Discovered through aerial photography of a wheat field whose cropmarks were particularly visible due to recent drought conditions in the 1990s and not disclosed to the public until archeological excavations were completed—having drawn the lesson from the nearby artefact, the
Nebra Skydisk—in 2003, the Goseck Circle is a Neolithic enclosure, approaching seven thousand years in age and the oldest such solar observatory known in Europe. The reconstructed alignment just a few kilometres north of Naumburg near the confluence of the Unstrut and the Saale consists of wooden posts following the concentric rings of the structure’s foundations and has openings that mark sunrise and sunset on the summer and winter solstices. A tourism route, Himmelswege, links the circle to the Himmelsscheibe von Nebra and other astronomical archeological sites in Saxon-Anhalt.
The village also has an impressive eleventh century palace, built on the grounds of a secularised (previously
here and
here) Benedictine monastery, with the castle church dating back to its original founding.
On the way back to the campsite, we stopped at the main city of the region, Naumburg (
previously), established in 1012 by the Margrave of Meissen at the crossroads of two important trade-routes, the
Via Regia and the Regensburg Road and took in some more impressions of the Naumburger Dom Sts Peter und Paul and market square. The tenth century Late-Romanesque cathedral became the first see of a German Protestant bishop, remaining an evangelical parish to the present, in the course of the Reformation in 1542, whose later Gothic embellishments, including architectural and figural elements by an anonymous mason known only as the Master of Naumburg, have earned it a place on the UNESCO’s register of World Heritage.
synchronoptica
one year ago: reprogramming government funding to dull the public pain of the US government shutdown (with synchronoptica), penmanship instruction plus more oblique strategies
two years ago: university commas, Peabody visual aides, an out-of-season bloom plus Dungeons & Dragons as group therapy
three years ago: assorted links to revisit plus unlucky thirteen
four years ago: another MST3K classic, the world’s first personal data protection law plus assorted links to revisit
five years ago: your daily demon: Focalor, The Style Council plus a psychedelic design collective
six years ago: a fashion show with puppets plus Witchtok community doing the Lord’s Work
seven years ago: the introduction of the Ampelmรคnnchen (1961), more links to enjoy plus more mushroom finds
eight years ago: democracy by lottery, vintage Sainsbury’s packaging plus a music video from Bob Sinclar
