Avebury Stone #42 Left Side Marks Stars Left of Sagittarius in Ophiuchus Scorpio Ara + Center of the Galaxy

Avebury Stone #42 on its Left Side viewed henge-outward marks stars directly to the left of the stars in Sagittarius marked on the henge-outward frontal face of the stone. The Left Side represents stars in Ophiuchus, Scorpio and Ara.

The galactic center is part of the chair being held by the figure, which we interpret to mean that it symbolizes the "throne" of the center of the Milky Way Galaxy whose galactic center is located there.

Avebury Stone #42 Left Side Photograph

Avebury Stone #42 Left Side Photo Tracing

Avebury Stone #42 Left Side and its Corresponding Stars in Ophiuchus, Scorpio & Ara to the left of the stars of Sagittarius marked on the henge-outward facing front face

The head at the bottom would seem to signify the underworld of the deceased, who, as we know from Avebury Stone #10 and from our previous decipherment of the Stonehenge sarsens and stones, marked the destination (presumably presumed "origin") to which the souls of the deceased returned.

Avebury Stone #42 Right Side Looking Henge-Outward Marks Stars of Capricorn and Microscopium

The "Right Side" of Avebury Henge Stone #42 marks stars in Capricorn to the right of the stars of Sagittarius marked on the frontal henge-outward face of the stone. Indeed, as shown in the decipherment below, it includes the back end and the extension of the horse depicted on the henge-outward front face.

Our method of proceeding in deciphering Avebury Henge stones is to clip an appropriate section of one of the photographs of Avebury stones we made September, 2005, as in the clip below, and then to make a lighter version of that photograph to be able to see the lines more readily. A good example is the head at the bottom, which marks Microscopium below Capricorn....

Avebury Stone #42 Right Side (Viewed Henge Outwards)
(always click on an image to see if a larger, original view, exists)

Avebury Stone #42 Right Side Tracing and Corresponding Stars

Avebury Stone #42 Henge-Inward Marks the Stars of Aquila as an Eagle

The creators of Avebury are pretty consistent in the way that the megaliths at Avebury Henge were carved to represent stars.

The henge-outward face marks "outer" stars toward the Milky Way, Ecliptic and Celestial Equator. The henge-inward face marks stars toward the center of the starry heavens (i.e. North Ecliptic and North Celestial Poles). Those henge-inward stars are immediately "above" the henge-outward stars in the sky. The narrower "sides" of each stone mark stars to the respective sides of the stars previously identified on the henge-outward and henge-inward faces.

This is also true for Avebury Stone #42, where the henge-outward face marks the stars of Sagittarius. Accordingly, when we "decipher" the remaining sides of that megalith, we already "know" where in the heavens the appropriate stars are, though re-drawing the figures on stone is not always intuitively obvious, and it takes some work to figure out what the ancients were doing.

The henge-inward face of Avebury Stone #42 thus represents the stars of Aquila, the Eagle. The three images below show a photo clip of our original photograph of Avebury Stone #42, plus a tracing of the most prominent lines and markings on the stone via our zoom-enabled graphic software, and then the corresponding stars to the figures, lines and markings carved in stone, including the entire shape of the megalith itself.

Avebury Stone #42 Henge-Inward Face Our Photograph

Avebury Stone #42 Henge-Inward Face Photo Traced

Avebury Stone #42 Henge-Inward Corresponding Stars Aquila & Scutum

We forgot to circle the face in the lower left hand corner on the sky map.
Do you see it? Compare the stone and the sky map above.

Sagittarius Marked as a Horse and Rider on Avebury Stone #42 Henge-Outward Reminding Also of the Mythical Half-Man Half-Beast Chiron

Avebury Stone #42 has such a "strange shape" for a megalith.

How could prior researchers have missed examining the possible connection of the strange but to us "familiar" shape of Avebury Stone #42 to the stars of Sagittarius, the equestrian archer of old and the astronomical Chiron?

The fabled early shape of Sagittarius in the stars, according to Richard Hinckley Allen's Star Names was as half-man and half-steed, either originally or later as an archer on horseback, and found later in the Centaur Chiron.

Directly below are four images: the first is the front henge-outward face of Avebury Stone #42, the second image is the astronomical "teapot" asterism of Sagittarius, the third image is the first image traced and labeled, and the fourth is an image of the corresponding stars in sky as carved on the stone:

• Avebury Stone #42 Facing Henge-Outward (we have lightened our original photograph to make the lines and markings more apparent)

• The "Teapot" Asterism of Sagittarius - https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3a/Sagittarius-teapot-asterism.jpg, public domain as uploaded to Wikimedia, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Eoghanacht

• Avebury Stone #42 Frontal Face Henge-Outward Traced and Labeled (it is possible that our identified "saddle" is merely the rider's cloak)

• The Corresponding Stars to the Lines and Figures Carved on the Henge-Outward Frontal Face of Avebury Stone #42 (extended "tail" of the horse is carved further on the narrow side of the megalith)

We are pleased here to publish our decipherment of Avebury Stone #42, including the images above, which clearly demonstrate by lines, figures and markings on the carved stone and corresponding stars that:

• the henge-outward ("Milky Way directed") face of Avebury Stone #42 marks a steed and its rider (as the Sagittarius teapot "asterism"),
• the henge-inward face of Avebury Stone #42 marks the neighboring stars above Sagittarius (i.e. inward toward heaven's center), i.e. Aquila,
• the "right side" of Avebury Stone #42  (seen henge-outward) marks stars next to Sagittarius toward Capricorn, including the back end and tail of the Sagittarian steed (marked in stars we today assign to the region of the stars alpha and beta Capricorn), a tail similar in extension to the modern Sagittarian asterism of "the teaspoon" (see http://www.go-astronomy.com/constellations.php?Name=Sagittarius)
• the "left side" of Avebury Stone #42 (seen henge-outward) marks stars next to Sagittarius in the direction of Scorpio, including the portrayal of the center of the Milky Way Galaxy as a chair-type "throne" at the galactic center, whose design reminds of the throne of Minoan Knossos and generally recalls our work on the Phaistos Disk.

The other three sides of Avebury Stone #42 are deciphered in the immediately subsequent postings.