Commentary On Hamlet's Mill

New Astronomical Discovery sheds light on Hamlet’s Mill and ties Precession of the Equinox to Indian Yuga Cycle and Platonic Year

Hamlet's Mill is the much acclaimed work by Giorgio de Santillana, professor of history and science at MIT and and Hertha von Dechend, professor of history and science at University of Frankfurt. These highly respected scholars completed Hamlet’s Mill in 1969 and the worlds of archaeology and anthropology have never been the same.

The main idea behind the book, which includes a detailed study of myths and folklore from around the ancient world, is that myths are the scientific language of yore. More importantly, Hamlet’s Mill clearly shows that most of the universal myths, especially those that are duplicated from culture to culture and often do not make sense to the uninitiated, are about astronomical phenomena. At the time of publication, this was a surprising fact to most traditional archaeologists and anthropologists who assumed ancient man was too primitive to understand complex astronomy. The truth is most traditional archaeologists today understand the subtleties of astronomy even less than the ancients! Fortunately, in addition to Hamlet’s Mill there have been a number of excellent books published on the topic of “archaeoatronomy” and hence the field is recently growing in acceptance.

One of the main themes of the book is that the phenomenon known as precession of the equinox (the Earths changing orientation to inertial space as measured at the time of the equinox) was well understood in the ancient world. Moreover it seemed to be a favorite topic of ancient peoples. Many of the old myths compared the Earth to a large mill, whereby the equinoctial point of the earth slowly precesses through the zodiac, thus clearly describing the main observable of precession.

The brillance of de Santillana and von Dechend was in understanding the significance of this cross cultural myth (that it is a scientific language dealing with astronomy), and pointing out the universal importance the ancients attached to the phenomenon of precession. But they were unable to discover “why” the ancients put so much emphasis on precession. However, in the thirty plus years since Hamlet’s Mill was published there have been a number of scholars that have done original research on solar system enigma’s and the precession phenomena. Recent papers and published work by the Binary Research Institute, Italian scientist Carlo Santagata, and the Sirius Resesarch Group out of Canada seem to show that precession is due to the Suns motion not lunisolar forces as originally postulated by Newton. If these findings are correct it is clear there may be an even larger importance attached to the mythic Mill story than that envisioned by de Santillana and von Dechend. It indicates the underlying reason why the ancients were so adamant about preserving knowledge of precession is that it is not just due to a wobbling earth, but to a motion of the solar system as fundamental as the spinning motion that produces a day and the revolving motion that produces a year: it is the celestial underpinning of a huge chronology system as reliable as the clock or the calendar. Moreover, ancient cultures associated this cyclical motion with a gradual rise and fall of civilization over eons of time. They implied that the celestial motion had some biological and psychological effect upon mankind, equivalent to the day and night effect of a spinning earth and the seasonal effect of a tilted earth revolving round the Sun. Examine these words by mythic Amlodhi, owner of a great Mill, to paraphrase: “In those ancient times it ground out peace and plenty. Later, however, in decaying days, it ground out only salt. Now at the bottom of the sea, it grinds rock and sand, and has created a vast whirlpool, Maelstrom, which leads to the land of the dead.”

De Santillana and von Dechend try gallantly to figure out the significance of the Mill but only scratch the surface. The Mill of course is the precession of the equinox, which the authors understood. What they could not understand, because it is was not yet known to western science, is that precession (in the most likely new theory) is caused by the Sun traveling around a companion star, which causes the earth to geometrically precess relative to inertial space. It is this celestial motion that is the “Mill” behind the Yuga cycle or Plato’s Great Year, whereby it is said that mankind and civilization itself waxes and wanes between the ages of enlightenment (the Golden Age) and the dark ages. Just as the spinning Earth causes night and day, and the tilted Earth going round the Sun causes the seasons, so too does the grand cycle, and the indirect influence of our binary companion cause a type of long term seasonality which effects everything on earth just as much as night or day or the seasons. At the time that Amlodhi is telling his story the world is near the bottom of the Kali yuga, or darkest age (approx 500AD), the world is “at the bottom of the sea” so to speak. He related that it had been in a declining phase for many many years, that once it had “ground out peace and plenty” (in the higher ages), then “salt” a less valuable but still useful commodity, and finally “rock and sand” something of no value. He was describing the 12,000-year descending Yuga phase when things gradually deteriorate on Earth, and was telling the story from the point of view of someone near the bottom of the cycle.

The great ancient civilizations of Mesopotamia, ancient Egypt, ancient India, the little understood megalithic culture, the lost Mayan civilization, etc. all apparently knew of the Earth’s third motion and its significant implications. They left us hints of their knowledge in the structure of their buildings and temples that reveal an unusual awareness of celestial mechanics and enable a calculation of the precessing equinox. These and other ancient, higher age civilizations, also left us the many myths that de Santillana and von Dechend so carefully document. If the ancients could talk in our modern language they would probably say:

People of the “modern ” earth awaken, there is nothing to fear, we are moving out of the darkest age into the light of a higher age. Just as a day waxes and wanes due to the spinning motion of the earth, bringing with the rising sun vitality to every man, and just as the tilted Earth experiences the splendor of the seasons simply by revolving around the Sun, and this brings annual renewal to plants and animals and all things living, so too is there an even larger cycle, also based on a celestial movement which also brings renewal to the planet. It is the Earth’s third motion. The first motion of the earth takes 24 hours, we call it a day and it only involves one body, the earth spinning on its own axis. The second motion takes a year and involves two bodies, the Earth and the Sun around which the Earth revolves. The third motion, involves three bodies and takes longer still. Yes the pole star does change, it was Thuban, it is now Polaris and will eventually be Vega (when you will not need these words). Yes, the earth does change orientation to inertial space at the current rate of about 50 arc seconds annually. But it will speed up as we approach our companion star. This phenomena is caused by the Earth slowly changing its orientation as the Sun and solar system gently curve through space. Just as the very short cycle of a day is caused by one body motion, and the intermediate cycle of the year is caused by two body motion, you will soon see the Earths changing orientation to space is caused by a three body motion: the Sun in 24,000 years revolving around its companion which turns the Earth as it goes.

You might wonder why I say precession is a 24,000-year cycle when the current rate is only 50.29 arc seconds of movement per year, which equates to a cycle time now computed at about 25,770 years in 2002. It is because the Sun’s orbit around its binary center of mass is an elliptical orbit as are all orbits of bodies in motion. Because we are now leaving the farthest point from our companion star, apoapsis, we are slowly accelerating, this is why the precession “rate” seems to increase each year. Essentially the orbit follows Kepler’s laws and we speed up and slow down depending on whether the two masses are moving farther apart (slowing) or closer together (speeding up). The rate was near 25,920 years at the bottom of the cycle, and it will go much faster as we near periapsis, the Golden Age. Overall, it will take about 24,000 years to return to the same position as today.

It is a microcosm of this complete cycle that the Mesopotamian, Egyptian and Incan cultures used to divide a day on which our modern time system is based. Just as the day at the time of equinox averages 12 hours of ascending light (am) and 12 hours of descending light (pm) so does it mimic the Great Year made of 12,000 years ascending, and 12,000 years descending. This time keeping system was one more way in which the ancients sought to impart higher knowledge to the inevitable lower age to follow.

We left apoapsis, the farthest point from our binary companion, about 1500 years ago. This always coincides with the low point of the dark ages, which most recently was around 498AD. Like the solstice the planet takes a while to notice the effects of the ascending phase. Progress was slight during the ascending Kali Yuga but you might have noticed a quickening in the world, at the time of the renaissance when we entered the dwapara yuga, the electrical age. Think about that word renaissance, it does not describe a strictly Darwinian world that is linearly evolving; it means a renewal of something that once was. This is the nature of the Yuga cycle, whereby the “Ages of Man”; Taurus, Pisces, Aquarius, etc. represent the changing seasons of the Great Year.

The world was once populated with many great ancient civilizations the wonders of which modern archaeology has barely discovered. They are beginning to realize the farther back we go towards the last great golden age the more amazing the level of culture. The Greeks were more artistic and more civil than the Romans, the last great civilization to die out before the depths of the dark age. The Egyptians were more advanced than the Greeks who had access to the library of Alexandria and profound astronomical knowledge. The Akkadian culture more advanced than the Babylonians, and the people of Sumeria more advanced than any of the Mesopotamian civilizations that came after it. Do you see the trend? Civilization became darker as we left our companion star, just as the day grows darker as we leave noon, or the year grows darker and less productive as we leave the summer solstice. It is not meant to hurt us, it is a renewal process, based on a celestial cycle. It is the way the universe works; moons revolving round planets, planets revolving round stars, stars taking companions and revolving round them, and all of these producing an ebb and flow of tides, and light and darkness and powerful forces man is yet to become acquainted with. Ancient man, in the higher ages knew these things and much more. Seeing the age was waning, memories fading, he tried to preserve knowledge in myths and folklore, the alignment of great stones, the shafts, geometry and orientation of pyramids, but most of the knowledge was drowned out in the “maelstrom” of the darkest age.

Soon huge new discoveries of ancient man will be made and once again the time of “civilized man” will be pushed back. In this great electrical age, the Dwapara Yuga, we are rapidly developing the technology to find things under the sea, to date things to their true period, to piece together and understand things that were incomprehensible only a few hundred years ago. Mankind is slowly awakening again.

The Yuga cycle today is largely misinterpreted due to errors that crept into the calculation at the beginning of the last Kali yuga. Consequently, the yugas are now thought to be absurdly long periods of time which are of little value to man and do not conform to the archaeological record. The error is in their multiplication as divine years. Without this error each yuga falls neatly into the equinoctial cycle of 24,000 years.

So do not fear the future, for the times you are in may still seem dark but the dawning of a higher age is at hand. Enjoy every day, every season, and every life as you incarnate throughout the Great Year.