Tanum Petroglyphs of Sweden (Norway) Deciphered as Astronomy : A Gigantic 70 Square Kilometer Planisphere of the Heavens - LexiLine Journal 449

This is probably one of the most sensational postings I shall ever make on LexiLine.

It presents my decipherment - of a ca. 6 kilometer by 12 kilometer expanse of land in Sweden - filled with petroglyphs - as an ancient sky map of the heavens.

I shall be presenting a paper about this in May this year in Horn / Bad Meinberg, Germany at the Machalett Conference [since then reconstituted and renamed as Der Forschungskreis Externsteine e. V.], so that this presentation just contains the basics.

It was 30 years ago in the year 1977 that I first visited the petroglyphs (rock drawings) of Tanum, Sweden, which formerly belonged to Norway (until the year 1658) and which were declared a World Heritage Site in 1994.

I greet especially the family Johansson in the rural outskirts of Uddevalla (Sweden), who allowed us to camp in their front yard, the family Digernes in Digernes (Norway) who showed us how farming in Norway was a bit more difficult than in Minnesota and the family Wegner in Sandefjord (Norway), who invited us into their comfortable home after some rough days in Norway's mountains, including climbing a glacier in Jotunheimen, where I lost one pair of glasses in a crevice in the glacier, and then broke one of the lenses on my only spare spectacles soon thereafter while still in the glacier, so that I had to climb down the glacier half-blind. But we made it. We thank also all those unnamed here who provided us with great hospitality during our one-month camping tour of Norway and Sweden. The vast expense of Vänern Lake, one of the largest lakes in Europe, bathing in near ice in Lom, waking up in August to snow and to giant elks nibbling breakfast right in front of our car, and 30 days camped out "in the wilderness" remain indelibly forever in memory.

Tanum, which is located in Tanumshede, Västra Götaland (historically Bohuslän), is about a two-hour drive north of Göteborg (Gothenburg). Tanum was not well known internationally in 1977, in spite of over 1500, in part gigantic, rock drawings.

It was at Tanum that my interest in ancient megalithic cultures and prehistoric rock drawings and cave paintings really began. At that time I was 30 years old and in the very strength of the prime of life and I could simply not understand that the archaeologists of this world were unable to decipher such a vast expanse of petroglyphs. Surely they could not claim that they did not have enough material available. But over the next 30 years, I too was not able to decipher the entire site either. Until this year. Only at Fossum had I previously made decipherment headway, but Fossum was only one small part of this gigantic complex of petroglyphs.

Tanum includes the following petroglyphic locations covering something like 70 square kilometers of countryside: Vitlycke (where the museum is located), Tanum, Tegneby, Aspeberget, Gerum, Ryland, Oppen, Slänge, Varlös, Fossum, Lycke, Hoghem, Västerby, Ljungby, Tuvene, Litsleby, Kyrkoryk, Orrekläpp, Rungstung, Satetorp, Ryk, Tyft, Hovtorp, Björneröd, Bergslycke, Kalleby and Trättelanda.

The map of Tanum at the World Heritage Site which I used for my decipherment was the key to my success. Without such a complete overview of the area, the decipherment would be impossible, so that the archaeologists are here not to be faulted too severely for keeping their at times blindered attention focused on individual petroglyphs or small groups of petroglyphs.

And yet, it is the entire complex of petroglyphs which builds the secret to this enormous site, for these petroglyphs represent the stars of the heavens, and multiple petroglyphs in clusters represent constellations of stars known to us today.

One cannot escape the feeling at Tanum that what we are witnessing here is the birth of astronomy among the ancient seafarers who needed a knowledge of the stars for navigation and who formed these constellations for practical purposes. No wonder there are so many boats (ancient ships) represented in the petroglyphic figures - to the seafaring ancients, the night sky was a sea of stars. I really think that this might be the location at which our modern stellar constellations may have been initially created by European man for purposes of seafaring travel.

There are many proofs that this decipherment is correct, but I will not bring them all here today. I will bring them in May when I present a long paper in German to the Machalett Study Group on Prehistory and Early History [since then reconstituted and renamed as Der Forschungskreis Externsteine e. V.],.

Here is the decipherment, copyright © by Andis Kaulins. What this means is that you can use my graphic for non-commercial purposes provided you give attribution that I am the discoverer. You can not use this graphic for commercial purposes. Of course, anyone is free to make their own graphic, based on my discovery, and use that as they wish, non-commercially or commercially, provided that they attribute this knowledge to me as the discoverer. Thank you.




The Decipherment of the Tanum Petroglyphs by Andis Kaulins 2007