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Stars, Stones and Scholars: The Decipherment of the Megaliths as an Ancient Survey of the Earth by Astronomy

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"Andis Kaulins is a nutter."
I am revising this to say that Kaulins is not nuts, he is a very clever man who spends so much time blogging that it seems unlikely that he has time to conduct actual archeological research. Be sure to read his threatening reply to my review. True enough, I only skimmed through this book, but why would I want to read the work of a guy who spends so much time bad-mouthing credentialed scientists? A scientist would not threaten people who merely quoted a few of his controversial ideas. His scholarship has been criticized by Eric C. Cline (From Eden to Exile,) and researchers at the University of Chicago: [...] Kaulins may have a few valid ideas about depictions of astronomy by ancient man and the importance of the Baltic languages, but they're getting lost in his shrill denunciations of mainstream academia. Read his bio, his own academic background is in law, not linguistics or archaeology.

From his Lexline journal:
"I am still working on my formal write-up of my Gobekli Tepe decipherment which will show that Göbekli Tepe is astronomical in nature and oriented to the stars ca. 3800 B.C.
I conclude that this location near Urfa is where the Hebrew Calendar began. Gobekli Tepe is only 12 kilometers (about 7.5 miles) from Urfa (currently called Sanliurfa or Edessa), the legendary birthplace of the Biblical Abraham, and only 38 kilometers (23.75 miles) from his later residence at Haran. (see Am Anfang war Anatolien)
I initially dated the installation of the standing stones by what I have deciphered to be the relief depiction of the appearance of Halley's Comet on one of the stones, which by its location on that stone can only be ca. 3800 B.C."

"My interpretations of Stonehenge by astronomy date the large megaliths at Stonehenge to 1749 BC."

"I have been able to decipher several of the Balkan Danube Scripts (ca. 4000-3000 BC) from Transylvania (Romania), Karanovo (Bulgaria) and from Thracian Greece as astronomy. In addition, I have been able to decipher the Djer wooden and ivory tablets from Abydos and Saqqara (ca. 3000 BC) - also as astronomy. In my view, this resolves the question of the origin of Pharaonic writing - it derives from what are today called the Danube Scripts, whatever their provenance may be."

"The identity of Tutankhamun can be explained as follows:
In my opinion, the evidence is incontrovertible that King Saul = Echnaton (Akhenaten), King David = Sethos and King Solomon = Ramses II with Shishak = Ramses III.
Accordingly, Tutankhamun can only be ATON, i.e. JON-ATHON ("young Aton, young Adonis, "Jaun-(IE)donis"), one of the sons of Saul in the Bible. Saul was Echn-ATON viz. Akhen-ATEN ("old Aton", old Adonis, "Vec-(IE)Donis"). The other brother was Semenchkare, Biblical Ish-Boshet, who served a short time as Pharaoh before being executed."

So there you have it- you decide, based on his own words, about the quality of his scholarship. Needless to say, he doesn't accept carbon dating. There's also a strong streak of "the Europeans/Hebrews did it first" in his theories. (From his correspondence: "I really do think that the Jews originally were what the Lithuanians now call the GUDDA, i.e. "White-Russians"." )
See also: Megaliths, Man and the Cosmos, Implications for both Archaeology and Pseudoarchaeology by Chelsee Arbour, May 31, 2007 and The Skeptic 2000 Vol 20. No. 1, in which Mark Newbrook, PhD, refers to Kaulins as a "fringe historical linguist."

Andis Kaulins, as Nazani points out, is clearly a very clever man. Unfortunately, his intellect seems to fall short of the critical acumen he has developed as a Doctor of Law when it comes to dealing with archaeological evidence.

He accepts untenable ideas about the past, such as the existence of ley lines, a fantasy dreamed up in the 1920s by the Herefordshire businessman Alfred Watkins and thoroughly debunked in the 1980s by Tom Williamson and Liz Bellamy in Ley Lines in Question. He finds cup-and-ring marks on stones that supposedly depict constellations in the southern hemisphere (such as Musca) that were not defined until the sixteenth century: remember that constellations have no objective reality in the sky, that they are arbitrary groupings of unrelated stars and that different cultures make different groupings. His mangling of linguistics allows him to state that the name of Merlin - who is identified as a genius behind megalithic carvings that no-one else has yet recognised! - can be derived from a root "MER- meaning "measure, survey" in ancient Indo-European" when it comes from Welsh Myrddin, probably derived from the Brittonic placename Moridunon, now Carmarthen (Caerfyrddin in Welsh), meaning "sea fort".

There is little point in trying to do a detailed, point-by-point rebuttal. The evidence simply does not stack up. While Andis Kaulins is evidently an accomplished lawyer and translator, I find nothing in his excursions into archaeology, ancient history and biblical exegesis that is really worth spending time on.

It is rare for a book to cover the distance and depth found in Stones, Stars and Scholars by Andis Kaulins. However the conclusion of the book, that the ancient megaliths tell a story about a world wide system of surveying and measurement well in effect in 3000 BC, will turn the world of scholarship upside down. While it is a pioneering work, there is more than enough information here to prove the authors basic premise that the megalithic sites, all over the world, represent a map of the sky on the ground.

Implications in this book for historians include granting ancient peoples much more credibility for understanding our place in the solar system, movements of people and ideas in the ancient world, the origin of scientific methods and an uncanny knowledge of these ideas around the world.

When I was growing up I always heard that our human cognitive abilities were developed in part from observing the sun, moon and stars. This book begins to develop the meaning of that statement by showing that the depth of understanding of the relationship of the sky to terrestrial geography was profound in the human species for a very long time. It is a shame that most historians and archeologists have forgotten or never knew basic astronomy and its relationship with the reality structure of ancient people. This book begins to mend this problem.

A bonus with the book is the linguistic comparison of the names of the constellations, stars, megalithic sites and local town names with the local native language, and other languages including Latvian. This analysis supports the theory that the ancients were aware of precession, the pole of the ecliptic and other astronomical facts that historians are reluctant to admit.

The dating of the monuments by analyzing carvings on the stones to represent moments where solstices and other astronomical events occured in the past is revolutionary. The author presents the idea that "modern time" began on December 25, 3117 BC and is found in carvings supporting that idea located around the world.

This book requires close study but is extremely rewarding in understanding human development: As above, so below.

This books is ridiculous. It ignores years of scholarly research by people who know what they are doing and is pure fantasy. Don't waste your money!

Stars, Stones and Scholars is a pioneer analysis of prehistoric art, megalithic sites, astronomy, archaeology and the history of civilization. The book title is an intentional play on the title of C.W. Ceram's famous book, Gods, Graves and Scholars, which analyzed the history of archaeology from a quite limited perspective - starting with the Gods and the Graves, placing too much emphasis on the Scholars, and ignoring the study of the Stars and the workmanship of Stones which PRECEDED them. Stars, Stones and Scholars presents the decipherment of the megaliths (standing stones) as an ancient survey of the Earth by astronomy. The book presents initial proofs and discussion claiming that ancient megalithic sites are remnants of ancient local, regional and worldwide Neolithic surveys oriented to the stars. This hypothesis is not even speculative - in ancient days, no other means except astronomy were available for earthly orientation. The book's ca. 40 photographs, 240 drawings and 80 maps show how megaliths were carved and "sculpted" with figures in relief (what can still be made of them) and cupmarks (holes in the stones) to intentionally represent specific stars, constellations and asterisms, long before our modern astrological Zodiac was allegedly known. Megalithic sites from around the world are analyzed and shown to be part of ancient SYSTEMATIC survey systems covering entire regions ca. 3000 BC. The countries analyzed include, for example, England (all the major Neolithic sites including e.g. Stonehenge, Wayland's Smithy, Kents Cavern), Wales (all the major Neolithic sites including e.g. Paviland), Scotland (all the major Neolithic sites including e.g. the Clava Cairns), Ireland (all the major Neolithic sites including Newgrange, Knowth, Tara), Germany (most of the major sites including the Externsteine, Nebra, Gollenstein, Felsenmeer), Benelux (Weris), France (Carnac, Lascaux, Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc), Italy (La Spezia), all the Malta Temples (e.g. Tarxien and the Hypogeum), Scandinavia (Tanum), as well as individual sites in the Baltic, Russia, the Near East, the Far East (China - the Great Wall, and Japan - e.g. Asuka, Kanayama), Africa (e.g. the Central African Republic), Central and South America (Tikal), Oceania (Hawaii), the continental USA (Cahokia, Miami Circle) and Canada (the Peterborough Petroglyphs). Many of these sites are examined and deciphered in great detail showing a site such as the Peterborough Petroglyphs in Canada, for example, to be an ancient map of the heavens and the Ki'i Petroglyphs on the island of Hawaii to be an ancient map of the world. The intent of the author is not so much to convince the reader of the correctness of his analysis, but rather to urge the reader to look at ancient sites and stones differently than before and, for example, to examine old vacation photographs of Stonehenge or similar sites, and see the figures carved on the stones. As far as the interpretation of the megaliths is concerned, there is no question that this is the way of the future.