right in the sky are interchanged when the world turns upside-down but this also has little effect on the appearance of Orion. (b) It scarcely changes its position at all, except in azimuth (compass bearing), when the world turns upside down. (c) Its position in the sky is remarkably little affected by the precession of the equinoxes. Orion remains an essentially equatorial constellation in almost every conceivable circumstance despite the shifts of the celestial equator which are produced by precession. It is also worth noting that the much quoted legend of the Scorpion coming up out of the ground to attack Orion is easily explained as a rolling of the earth towards Scorpius: Orion would simultaneously disappear over the opposite horizon. The question of which way Orion faces seems to be largely a matter of how the particular ceiling designer interpreted the data which was passed down to him. The key appears to lie in whether Orion's "upper shoulder", believed to be indicated by one of the Remen-Sah decans, was judged to be on his left side or on his right side. It is also clear the these decans (together with some others as well, but the complete story is too long and involved for detailed discussion here) did change the order of their appearance in different tabulations of the heavens. 8. Descriptions of the constellations Scorpius and Sagittarius can be found in The Flammarion Book of Astronomy (George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1964 p.405); they are seldom referred to in European publications because they are for the most part too far south to be visible from Europe. Patrick Moore, in The Observer's Book of Astronomy (Frederick Warne & Co. Ltd. 1971, p.101) describes Scorpio as "a superb constellation" and also cites the legend that Phaeton was scared by the scorpion immediately before being struck down by Jupiter. . 9. Malcolm Lowery's article "F.X. Kugler - Almost a Catastrophist" was published in Newsletter No. 2 of the Interdisciplinary Study Group (September 1975), pp.12 - 16. It has also appeared in somewhat revised and expanded form as "Father Kugler's Falling Star" in Kronos, Vol.II No. 4 (Summer 1977) pp. 3 - 28. 10. For evidence of ancient confusion between Ursa major, Ursa minor and Bootes (Arcturus), see for instance Everyman's Smaller Classical Dictionary (J.M. Dent & Sons, 1952) under the heading of "Arctos". Similar accounts appear in other dictionaries as well, always under "Arctos". 11. Sir William Peck F.R.A.S.: The Constellations & How to Find them (First published ca. 1900 by Gall & Inglis, revised and reprinted many times since.) 12. Neugebauer & Parker list approximately 50 monuments containing at least partial representations of the theme depicted on Senmut's northern panel. Of these, 23 show the hippo to the right of the bulk as on Senmut's ceiling, and 16 show it to the left of the bull. The earliest known such monument, the Heny coffin board, is one of those showing it to the left of the bull. This count can only be regarded as provisional, however, for a few of the interpretations are challengeable (either because the monuments are reconstructed form fragments or because significant parts of the design are "upside-down" making it ambiguous how the terms "left" and "right" are to be interpreted). There is still ample material on these monuments which could be applied to further development of the themes discussed in this article. 13. Records of "the running of Apis" appear three times on the Palermo stone and are datable to the 2nd and 3rd Egyptian dynasties according to Duncan MacNaughton in his book A Scheme of Egyptian Chronology Luzac & Co., London (1932). Students of cometary orbits may also like to note that MacNaughton's data indicates the separation between two consecutive "runs" as being 6 years (plus or minus 1 year), offering good agreement with the Venus models proposed by Rose & Vaughan and adopted by Ransom & Hoffee in Pensee IVR I, III & VIII (1972 - 74). 14. R.A. Proctor, in chapter 12 (headed "Origins of the constellation figures") of his Myths and Marvels of Astronomy (Longmans Green & Co., 1903) gives a good description of the orthodox method of calculating the era at which the presently recognised constellations were first listed and named. He arrives at 2200-2100 BC with a probability of 2170 BC. The method assumes continuity of the precession of the equinoxes since that date. In the present article, it is provisionally assumed that this will be the latest possible date for the legendary Phaeton catastrophe. a conceivable partial correction for the effects of subsequent interference, attributed to Kugler, is referred to in W in C II, viii: "The reforming of the calendar". An aberration of 6° in the longitude of either equinox (or solstice) would cause any precessionally determined date affected by it to be in error by approx. 430 years; the prima facie suggestion is that precessionally determined dates of the second millennium BC (or earlier) should be increased by at least this amount, but this suggestion should be regarded as very tentative and provisional for the present, there being further suggestions also referenced in Velikovsky's book and there still also being ample scope for a deeper study of the relevant data, particularly of the way in which successive disturbances of the orbits of comets tend to cancel one another out. See, for instance, "The Missing Comets" by R.J. Buckley, Journal of the British Astronomical Association Vol 87, No. 3 (April 1977) pp. 226 - 239 15. Pogo, A.: 'Calendars on coffin lids from Asyut", Isis 17 ( 1932), 6 - 24. Pogo's account of how the star clock is set up on the Senmut ceiling differs from Neugebauer & Parker's: some further critical comparison of the two schemes could be helpful. The present author imagines that the future will see these traditional star arrangements recognised as something other than a "star clock", possibly a commemorative monument of some kind (like the Senmut ceiling itself). The later Ramesside "star tables" appear to be in a similar category, probably commemorating the celestial disturbances of a year somewhere around 700 BC. 16. Some readers will doubtless prefer to construe the "planetary" depictions of Isis and Osiris as yet another aspect of the Venus legends. The present text is not intended to deny this possibility but the implications are too far-reaching for detailed examination in the present article. They form a part of the case for the tentative suggestion that an exchange of positions (and / or identities) between Venus and Sirius may be amongst the historical events commemorated on these ceilings. One could also suppose that "Bennu" (seen at the bottom left hand corner of the southern panel) depicts the phoenix, the design of Senmut's ceiling as a whole obviously being consistent with an interpretation that it is a record of "A visit of the Phoenix". Duncan MacNaughton's wind-up to his article on the shadow clock of Seti I, published in the Journal of the British Association (Vol 54, No. 7, pp. 135 - 137, September 1944) may be found particularly suggestive: "The inference is, therefore, that the clock was originally used at or near the time of the summer solstice, perhaps for the timing of the ceremonies connected with the death and resurrection of Osiris." The writer knows of no actual description of the "destruction" of Osiris by Phaeton, but a glance at the diagram accompanying this article will show that the comet could have been seen in the vicinity of Orion (equated with Osiris) quite shortly after being struck by Jupiter, at which time the heavens would certainly have presented a fearsome aspect. The writer is inclined to think that the traditional destruction and resurrection of Osiris may refer to a still earlier catastrophe than this one, however. 17. G. Maspero's book The Dawn of Civilisation was published by the Society for Promotion of Christian Knowledge, London (3rd Edition, 1897). It contains also copious and well detailed references to the conclusions of other Egyptologists concerning the legends of ancient Egypt. 18. Citations of "A time before there was a moon in the sky" have appeared in the magazine Pensee as follows: 1973, IVR III, p.25 - "Earth without a Moon" by I. Velikovsky; 1973, IVR III pp. 46-47 - "Giordano Bruno's view of the Earth without a Moon" by A.M. Paterson; 1974, IVR VII, pp. 49-50 - Letter from Rev. D. de Jong. 19. The diagram is approximate only, in the sense that the star positions shown are modern ones; they require correction for the slight drift in position of individual stars with time (e.g. currently 1° per 1570 years in the case of Arcturus, which is much the fastest moving of those included on the diagram) and also for some secondary effects of precession, those connected with the varying relative positions of the celestial equator and the ecliptic. The position of the ecliptic itself has also been reported to drift slightly with the passage of centuries. These corrections are small by comparison with the accuracy of the diagram as a whole, not to mention the possibility that the rate of precession may have varied, whilst still another consideration is that we cannot be entirely sure how the ancients of any particular generation would have assessed the alignment of stars remote from the ecliptic and the celestial equator (notably Sirius and Arcturus) when presenting them on a flat map. It is tempting to see Arcturus rather closer to Spica than it appears on the present diagram, for instance, and this occurs automatically if one re-makes the diagram on a basis of stellar longitudes rather than right ascensions (the effect is to locate the sun rather more centrally in Capricorn) but it seems premature to attempt any serious revision of the detail of the diagram before still more threads of the story have been drawn together into a self-consistent whole. Serious students are recommended to set the scene up on a star globe which has been adjusted for upside-downness, precession etc. and form their own judgement as to just how it would all have appeared to the ancients; they might also profitably ask themselves why Senmut and his peers did not choose to construct domed astronomical ceilings instead of flat ones. A spherical presentation would show Spica as much more remote from Arcturus than it appears on our diagrams. It also should not be overlooked that Venus has a diameter which is only very marginally smaller than that of the earth. It has unfortunately proved impracticable to indicate this satisfactorily on the present diagram, which is necessarily made with an extremely unequal scale of distances. (Both the earth and Venus would appear as near pin-points on almost any diagram which purported to show celestial distances to scale.) The zodiac, which is simply to be understood as a convenient and essentially practical scale of celestial longitudes, has been aligned on the present diagram by inspection of the limits of the constellations Scorpius and Pisces, each of which just about fills its respective sign. It incidentally appears unlikely that anybody could have seen a real cometary tail stretching from Spica to Bootes, at least so long as the earth's axis was not quite differently aligned (postulated as possible and supported with geographical/geological evidence by Donald W. Patten in his book The Biblical Flood and the Ice Epoch, Pacific Meridian Publishing Co., Seattle, 1966 but only in respect of an even earlier era than the one assumed here; apart from this, however the earth's axis would inevitably "wobble" very drastically in the course of any major slow-down of its speed of rotation thus giving rise to the "star battles" described in the "Kugler ' article of Note 9, above). Eridanus, where Phaeton is alleged finally to have plunged (or last been seen), is mainly in Aries and just beyond the longitude of the Pleiades (included in the diagram). It is also quite well to the south of both the celestial equator and the ecliptic, confirming the generally southward drift of the comet's path (that is, southward in the modern sense as applied to the heavens geographical: south and celestial south indicate opposing directions when the world is upside-down, all the easier references in this article having been to the geographical south as it would have appeared to an ancient inhabitant of Egypt, who would presumably still regard upstream of the Nile as "south", whichever way the angle of the earth happened to be oriented with respect to the heavens for the time being). That the comet was actually tracked as far as Eridanus seems quite remarkable, in view of the fearful destruction which it was wreaking on earth. The comment on p. 19 of Martin Sieff's article in SISR I, No. 4 ("The Cosmology of Job"), re the danger associated with a comet which passes above Orion, is also consistent with a comet which passes south (celestially) of Orion whilst the world is upside-down, as in the present case. Phaeton seemingly passed just south of Orion and very close to Sirius (which appears above Orion when the world is upside down) shortly before reaching Eridanus. Dr Velikovsky similarly quotes a Chinese source that "in the time of Tsin the planet Venus used to move 40 degrees to the south of the ecliptic and eclipse the star Sirius" (W in C, II, vii:"The reforming of the calendar"). It should prove particularly helpful to further unravelling of the data recorded on these complex astronomical monuments if any firm evidence can be produced as to just when, how and why Isis, Venus and Sirius came to be equated with one another, and how Orion came to be equated with Osiris; these conventions may well ante-date the Phaeton episode. 20. It will be well known that mechanisms which can account adequately for motions such as an inversion of the poles or a reversal of the rotation of the earth are still sadly missing from our repertoire. An inversion of precisely 180° is not quite inconceivable however, 180° being the natural limit of certain styles of gyroscopic precession. These styles of precession are always variable rate, however, and it seems improbable that a 180° turn could be completed in less than a matter of days, more likely weeks or months. Some hints on the general subject of magnetic/electrostatic forces and their possible relevance to precessional shifts of the world's axis were included in Professor Irving Michelson's conference paper reprinted in Pensee IVR VII (Vol. 4, No.2, Spring 1974, pp. 15-21 and p. 43). It is also conceivable that the two principal sloping passages (26° 18' slope) in the Great Pyramid were planned to permit recognition of the completion of such a turn. Reversal of the direction of rotation of the earth presents still more intractable problems. Such few hints as ancient history currently affords support the proposition that the earth may have to reverse its direction of rotation if it becomes inverted and this proposition probably merits serious consideration. It would seem unlikely that such a combined manoeuvre could be completed in less than a semi-orbit of the earth (6 months); it would imply a prolonged period of most disorderly conditions on earth, when even the terms "day" and "night" might lose much of their ordinary significance. Almost the only hope the few survivors of such a catastrophe would have of keeping any reasonably dependable record of elapsed time would seem to lie in the possibility that they might be vouchsafed occasional glimpses of the moon against the background of the fixed stars (the moon completes a circuit of the zodiac, plus one sign, in a month; this is probably a part of the original definition of a zodiacal sign). 21. Mars is not shown on the Senmut ceiling but it is included on the Seti and Ramesseum ones; if they are to be trusted, it was close to the boundary between Cancer and Leo. In this position it would be at maximum brilliance and just completing its periodic retrograde motion (as is so often claimed on Egyptian monuments). This would also make it the "Morning star" of Sibyls V. (Note that it could not be a morning star as ordinarily defined, for Mars must already have been an outer planet to be found in this position at all). It would have been conspicuous in the south-east in the early morning, however and it would seem probable that the ancients' concept of a morning star was different from ours, whether referring to Mars, Venus or any other. As an inner planet, capable of alternating between morning and evening star apparitions in the modern sense, it would have had to be much closer to the sun and possibly invisible from earth at the time depicted here. It remains an open question whether Mars is to be considered an inner planet and invisible, as the Senmut ceiling could tentatively suggest, or an outer one which was both brilliant and retrograde, as the later monuments do suggest. It is also worth noting that the warning of the danger of having the planets all in one line, in Cancer or Capricorn or both, is applicable to the situation outlined here. Note also, however, that Mercury has been omitted from the present account; it does get a mention on the ceilings but it would appear that there is a lot of work still to be done before the part played by Mercury in the ancient celestial scene will be established with any degree of certainty. 22. The author would like to acknowledge the assistance given by Malcolm Lowery, Peter James, Geoffrey Gammon and other members of this Society in the preparation of this article, including some original suggestions and finding of documentary data. Their complete acceptance of all the views expressed in the article should not be assumed, however. _________________________________________________________________ \cdrom\pubs\journals\review\v0201\10senmt.htm