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Paper: Solar Orientations of Bronze Age Shrines in Gournia, Crete
Volume: 409, Cosmology Across Cultures
Page: 430
Authors: Henriksson, G.; Blomberg, M.
Abstract: The measurements of orientations at Gournia are part of the Uppsala University project to investigate the nature of Minoan astronomy. The town is typical of Minoan settlements and therefore was chosen for the selection of representative buildings from different kinds of Minoan sites. We use classical archaeoastronomical methods and our own computer programs for calculation of the positions of the sun, moon and stars in the Aegean Bronze Age. We discovered that Gournia is the fourth Minoan site with shrines that are oriented to sunrise at lunar month intervals with respect to the equinoxes. There is also a Mycenaean shrine in the town and we compared its orientation to Mycenaean buildings of the same type in Crete.
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