(paper presented at the General Studies Journal of the island of La Palma, 2008)
The mystic San Juan de La Cruz pointed out that to go where no one knows, is to go where no known, since the beaten path leading to more predictable or dead ends. Also, the visionary Dee Hock warned that the problem is not ways to bring innovative ideas in your head, but as free from the old.
The first look at the prehistory of the Canary Islands was put, among others, historians, geographers, travelers, Catalan, Portuguese, Genoese, Arab conquerors and, finally, the rationalist and romantic writers of the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, much before the weight of the publications fall exclusively on the backs of academic archeology. After a few years from the prolific 1960's, the lack of continuity in the last twenty years has led to a situation of need when interpreting the works. At least the island of La Palma, has only been a comfortable archeology surveys, some very specific excavations with excellent results and especially archaeological charts by municipalities, without further deliberation. In this sense, knowledge is reduced inventories and a knowledge of the individual human being (as subject) and was never a knowledge of the human being as a whole. This does not mean it is not important, but not enough. Therefore, we dare to assert, categorically, that archeology has failed in the attempt to provide answers to key questions that presents our distant past. Its working methods are very rigid and outdated. We need, at least one small revolution.
In this intricate world of archeology, as in other branches of research, each going his own way, turning their research into "timeless", immune to change. They are still harboring the same proposals that advocated for over two and three decades. With them, obviously, has stopped the scientific imagination. Still doing the same thing all the time, the method has not changed and therefore there is no learning. It's that simple. Therefore, archeology has become a matter of personal interpretation, in a territorial ownership or mute rejecting what some outside interference by people who they believe they do not know the peculiarities of insular prehistory. Behind there is only one interest of personal prestige, against our interest.
The first approach to prehistory treatment at the University was fully structured in some models of rational knowledge experienced by the teachers themselves, whose views are transmitted to us as icons of scientific continuity. We are left with the conviction that knowledge about the prehistoric era as reported to us.
Tamarahoya
When we started our research we track doing what was being done, without considering any self-criticism. We could not leave a record preset working conditions and interpretation. Very little could contribute and nothing really important, just the prospect of little places inspected, inventoried (with chips) new engravings stations, canals and cups, piles of stones, pottery remains available, stone, bone-filled cave archaeological, etc.
not know exactly when we started to be interested in issues allegedly unfit to explore prehistoric. The investigation came alone, with the rhythm of the very need to address the ancient society of the island of La Palma, taking small steps with forays into other allegedly related sciences and others less so. The multidisciplinary approach allowed us to open new avenues and research led us in ways unforeseen by taking marginal positions in the scientific insight. Since then, we started to take items in any discipline that gives us knowledge and conjugate, after a decade, a new end product of classification impossible in Western academic circles, adapted to the island of La Palma. So where to put this new material? The answer is difficult because no specific science can be comprehended. It is a part of all, without being genuinely no. Therefore, after several years looking for a location that summarizes the objectives overall, we conclude from joining three words connected to propose a new scientific intervention: Prehistoric Astronomical position (PREP).
"If we want to study the material remains only have to look very closely, but to study a material element of a religious nature must learn to direct the light in the distance." This is one of our mottos of work since we created the "Association Irueña La Palma" and start with real intensity, a self-examination, differential field to date have examined by investigators. The book "Abora" published in 2006, marked the beginning of a new analysis of prehistoric studies in the Canaries. Followed the creation of three posts * 1 where we deliver, in an accessible and free, the results of the inquiries that have occurred. The work ahead is demanding but encouraging. Position
Prehistory Astronomical created with the aim of interpretation in the slippery world of religiosity. Proposes to begin the search for basic religion of prehistoric peoples canaries. Priority is to demonstrate the connection between the position in which the components are sacred (Piles of stones, channels, and bowls, rock carvings) and the stars, especially the Sun and the Moon. From here, no one imagines the world so complex that we found. Only those who wanted to come have demonstrated the close relationship that awara (ancient inhabitants of La Palma) established with the cosmos. After touring the island, we have a very clear conviction that religion is awara is based on a reality that was expressed at high altitude.
When we find something in a dark room, the first thing we do is light a light bulb but do not look all the time and waste time in describing it from all angles, shapes, size, material that is made, etc, etc. what we do is look at everything that we can see the light. What has made the archeology? Look at the bulb. The same has happened with the structures and sacred symbols. PREP has looked up and found the answers in the sky (specifically the Sun and the Moon) and now beginning to understand the depths of human knowledge and to respond to the location of prehistoric sites.
The fact that these astronomical phenomena have been referred by different human groups, allows us to compare these different perspectives, learn a lot about the societies that created them. One of the major obstacles to developing this important perspective has been little serious study of those who, attracted by the interesting theme, have dedicated themselves to indulge their wildest fantasies. In these cases, the fascination with the "hidden", the desire to impress and fashion, hinder the real work and disregard for the cultures and peoples supposedly studied (www.fcaglp.unlp.edu.ar/ ~ sixto / tonnage / index. htm).
Humans can not live without gods, like the earth without heaven. Understanding how it behaves the sky was already a form of worship. One of his expressions was to bring every human work in harmony with the principles of natural order spatial and temporal derivatives of movement of the stars. "... The sun, moon, sky, mountains, sea, winds, in a word, the great cosmic forces were the first to be elevated to that dignity ... are certain cosmic events which would have constituted the starting point of religious evolution "(Emile Durkheim, 1992) * 2.
For the observer of nature is obvious that the only way to establish permanent addresses in the landscape across the sky. The apparent motion of the celestial north clearly defined by the position of the Earth's rotation axis projected on the plane of the sky. The rotation provides east-west directions, that are already identified as points of departure and sunset.
the beginning of the investigation of error panic, that the line drawn is not correct. The field work was intense revisiting known sites now analyzed from another perspective, with the compass and GPS as primary tools. Then return to the same places at key times of the year (the solstices and equinoxes) for confirmation. After many sunrises and sunsets, hours and miles traveled, drew up the first statistic in 2006. The surprising results dispelled any fears. We found the key that takes us into their religious thought. We can prove.
This has only just begun. In this long distance race are prepared and resigned to endure the lack of interest and the rejection by most archaeologists that ignorance does not want to know about news. It's about time.
We must understand that science is all around us. So to make progress is to use the mind, reflect and experiment. PREPA has just opened a new field for prehistoric science. It is extremely attractive, very practical, because the field is the essence of research. Share the experiences of other sciences, not only social. Both the theory and practice are oriented beyond ethnocentrism and presents a wider possibility that the specific description of archeology. Even cultural comparison, as rejected by archaeologists, is for us a primary source of understanding of ancient thought. The results guarantee us to elevate to the level of discipline, but has no academic status.
material culture is a key element, you have to do is understand in a broader sense, as the hidden objects, besides the functional sense, another sense of signs and symbols that has been neglected by archaeologists. A petroglyph is something that comes to us mediated symbolically interpreted not revealed because his message is encoded. Our job is to decode the messages hidden in the natural landscape (especially the mountains) and in the stars. We approach and common sense interpretation awara and value from their own worldview, not from common sense and from our cultural biases as has hitherto been done.
Gradually we realized free of speculation that we were under at the time of the interpretation of archaeological remains, which relate to cognitive issues. A sample is the explanation according to our logic, one that gives you the nearest place, eg in the case of the usual rock carvings into any interpreting work as a ringer to indicate a crossing route, a cult to the sources, rituals of rain or a mark of ownership. This is purely speculative archaeological without any scientific value. And yet, the academic community holds it tenaciously.
Our project seeks to move beyond the mere description of archaeological objects, aspects are not always fixed in determining the role plastic shapes or types. We structure following possible principles for which they were created by a general meditation on how the awara get their picture of the world. We are born with holiday
service, without prejudice or discredit the remaining materials covering the study of prehistory of the Canary Islands. Ambition, work, power of observation and wit, arousing practically the only subject that has dominated the study: archeology. But then again, pretending to be a true science that offers testable theories, especially in the field of interpretation of religious models. So far the Canary archeology has nothing to do with deepening the appreciation of the reality of prehistoric human groups.
no point pretending that awara were like us, who understood the world as we do, indeed, had a perception of the area and the different time ours with a different idea of \u200b\u200bwhat the world is. Actually ordered it through some parameters to which we had access, principally marks set in space and time, the extreme positions of the Sun and the Moon, and secondarily, the equinoxes and the most important sacred mountains in the landscape.
Obviously, this requires a better explanation to end to understand. Therefore, we published "Abora and three blogs. As well archaeologist says Almudena Hernando (2002) * 3 while not assume that the order of rationality, the modeling of emotions and logic that guided the actions and lives of the prehistoric societies were different from ours, we will be limiting ourselves to project ourselves into a timeline that is not ours, distorts, so essential and irrefutable, the reconstruction of that past. Now, all we have done after breaking up with many of the approaches that have been developed so far Canary archeology. Following
Almudena Hernando (idem), we can confirm that modernity is based on two categories of understanding the world: reason and the subject. This individualization of modern life involves a complex perception of the difference of each human being for all others and existential isolation in the middle of the world around him. We give priority reason as the determining parameter of human knowledge. Current models are intended to make society, the economy or the individual object of study. If the observer is not aware that he has a way of understanding the world and human relationships that support other than other human groups, believe that the world is as he sees it, so move this conviction is , their world view, to any society to study or anything that attempts to analyze. In this case, archeology, project their own subjectivity to the past, and claim that the prehistoric people understood the world, valued personal relationships had the same emotions they have. Subjectivity began to assume a role as a determinant of knowledge.
modernity, reason and subject itself rotates on applying scientific logic of human societies with the aim of knowing the truth of the phenomena it studies, building a distorted and unreal past. Postmodernism has created the individualism of a society steeped in a growing awareness of subjectivity. It is science that has taught us that things are complex and difficult to understand.
The knowledge of past societies, writes Almudena Hernando (ibid.), will necessarily be biased as long as we keep in mind that your order of rationality to understand the world and giving meaning to any phenomenon of reality or any element of the culture were different from those that characterize us.
"awara designed the scenery in a deliberate ritual? Technology based on the compass, global positioning satellites (GPS) and software which was used in the field to map the exact position of each monument to obtain positional data from each building and its nearest natural feature respective landscape. This degree of precision on the monuments and symbols are oriented toward the natural landscape features according to an astronomical event appears to be accidental, but quite deliberate. Means we can see evidence of a technique applied to the landscape on a scale never seen before. This suggests the existence of a formula or system.
"necessarily has to be on the basis of all belief systems and all religions are a number of fundamental representations rituals and attitudes, despite the diversity of forms that have been taken, are identical in all cases objective meaning and always met the same functions. These are the permanent elements that constitute what eternal and human aspects of religion: it is the objective content of idea is expressed when talking about religion "(Emile Durkheim, idem).
A culture is then structured systems, and in this sense, PREP has found a line of argument and tries to reconstruct the ancient thought through mechanisms that awara established, guided by ritual components, between earth and sky. There is a huge number of links between the various aspects of the lives of men and how these look at the sky and think. The starting point is the space and time, only to establish an order quantification, a reference immutable, since otherwise be lost orientation. Therefore, we are working to demonstrate the role of the Sun and Moon in the construction of the milestones that mark the space and time.
puts space on observable facts with references stationary, stable and fixed milestones, it is not convertible, is identified with its content and can not be changed. Metaphorical references that allow you to sort the territory are the peaks of the highest mountains of the island, and even the hills of El Sombrero de Chasna Guajara, Pico Viejo and Teide on the island of Tenerife. This turns them into reality on areas they believe have some control, as ordered. "Nothing can begin, be, without a previous guidance, and any guidance involves the acquisition a fixed point. Therefore the religious man has endeavored to establish the "Center of the World" (Mircea Eliade, 1988) * 4
Religious ideas are the result of pre-existing feelings, while representations are symbols, only package surface. At this point, no one can doubt that the prehistoric follow a distribution learned in geography. The shrines, in any culture, are arranged in a much-studied field. Researchers and learners can go through these works without realizing that contain the encrypted message. There are, century after century, having a stimulus outdoor aesthetic part of nature, influencing it and passing its meaning and reason for being there. Part of the landscape and those who can contemplate. Nature is not only natural, is also at the same time, the manifestation of sacred forces and the embodiment of transcendent reality (supernatural).
men and women of prehistory lived in a mythical world in which the divine manifests itself eternally through the elements of the space that is sacred. Only known space and time to live down the margins of the order that matters. His world, the same as we live, was built with a quantification different from ours, as subjectively real to them as ours is to us. Perceiving
time is to realize the lifetime focused on the present. Life is an ever recurring cycle that does not support changes. Therefore, cyclical phenomena of nature remain perfect reference for the calculation and planning of the shares in these companies. Among those aware, these phones are basically references the Sun and the Moon.
Time is slowly but surely. Prehistoric men sought ways to control to anticipate events and make them predictable. So they created structures, systems devised and guidance regarding highlights of the very nature and invented the solar and lunisolar calendars.
The peaks that surround the Caldera, above 1,900 m altitude, respond to that quality of perception of reality that imagined and stamped awara cosmic architecture built around seventy piles of stones to greet the New Year during the winter solstice (the beginning of a new cycle), and two astronomical markers, located at 500 m away from each other in the town of Garafía: solar marker Izcagua headers, marking the solstices and equinoxes and the complex lunisolar marker of Las Lajitas, confirming an advanced astronomical knowledge about the lunar cycle by the construction of stacked stone structures.
Most dispersed individually throughout the territory, others are forming groups. Likewise, we distinguish two types of reference with two subtypes by the number of piles:
A. A single pile of stones serving as the axis and the mountains as reference marker. Most deposits.
B. Several piles of stones aligned with the mountain as a reference. Has two subtypes:
B.1. Two piles of stones aligned. We found in four sites (Corralejo, Beard II, astronomical marker Izcagua Headers and Llano de Las Animas I).
B.2. Three piles of stones aligned in two sites (I Izcagua Headers and astronomical marker Izcagua headers).
On the other hand, especially in coastal areas, were carved in the tuff cups and channels in the faces of the grain watching or following a direction to the point position in both the sunrises and the sunsets during the summer solstice, as a ritual of communion between humans and Abora, the Mother Goddess Sun
For its part, the abstract rock art is represented by a wide range of geometric forms, sacred symbols were engraved on the rock-air free. With a compass, a pencil and pad toured numerous rock art sites, those that retain its original position, noting the directions that projected the faces that were carved with symbols, resulting in four directions very clear (about 75 º, 125 º, 250 º and 300 º). What do these four directions? For the four solstice points, the maximum north and south ends made by the Sun in its sunrises and sunsets.
Has anyone ever questioned why rock carvings found in certain rocks? What forced them to choose the type of support? One of the mysteries that often make the dream of archeology professionals is to understand the criteria used to select areas of percussion of sacred symbols. When performing field work is often disconcerting to check small stones with no apparent importance, present a wealth of designs and on the other hand, nearby rocks that according to current criteria polished, have seemingly better features to provide support for the prints have not been used. 
On the island of La Palma in the Canary archipelago, the main criterion used by the Hispanic population to choose the media has a very visible. In heaven we find the answer. We found that the natives chose to make their rock petroglyphs in relation to important astronomical events (solstices and equinoxes on a few occasions). Therefore, we have considered the art of the cosmos, they represent an identity based on the life cycle. Let us never forget that the essence of religion is the perpetual renewal of life and that humans are a guarantee of this life in the phenomena that surround him in heaven and on earth. In La Palma, stand the sun, moon, stars and mountains.
The "Irueña La Palma" has entered the darkness of the mystery we confirmed the existence of a principle or coherent system of guidelines that govern rock stations in an almost absolute (A) with three exceptions (B, C, D )
The system created to give order to space and time allowed for a greater sense of safety and security to those humans who scan the sky the answers to their existence.
This group defines organized religion.
NOTES * 1 www.prehistorialapalma.blogspot.com
www.amontonamientosdepiedras.blogspot.com
www.iruene la palma.blogspot.com
* 2 Durkheim, E. (1992): "The Elementary Forms of Religious Life" Akal. Madrid.
* 3 Hernando, A. (2002): "Archaeology of Identity" Akal. Madrid.
* 4 Eliade, M. (1988): "The sacred and the profane" Labor / Omega Point. Barcelona
