Solar eclipse in 1097 may be rock-carving subject

By Emily Schwing

導讀:古人的智慧有時我們不得不佩服，比如埃及金字塔、空中花園，即使那個時候什么工具也沒有，但是古人仍然能夠通過其他方式向我們展現那個時候的文明。

More than 900 years ago,the Pueblo people were thriving in New Mexico’s Chaco Canyon.While they were there,the region experienced what the whole country is looking forward to on August 21st:a total solar eclipse.Theirs took place in the year 1097，and they may have left a record of the event.

“I spotted this very peculiar petroglyph,which was a round object.”

Kim Malville is a retired Solar Astronomer from the University of Colorado Boulder.In 1992,he and colleagues were leading a field course in Chaco Canyon when he noticed a unique carving on the south side of a rock.

“It was a round object with loops coming out of it,and it struck me as maybe this was an image of the sun with the corona in a very active state.And maybe at that time,there is

900多年前，普韋布洛人在新墨西哥州查科峽谷過著繁榮昌盛的生活。那時在查科峽谷的人們也經歷了類似整個美國都在翹首以盼的8月21日的日全食。那次日全食發生在1097年，普韋布洛人可能留下了日全食的記錄。

“我發現了一個非常奇特的巖石雕刻，上面是一個圓形物體。”

金·馬勒維爾是科羅拉多大學博爾德分校一位已退休的太陽天文學家。1992年，他和同事在查科峽谷地區進行實地考察時，他注意到一塊石巖的南側有一個獨特的雕刻。

“那是一個圓形物體，周圍有圓環，這讓我感到震驚，因為這可能是太陽日冕處于非常活躍狀態時的圖像。也許當時發生了日冕物質拋射。”

日冕物質拋射是在太陽耀斑的作用下，巨型等離子云盤旋轉逃脫太陽表面的現象。“我們對巖石雕刻進行了具體解釋，不過這個解釋也過于武斷，我們需要確切的證據來證實。”不過，馬勒維爾明白這確實是一個有待于證實的假設。what is known as a coronal mass ejection.”

That’s when a giant cloud of plasma spirals off the sun’s surface because of a solar flare. “It was somewhat foolhardy I suppose,on our part to suggest a particular explanation for it.”But Malville knew that he had a testable hypothesis.

Astronomers knew that the region had a total solar eclipse on July 11,1097.During the brief darkness,the sun’s corona would have been visible.Solar activity increases and decreases on a roughly 11-year cycle,so Malville used various historic records to find out what was happening in 1097.

“And all of these indicated that in 1097,the sun was indeed in a state of very high activity and thus,we couldn’t prove that this was actually an image of the corona,but we could not falsify our hypothesis.”

In another portion of Chaco Canyon,a pictograph high on an overhang has been interpreted as marking a supernova explosion in 1054.Below that,a pictograph may mark the sighting of Hailey’s Comet in 1066.

“And all three of them may have played a role in intensifying people’s interest in the heavens and looking at the heavens very carefully.”

It is exactly what millions of current residents will be doing during solar eclipse over North America.

天文學家都知道查科峽谷在1097年7月11日發生了日全食。在那短暫的黑暗期間，太陽日冕應該可見。太陽活動的增減周期約為11年，因此，馬勒維爾利用各種歷史記錄來查證1097年到底發生了什么。

“所有記錄都表明，1097年太陽的確處于非常活躍的狀態，但我們無法就此證明巖石上的形象就是日冕，但是我們也不能輕易否認自己的假設。”

在查科峽谷另一處，懸崖高處的象形文字經翻譯后，發現是記錄1054年發生的超新星爆炸事件。其下方的象形文字則可能記錄的是1066年哈雷彗星經過地球的景象。

“這三幅壁畫可能在提高人們對天空的興趣方面發揮了一定作用，讓人們更仔細地觀察天空。”

而這正是北美洲日全食期間，數百萬名居民會做的事。