Marduk Wrote:
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> you have the opinion of one person
False. Kat has *quoted* the opinion of one person. It is not only the opinion of the acknowledged authority ("acknowledged" as in "acknowledged by those who know anything non-trivial about it") on the subject, but that of a number of other knowledgeable people, several of whom have tried to pick holes in it!
> so what he's saying is that venus appears in the
> windows on the north and east sides
No, that is *not* what he is saying. It may be what you would *like* him to be saying, but that's not quite the same thing. He specifically mentions Cytherean
standstills and
narrow shaftlike windows. The windows are entirely consistent with being sights for Cytherean standstills. AFAIK nobody has suggested any other astronomical horizon event with which they are consistent.
In addition, a preoccupation with Venus is demonstrated in many places; AFAIK no serious scholar doubts that Venus was the most significant astronomical body after the Sun. For example there are legends, there is the
Dresden Codex to which Aveni alludes in the piece that Kat quoted, the
Vienna Codex and, possibly most significant in teh context of this thread, buildings in Chichen Itza (one of which has five rain-god masks, with Venus-symbols under the eyes, facing the Caracol). Groups of five masks with Venus-symbols are common. If you wish to portray a
lack of preoccupation with Venus, you have a tremendous number of consistencies to explain away.
The one bit of Aveni's interpretation that is perhaps contentious is his interpretation of the significance of the dot-and-bar 8s that occur above mask eyes. He favours the interpretation that it represents the 8-day (mean) disappearances of Venus from the skies; this is entirely possible, but also possible is that it represents the 8-year cycle of the Cytherean horizon extremes.
If you have another scenario that is consistent with all that is attributed to a Cytherean connection, we shoul dperhaps hear it. As yet, you have not presented it.
--
Stephen
