Megalithic Yard

A Megalithic Yard is a unit of measurement, about 2.72 feet (0.83 m),[1][2][3] that some researchers believe was used in the construction of megalithic structures. The proposal was made by Alexander Thom as a result of his surveys of 600 megalithic sites in England, Scotland, Wales and Britanny.[4] Thom additionally proposed the Megalithic Rod of 2.5 MY[5] and suggested the Megalithic Rod could be divided into one hundred and the Meglithic Yard divided into forty, which he called the Megalithic Inch of 2.073 centimetres (0.816 in). Thom applied the statistical lumped variance test of J.R. Broadbent[6] on this quantum and found the results significant[7] while others have challenged his statistical analysis and suggested that Thom's evidence can be explained in other ways, for instance the average length of a pace.

Contents

Other units

Thom suggested that "There must have been a headquarters from which standard rods were sent out but whether this was in these islands or on the Continent the present investigation cannot determine."[8]

Margaret Ponting has suggested that artefacts such as a marked bone found during excavations at Dail Mòr near Callanish, the Patrickholme bone bead from Lanarkshire and Dalgety bone bead from Fife in Scotland have shown some evidence of being measuring rods based on the Megalithic Yard in Britain.[9] An Oak rod from the Iron Age fortified settlement at Borre Fen mearured 53.15 inches (135.0 cm) with marks dividing it up into eight parts of 6.64 inches (16.9 cm). Euan Mackie referred to five eights of this rod 33.2 inches (84 cm) as "very close to a megalithic yard".[10] A Hazel measuring rod recovered from a Bronze Age burial mound in Borum Eshøj, East Jutland by P. V. Glob in 1875 mearured 30.9 inches (78 cm). Keith Critchlow suggested this may have shrunk 0.63 inches (1.6 cm) from the Megalithic Yard over 3000 years.[11]

Thom made a comparison of his Megalithic Yard with the Spanish vara, the pre-metric measurement of Iberia, its value 2.7425 feet. Archaeologist Euan Mackie noticed similarities between the MY and a unit of measurement extrapolated from a long, marked shell from Mohenjo Daro and ancient measuring rods used in mining in the Austrian Tyrol.[12] He suggested similarities with other measurements such as the ancient Indian gaz and the Sumerian šu-du3-a.[12] Along with John Michell, Mackie also noted that it is the diagonal of a rectangle measuring 2 by 1 Egyptian remens.[13][14] Jay Kappraff has noted similarity between the Megalithic Yard and the ancient Indus short yard of 33 inches (0.84 m).[15] Anne Macaulay[16] reported that the Megalithic Rod is equal in length to the Greek fathom of (2.072 metres (6.80 ft))[15] from studies by Eric Fernie of the Metrological Relief in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.[17]

Reception

Thom's claim was initially ignored or regarded as unbelievable by traditional archaeologists.[18] Colin Renfrew reviewed Thom's work and observed arrangements of megaliths in full integers or exact halves of the megalithic yard.[19]

Clive Ruggles has said that both classical and Bayesian statistical reassessments of Thom's date "reached the conclusion that the evidence in favour of the MY was at best marginal, and that even if it does exist the uncertainty in our knowledge of its value is of the order of centimetres, far greater than the 1mm precision claimed by Thom. In other words, the evidence presented by Thom could be adequately explained by, say, monuments being set out by pacing, with the 'unit' reflecting an average length of pace."[20] David George Kendall had previously argued that pacing would have created a greater difference in measurements between sites, he concluded after investigation for the Royal Academy, that "The hypothesis of a smooth, non-quantal distribution of circle diameters (for Scottish, English and Welsh true circles) is thus rejected at the 1% level."[7][18]

Douglas Heggie casts doubt on Thom's suggestion as well, stating that his careful analysis uncovered "little evidence for a highly accurate unit" and "little justification for the claim that a highly accurate unit was in use".[21]

In his book Rings of Stone: The Prehistoric Stone Circles of Britain and Ireland. Aubrey Burl calls the megalithic yard "a chimera, a grotesque statistical misconception." [22]

See also

References

  1. ^ Thom, Alexander., The megalithic unit of length, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, A 125, 243-251, 1962.
  2. ^ Alexander Thom (12 March 1964). New Scientist. Reed Business Information. pp. 690–. ISSN 02624079. http://books.google.com/books?id=c2iCzjpnd4EC&pg=PA690. Retrieved 19 April 2011. 
  3. ^ Barbara Ann Kipfer (2000). Encyclopedic dictionary of archaeology. Springer. pp. 344–. ISBN 9780306461583. http://books.google.com/books?id=XneTstDbcC0C&pg=PA344. Retrieved 23 April 2011. 
  4. ^ Archibald Stevenson Thom (1995). Walking in all of the squares: a biography of Alexander Thom : engineer, archaeoastronomer, discoverer of a prehistoric calendar, the geometry of stone rings and megalithic measurement. Argyll Pub.. ISBN 9781874640660. http://books.google.com/books?id=o0HbAAAAMAAJ. Retrieved 19 April 2011. 
  5. ^ Thom, Alexander., The larger units of length of megalithic man, Journal for the Royal Statistical Society, A 127, 527-533, 1964.
  6. ^ Broadbent S.R., Quantum hypothesis, Biometrika, 42, 45-57 (1955)
  7. ^ a b David H. Kelley; Eugene F. Milone; Anthony F. (FRW) Aveni (28 February 2011). Exploring Ancient Skies: A Survey of Ancient and Cultural Astronomy. Springer. pp. 163–. ISBN 9781441976239. http://books.google.com/books?id=ILBuYcGASxcC&pg=PA163. Retrieved 22 April 2011. 
  8. ^ A. Thom (1976). Megalithic sites in Britain, p. 43. Clarendon. http://books.google.com/books?id=Y6p-DwEACAAJ. Retrieved 6 April 2011. 
  9. ^ Margaret Ponting (13 February 2003). "Megalithic Callanish". In Clive Ruggles. Records in Stone: Papers in Memory of Alexander Thom. Cambridge University Press. pp. 423–441. ISBN 9780521531306. http://books.google.com/books?id=oZ3JGYd1kJoC&pg=PA431. Retrieved 22 April 2011. 
  10. ^ John David North (1996). Stonehenge: Neolithic man and the cosmos, p. 302. HarperCollins. ISBN 9780002557733. http://books.google.com/books?id=TnFnAAAAMAAJ. Retrieved 23 April 2011. 
  11. ^ Keith Critchlow (1979). Time stands still: new light on megalithic science, p. 37. Gordon Fraser. http://books.google.com/books?id=jK3aAAAAMAAJ. Retrieved 23 April 2011. 
  12. ^ a b Euan Wallace MacKie (1977). The megalith builders, p. 192. Phaidon. http://books.google.com/books?id=7gOBAAAAMAAJ. Retrieved 22 April 2011. 
  13. ^ John Michell (1978). City of Revelation: On the Proportion and Symbolic Numbers of the Cosmic Temple. Abacus. ISBN 9780349123219. http://books.google.com/books?id=MHfubwAACAAJ. Retrieved 22 April 2011. 
  14. ^ Euan Wallace MacKie (1977). Science and society in prehistoric Britain. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 9780312702458. http://books.google.com/books?id=o3O-QgAACAAJ. Retrieved 26 April 2011. 
  15. ^ a b Jay Kappraff (2002). Beyond measure: a guided tour through nature, myth, and number. World Scientific. pp. 237–. ISBN 9789810247027. http://books.google.com/books?id=vAfBrK678_kC&pg=PA237. Retrieved 22 April 2011. 
  16. ^ Anne Macaulay; Richard A. Batchelor (July 2006). Megalithic measures and rhythms: sacred knowledge of the ancient Britons, p. 38 (Megalithic yardsticks). Floris. ISBN 9780863155543. http://books.google.com/books?id=QqkVAgAACAAJ. Retrieved 23 April 2011. 
  17. ^ Society of Antiquaries of London (1981). The Antiquaries journal: being the journal of the Society of Antiquaries of London, The Greek Metrological Relief in Oxford by Eric J. Fernie, p. 255. Oxford University Press. http://books.google.com/books?id=JAgpAAAAYAAJ. Retrieved 23 April 2011. 
  18. ^ a b David George Kendall; F. R. Hodson; Royal Society (Great Britain); British Academy (1974). The Place of astronomy in the ancient world: a joint symposium of the Royal Society and the British Academy. Oxford University Press for the British Academy. http://books.google.com/books?id=FHLvAAAAMAAJ. Retrieved 19 April 2011. 
  19. ^ Colin Renfrew (1973). Before civilization: the radiocarbon revolution and prehistoric Europe, p. 237. Cape. http://books.google.com/books?id=tfGAAAAAMAAJ. Retrieved 23 April 2011. 
  20. ^ Ruggles, Clive (1999). Astronomy in Prehistoric Britain and Ireland. Yale University Press. p. 83. ISBN 978-0300078145. 
  21. ^ Heggie, Douglas C. (1981). Megalithic Science: Ancient Mathematics and Astronomy in North-west Europe. Thames and Hudson. p. 58. ISBN 0-50005036-8. 
  22. ^ Balfour, M; O GIngerich (1980). "Book-Review - Stonehenge and its Mysteries". Journal of Historical Astronomy SUPP. VOL.11, P.S104. http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/full/seri/JHAS./0011//0000104.000.html. Retrieved 3 May 2011. 

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