SerioFoderà GiorgiaHoskinMichael and VenturaFrank, “The orientations of the temples of Malta”, Journal for the history of astronomy, xxiii (1992), 107–19.
AgiusGeorge and VenturaFrank, Investigation into the possible astronomical alignments of the Copper Age temples in Malta (Malta, 1980). This booklet, published by Malta University Press, was republished in revised form in Archaeoastronomy [bulletin], iv (1981), 10–21.
4.
VenturaFrank and TantiTony, “Orientations of Malta's megalithic temples”, article in the Malta Sunday Times Building and Architecture Supplement, 5 August 1990.
5.
AshbyT.BradleyR. N.PeetT. E. and TagliaferroN., Excavations in 1908–11 in various megalithic buildings in Malta and Gozo (Papers of the British School in Rome, iv/1; Rome, 1913), 91.
6.
See for example AveniAnthony F., Skywatchers of ancient Mexico (Austin, 1980), 30–35. DicksD. R., in Early Greek astronomy to Aristotle (London, 1970), remarks that the Pleiades star-group “has been used by various people all over the world to mark the passage of time and the seasons of the year” (p. 36).
7.
Private communication to Hoskin, 15 March 1992. Using a value of k = 0.3 mag/air mass, and taking the Pleiades to have the same visibility as a 2.0 magnitude star and the faintest star visible in a dark zenith to have 6.0 magnitude, Dr Schaefer's best estimate for the heliacal rise of the Pleiades in 3000 b.c. is 14 April and for the heliacal setting 20 February, where 21 March is the vernal equinox. But if k = 0.2 (or if one were dealing with a star of 1.0 magnitude), then Dr Schaefer obtains 6 April in place of 14 April.
8.
On the calendar in Hesiod's Works and days, see the discussion in Dicks, op. cit. (ref. 6), 34–38. When “rosyfingered dawn gazes on Arcturus”, for example, the grapes should be cut (Works and days, 609–11).
9.
Hesiod mentions that when, towards the end of October, “the Pleiades and the Hyades and the might of Orion set”, the farmer's year is ended and so the farmer must again think of ploughing (Works and days, 615). At the time of Homer, the Hyades were also recognized among the most significant stars. We find in Iliad, xviii, 483 that when Hephaistos made the shield of Achilles, “he wrought thereon Earth and Heaven and Sea, and the unwearied sun and the full moon and all the signs wherewith the Heaven is crowned, the Pleiades and the Hyades and the might of Orion and the Bear which also men call the Wain …”. We thank Dr Maria Papathanassiou for these references.
