Recording a Spectacle?
While American Indians paid close attention to the Sun, Moon, and stars, they seldom recorded the “special events” in the night sky, such as comets and meteor showers. Comets often were considered bad omens, and were ignored in hopes that they would go away. Meteor showers were sometimes seen as the work of Coyote, who sprinkled extra stars across the firmament. One of the greatest meteor “storms” in history, the Leonids of 1833, were recorded on several “winter counts” — pictorial histories of tribal life drawn on the hides of buffalo or other animals.

One spectacular celestial event may be recorded in rock art found throughout the southwest — and then again, maybe it isn’t.

The event was the supernova of 1054.

	Like other structures in Chaco Canyon, Pueblo Bonita is aligned in near-perfect north-south and east-west directions.

“ Here in the New World, on the morning of July 5th, 1054, a couple of hours before the Sun came up, this bright star...just suddenly came out of nowhere,” says G.B. Cornucopia, an interpretive ranger at Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico. “This is what we call a supernova — an explosion of a huge star, much bigger than our star. And it was a mere 6500 light-years away from us. We see them in distant galaxies tens of millions of light-years away.…So this was quite an event.”

Astronomers in China and Japan recorded the supernova, but those in Europe did not. Some scientists believe the supernova also was recorded in a painting on the sandstone cliffs of Chaco Canyon.

From about 850 to 1150 A.D., the culture known as the Anasazi, a Navajo word meaning “the old ones,” built thousands of stone structures in this region. The largest are fantastic pueblos with hundreds of rooms, including several kivas — circular pits used for important ceremonies and tribal business. Despite near-desert conditions, the Anasazi farmed this region, and Chaco Canyon became the hub of a busy empire.

Evidence suggests the Chacoans were especially interested in the stars. The largest pueblo, called Pueblo Bonito, is built along perfect north-south and east-west alignments. The largest kiva in the canyon, Casa Rinconada, is also laid out along the cardinal directions, and a small window at the top may have served as a marker for the rising Sun on the summer solstice. Scientists have identified several possible sunwatching stations throughout the canyon — secluded spots where tribal experts could predict the upcoming solstices and equinoxes. This was especially important in winter, when the Sun moved south, the days grew short, and nighttime temperatures plunged well below zero. Evidence from New Mexico’s modern-day pueblo people, some of the descendants of the Anasazi, suggests that the people of Chaco Canyon conducted rituals around the winter solstice to entreat the Sun to head northward again and bring warmth back to Chaco. Without them, they feared the Sun would keep moving south — and disappear forever.

In the 1970s, archaeologists found a small pictograph on the underside of a tall ledge of rock. Executed in vivid red, the pictograph shows what appears to be a crescent Moon, a star, and a hand. The star is to the left of the Moon, just as the supernova of 1054 would have appeared. Although the case is compelling, it’s not conclusive. Some experts say the pictograph shows the Moon and the planet Venus, the brilliant “morning star.”

“When you look at that [the pictograph], you’re looking at something that reflects back to us, as directly as it can be, these people’s relationship with the sky — historical event or otherwise,” says Cornucopia. “Whatever it might be, it’s something about these people’s relationship with the sky. You can’t stand there and look at that and not feel that connection.”

Article and photos by Damond Benningfield, executive editor of StarDate magazine.