Did The Vikings Use a Solar Stone Crystal to Navigate Cloudy Seas?
Vikings dominated the North Atlantic seas for at least 300 years, but how did they sail across great distances with incredible accuracy, without a magnetic compass? A long-held theory about Vikings using crystals for navigation may have been proven true with modern science.
The Vikings, the great north seamen, sailed from Norway to Greenland and many parts in between. They were known to have amazing maritime navigation skills, by using the sun to plot their position on the globe. But scientists have wondered for years how they could navigate when they couldn’t see the Sun. Enter the sunstone, or solar sign, a crystal that when held up to a cloudy sky, can help to locate the Sun.
For years the use of Sunstones has been nothing but a theory based on a legend. Such as this mention in the tale Rauðúlfs þáttr:
“The king made people look out and they could nowhere see a clear sky. Then he asked Sigurður to tell where the sun was at that time. He gave a clear assertion. Then the king made them fetch the solar stone and held it up and saw where the light radiated from the stone and thus directly verified Sigurður’s prediction.”
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Teotihuacán: City of the Gods or Ancient Spaceport?
The time: The first century. The place: Teotihuacán, one of the largest Mayan cities in ancient Mexico. Its name means “City of the Gods,” or “the place where men become gods.” Despite the ancient time period, the civilization was a bustling metropolis, housing sophisticated infrastructure, engineering, and technology.
Suddenly, the residents of the great city disappeared in 7 A.D., leaving behind their once-thriving civilization. Where did they go, and why? No one is entirely sure of what happened, but a few key pieces of evidence tell us that the residents of Teotihuacán were more advanced than once thought.
Both mica and mercury — minerals that play an integral role in today’s aerospace industry — have been discovered in Teotihuacán’s ruins. Is it possible that the city’s residents departed their beloved city to establish breakaway civilizations elsewhere?
Other questions arise concerning the ruins that were left behind. The Teotihuacán pyramids turn out to be very similar to the ancient pyramids found in Egypt. How and why did that happen? The Mayans left behind mysteries that scientists, archeologists, historians, and interested people are still trying to unravel even after all these years.
