Nabta Playa, Egypt: A roughly 6,500-year-old stone circle aligned with the summer-solstice sunrise and Sirius predates Stonehenge by about 1,000 years. The Late Neolithic site is among the world's oldest known astronomical stone circles.
Nabta Playa: oldest known astronomical stone circle predating Stonehenge by 1,000 years
Site mentioned
📍 Nabta Playa, Egypt🌍 Show on the globe
Key facts
- Nabta Playa lies about 60 miles (100 km) north of the Sudanese border in a natural depression covering roughly 5,000 square kilometers.
- The Late Neolithic megalithic complex is 6,000–7,000 years old, and its stone circle is among the world's oldest known astronomical alignments.
- The roughly 6,500-year-old circle is commonly described as predating Stonehenge by about 1,000 years, not 2,000.
- Its quartzite and sandstone stones reach about 6 feet wide and 9 feet high and were brought from a quarry roughly 0.5 km away.
- Near local noon around the summer solstice, the stones cast almost no shadow, helping track the Sun's position over roughly three weeks.
- Researchers identified alignments with summer-solstice sunrise and the rising positions of Sirius, Dubhe and Orion's Belt.
- The area was occupied from about 11,000 years ago until approximately 4,800 years ago.
- Environmental and archaeological evidence at the site has been linked to the onset of stronger summer monsoons from central Africa.
Sources
Nabta Playa: A mysterious stone circle that may be the world's oldest ...livescience.com
Nabta Playa in Egypt is an ancient stone circle that researchers suspect was used to determine the summer solstice, which signaled rain was on the way.
A Computer-Aided Interpretation of the Nabta Playa Stone Circleirispublishers.com
The Nabta Playa circle consists of 29 stones - an unmistakable nod to the lunar month - that surround taller central stelae. The circle's small ...
Nabta Playa: A mysterious stone circle that may be the world's oldest ...space.com
Nabta Playa in Egypt is an ancient stone circle that researchers suspect was used to determine the summer solstice, which signaled rain was ...
Nabta Playa Stone Circle - Ancient Egypt Onlineancientegyptonline.co.uk
At around 4800 BC the stone circle was erected to mark the summer solstice, and further megalithic structures followed until around 3600 BC. The rich ...
Nabta Playa: The world's first astronomical site was built in Africaastronomy.com
It was built more than 7,000 years ago, making Nabta Playa the oldest stone circle in the world — and possibly Earth's oldest astronomical ...
The Megaliths of Nabta Playa, South Western Desert of Egyptiaepan.edu.pl
Early and Late megalithic installations of Nabta Playa are among the oldest in the world. The unusually large field of offering tumuli upon the Sacred Mountain ...
A Computer-Aided Interpretation of the Nabta Playa Stone ...researchgate.net
The Nabta Playa stone circle is located approximately 100 km west of Abu Simbel in southern Egypt. The site features stone alignments that a record of ...
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