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20-416: Fajada Butte (Banded Butte) rises 135 meters above the canyon floor. Although there is no water source on the butte, there are ruins of small cliff dwellings in the higher regions of the butte. Analysis of fragments of pottery found on Fajada show that these structures were used between the 10th to 13th centuries. The remains of a 95-meter-high, 230-meter-long ramp are evident on the southwestern face of

40-906: A cliff, as are the Mogao Caves in China. Famous cliff dwellings are found around the world. In China, the Guyaju Caves located near Dongmenying , Yanqing District , Beijing are a cave complex of many rock hewn dwellings that form a community. In the United States and Mexico, among the canyons of the southwest, in Arizona , New Mexico , Utah , Colorado , and Chihuahua , some cliff dwellings are still used by Native Americans . There has been considerable discussion as to their antiquity, but modern research finds no definite justification for assigning them to an earlier culture distinct from

60-638: A concern with the lunar standstill cycle in the historic pueblos (Zeilik 1985, pp. S80-4). He also noted that contemporary pueblo horizon observations achieve greater precision than that possible using the sun-dagger site, leading him to conclude that the Sun Dagger site may have been a sun shrine , but would not have functioned well to regulate the solar calendar (Zeilik 1985, pp. S71, S77–S80). Cliff dwelling In archaeology , cliff dwellings are dwellings formed by using niches or caves in high cliffs , and sometimes with excavation or additions in

80-789: A larger site, such as Konark . The Temple of the Sun in Beijing , China , was built in 1530 during the Ming dynasty by the Jiajing Emperor , together with new temples dedicated to the Earth and the Moon , and an expansion of the Temple of Heaven . The Temple of the Sun was used by the imperial court for elaborate acts of worship involving fasting, prayers, dancing and animal sacrifices, as part of

100-514: A short distance below the Sun Dagger site, five petroglyphs are also marked by visually compelling patterns of shadow and light that indicate solar noon distinctively at the solstices and equinoxes (Sofaer and Sinclair 1987, p. 59). It has been noted, however, that these five noontime events are essentially the number one would expect by chance (McCluskey 1988, p. S69). In the 1980s the National Park Service closed off access to

120-508: A year-long cycle of ceremonies involving all the temples. An important element was the colour red, which was associated with the Sun, including red utensils for food and wine offerings, and red clothes for the emperor to wear during the ceremonies. The temple is now part of a public park. In ancient Egypt , there were a number of sun temples. Among these old monuments is the Great Temple of Ramses at Abu Simbel, and complexes built by

140-499: Is a building used for religious or spiritual activities, such as prayer and sacrifice, dedicated to the sun or a solar deity . Such temples were built by a number different cultures and are distributed around the world including in India , China , Egypt , Japan and Peru . Some of the temples are in ruins, undergoing excavation , preservation or restoration and a few are listed as World Heritage Sites individually or as part of

160-655: The Eastern Ganga Dynasty . Surya was an important deity in early Hinduism, but sun worship largely declined as a principal deity around the 12th century. In Manipuri mythology , the sun god Korouhanba is the synonym of the Hindu deity Surya . Other Surya or sun temples in the Indian subcontinent include: The following are Pre-Columbian temples of Inti (the Inca god Sun): There are also sun temple sites in

180-533: The Fifth Dynasty , of which only two examples survive, that of Userkaf and of Niuserre . The Fifth Dynasty temples usually had three components, a main temple building at a higher elevation, accessed by a causeway, from a much smaller entrance building. In 2006, archaeologists found ruins underneath a market in Cairo, which could possibly be the largest temple built by Ramesses II . The sun temples of

200-719: The Indian subcontinent are dedicated to the Hindu deity Surya , with the most prominent among them being the Konark Sun Temple (also known as the Black Pagoda ), a UNESCO World Heritage Site . at Konark in Odisha and the Sun Temple at Modhera , Gujarat , built in 1026–1027. Both are now ruins, having been destroyed by invading Muslim armies . Konark was constructed around 1250, by Narasimhadeva I of

220-498: The ancestors of the modern Pueblo people . The area in which they occur coincides with that in which other traces of the Pueblo tribes have been found. The niches that were used are often of considerable size, occurring in cliffs up to a thousand feet in height, and approached by rock steps or log ladders. [REDACTED] Media related to Cliff dwellings at Wikimedia Commons Sun temple A sun temple (or solar temple )

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240-465: The butte (Ford 1993, p. 478). The magnitude of this building project, without an apparent utilitarian purpose, indicates that Fajada Butte may have had considerable ceremonial importance for the Chacoan people. In 1977 the artist Anna Sofaer visited Chaco Canyon as a volunteer recording rock art. There she recorded petroglyphs on Fajada Butte at what is now called the Sun Dagger site, now perhaps

260-406: The butte due to the delicate nature of the site and the damage and erosion caused by tourism. Studies by Sofaer's Solstice Project suggest that the major buildings of the ancient Chacoan culture of New Mexico also contain solar and lunar cosmology in three separate articulations: their orientations, internal geometry, and geographic interrelationships were developed in relationship to the cycles of

280-427: The larger of the two spirals (Sofaer, Zinser and Sinclair 1979, p. 285). Similar sun daggers mark the winter solstice and equinoxes {Sofaer, Zinser and Sinclair 1979, p. 286} At one extreme in the moon's eighteen- to nineteen-year cycle (the lunar minor standstill ), a shadow bisects the larger spiral just as the moon rises; and at its other extreme, nine-and-a-half years later (the lunar major standstill),

300-478: The most famous site in Chaco Canyon, located at a southeastern facing cliff near the top of Fajada Butte. She noted three large stone slabs leaning against the cliff which channel light and shadow markings onto two spiral petroglyphs on the cliff wall. On her second visit she saw a "dagger of light" bisecting one of the spirals. At about 11:15 am. on the summer solstice a dagger-shaped light form pierces

320-450: The shadow of the rising moon falls on the left edge of the larger spiral.(Sofaer, Sinclair and Doggett 1982, p. 43) In each case these shadows align with pecked grooves (Sofaer and Sinclair 1987, pp. 48 – 59). Due to one of the slabs settling, the "dagger of light" no longer crosses through the center of the spiral during the summer solstice. Public access to the butte was curtailed when, in 1989, erosion from modern foot traffic

340-499: The sun and moon (Sofaer 2007, p. 225). There are several issues surrounding this site. One is when the two spirals were pecked into the walls, some scholars suggesting it "postdates the height of the Chaco tradition". Another is its importance. Although other solar observatories constructed by the Pueblo people predict solar events by the movement of the light over a period of time, this one does not. It has also been suggested that it

360-606: The way of masonry. Two special types of cliff dwelling are distinguished by archaeologists: the cliff-house , which is actually built on levels in the cliff, and the cavate , which is dug out, by using natural recesses or openings. Rock-cut architecture generally refers to rather grander temples, but also tombs, cut into rock, although for example the Ajanta Caves in India, of the 2nd century BCE to 5th century CE, probably housed several hundred Buddhist monks and are cut into

380-449: Was found to be responsible for one of the three screening slabs at the "Sun Dagger" site shifting out of its ancient position. Because of that shift, the assemblage of stones has lost some of its former spatial and temporal precision as a solar and lunar calendar. In 1990 the screens were stabilized and placed under observation, but the wayward slab was not moved back into its original orientation. At two other sites on Fajada Butte, located

400-420: Was not built but that those who made the inscriptions were using a convenient existing fall of rock (Kantner 2004, p.99). Critics generally agree that the light and shadow phenomena at the site were intended to mark the arrival of the sun at the solstices and equinoxes (Carlson 1987, pp. 86-7; Zeilik 1985, p. S84). There is less agreement on the lunar phenomena; Michael Zeilik found no ethnographic evidence for

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