Archaeoastronomy: The Astronomy of Civilizations Past

Archaeoastronomy can be defined as “the study of how people in the past have understood the phenomena in the sky, how they have used these phenomena, and what role the sky played in their cultures”. University of Leicester archaeoastronomer Clive Ruggles has described it as “a field with academic work of high quality at one end, but uncontrolled speculation bordering on lunacy at the other”. This illustrated, non-technical presentation will highlight examples from both the Old World and the New World. Presenter John Percy is a Professor Emeritus of Astronomy & Astrophysics, and of Science Education at the University of Toronto, and an Associate of the Dunlap Institute. He has a longstanding interest in this and other interdisciplinary aspects of astronomy.The Zoom link will be shared closer to the event date!