 Vernal Equinox 10880BC looking east - the Sun's virgin birth
Over the course of the next 13 millennia the position of the vernal equinox point relative to the starry backdrop would continue its drift westwards through first Leo, then Cancer, Gemini, Taurus and Aries to where it resides today at the western end of Pisces.
 Vernal Equinox 2008AD looking east
And yet this too, is not to last and the sky is about to be overturned again - the precessional pendulum has nearly reached the opposite end of its swing.
Just as the vernal equinox point has been drifting slowly westwards (at about 1° every 72 years), so have the points of the summer and winter solstices and of the autumnal equinox.
In 2080AD we will pass the halfway point in the Great Year and Orion, which has been rising higher and higher at culmination over the last 12960 years, will begin to fall back again. See this article for an explanation.
The effect of the rising altitude of Orion over the first half of the precessional cycle has been to bring it closer and closer to the altitude of the Sun at midday on the Summer Solstice in our time.
In 2080AD, Orion will be crowned by the Sun on the Summer Solstice at its highest point in the current precessional cycle.
 Summer Solstice 2080AD looking south
The story of this event and its foretelling has been handed down through generations of human history and it forms the basis of many religious and creation mythologies.
I hope to explore some of these connections in other essays.
--
simon
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Animation of Summer Solstice point from 1AD to 4033AD and its relationship to Orion (click for a larger version)
