Ramesside-Star-Clocks

The Ramesside Star Clocks (RSC) are ancient Egyptian astronomical tables painted into the tombs of Ramses VI, VII, and IX in the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, Egypt, dated to approximately 1100 BCE. Each clock consists of 24 bi-weekly tables tracking 47 stars across one year, with 13 rows representing hours of the night and 7 columns representing positional subregions of the sky. The clocks were first documented and transcribed by Neugebauer and Parker (1960), whose work remains the foundational reference for RSC research. No surviving writings explain how or why the clocks were created, making their observational methodology an open research question.

This toolkit was developed to investigate that question computationally. By generating synthetic star clocks from adjustable observational parameters (random skies, the Hipparcos catalogue, or Sirius-based models) and statistically comparing them to the real RSC data, the code helps rule out candidate collection methodologies. The toolkit produces 8 statistical figures, a colour-coded frequency table, and 3 celestial map projections per run.

Notebooks

Notebook	Purpose
StarData.ipynb	Generates 8 statistical figures + 1 Excel frequency table from a run file
MapMaker.ipynb	Generates 3D and stereographic star maps from coordinates in degrees
MapMaker (HH.MM.SS).ipynb	Same as MapMaker but accepts RA in HH.MM.SS format

Outputs

StarData produces: star count figure, frequency by star, frequency by position, stars per table, average position & standard deviation, percentage star appearance, star stability chart (3D), and a position boxplot with t-test p-value.

MapMaker produces: 3D celestial sphere projection, stereographic northern hemisphere map, stereographic southern hemisphere map.

Quick Start

StarData

1. Place your run file (.xlsx) in the project folder
2. Open StarData.ipynb and set file_path, sheet_name, runName, and series in the User Input section
3. Run all cells — output charts will appear in a new folder

MapMaker

1. Place your coordinate file (.xlsx) in the project folder
2. Open the appropriate MapMaker notebook and set file_path and Series
3. Run all cells — 3 projection PNGs will appear in a new folder

Dependencies

pip install pandas matplotlib scipy openpyxl numpy

Full Documentation

See Star Clocks Code Manual Jonah W.pdf for detailed explanation of all outputs and code sections.

References

Neugebauer, O. and Parker, R.A., 1960. Egyptian Astronomical Texts. Vol 2. Providence RI: Brown University Press.