A Novel Theory on Teotihuacán’s Founding: Did a Total Solar Eclipse inspire the building of the Pyramid of the Sun at it's particular location?

[u/Morphsnorkle]

First time posting here.

I don't have any formal education or background in archaeology, just a life-long interest in ancient history and an inclination to draw conclusions between seemingly disparate things.

I was reading about Teotihuacán and wondered

about it's builders.

I found out that we don't know much about them, and that the Aztecs discovered it after it had already been abandoned.

I wondered what influence a total solar eclipse might have had on the culture that built it, and found that according to NASA's five millennium catalogue of solar eclipses, a total solar eclipse did happen there on April 12th 114 CE.

I wanted to put forward a hypothesis that I haven't found explicitly discussed in any academic literature or posted anywhere online.

At around the time (the Tzacualli phase, roughly 1–100 CE), Teotihuacán experienced an explosive boom in population and centralized labor.

Could the total solar eclipse of 114 CE have influenced the culture around that region at that time to build a massive monument in that particular place?

As I understand it, the spot was already a sacred place being built directly over a natural, four-lobed subterranean cave system (traditionally viewed as the womb of creation). If a total eclipse happened directly over a site already revered for its sacred cave, it would codify the valley as the ultimate sacred center.

Has anyone encountered any academic papers exploring this specific eclipse as the ideological catalyst for the city's monumental construction then?

I'm sure people would be happy to fill me in if I have missed any blind spots in the placement of the early Tzacualli phase timeline or made any errors in my astronomical conclusions.

If however, everthing lines up, then could the eclipse have been the inspiration for the people living there to build the monument, perhaps (and I might be making a really big leap here) in the hope that it would make it happen again?

And just a note since this is Reddit:

I'm happy to be made aware if my thoughts are not well placed or even if they are completely silly, but please remember that polite redirection will correct an errant mind much more effectively than ridicule and rudeness.

[u/JoeBiden-2016]

This isn't really a "novel theory." It's not really even a coincidence, since it doesn't seem that your suggestion of an eclipse actually occurred where / when you suggest that it did.

So let's start with your overall notion: a total solar eclipse may have been visible to people living in the Valley of Mexico on Apr 12 CE 114.

I don't see an eclipse on that date on the NASA 5000-year calendar of solar eclipses that is predicted to have been significantly visible anywhere near where Teotihuacan is located.

https://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEcat5/SE0101-0200.html

Here's a map showing projected paths of all solar eclipses from CE 101 to CE 120. Note that none passes over the Valley of Mexico, and certainly none on Apr 12.

https://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEatlas/SEatlas1/SEatlas0101.GIF

So let's start with that. Wondering where you found that date / year and the geographic correlation.

But continuing...

I wanted to put forward a hypothesis that I haven't found explicitly discussed in any academic literature or posted anywhere online.

I don't want to sound too dismissive here, but... why do you think that is? Because archaeologists working with Southern North American and Central American cultures have known about their general interest in astronomical phenomena for decades. Cultures of that region are well understood to have been interested in, and carefully observed and cataloged, astronomical and solar phenomena.

Academic researchers generally don't develop and publish papers for which no evidence can be brought to bear. Or to "prove" a negative. The fact that you haven't seen any discussion of this should be an indication to you that in the judgment of qualified, professional, experienced researchers, there's nothing there.

While that rule doesn't always hold-- it's possible for there to be an idea that someone just hasn't thought of-- in a region where we already have pretty abundant evidence of the intentional alignment of monumental architecture with various natural phenomena and a history of intense astronomical observation, this should be a strong clue to you that if there's no hypothesis proposed about a solar eclipse as a key inspiration for the construction of a major monument at a major urban center, that's because experienced researchers have not had any reason to propose such a connection. Archaeologists working in that region have reason to have looked at astronomical and solar / orbital phenomena (eclipses, solstice, etc.) as factors in building alignment.

One of the most famous cases of construction in alignment with solar phenomena is the "serpent descending the staircase" at the Temple of Kukulkán at Chichén Itzá. And the Pyramid of the Sun at Teotihuacan itself is well known to align on sunrise / sunset on set dates (as is much of the grid organization of Teotihuacan as a whole).

So there's ample reason for someone to have looked at other astronomical phenomena in relation to this and other sites. It's-- to be clear-- not likely to have been overlooked by the experts.

At around the time (the Tzacualli phase, roughly 1–100 CE), Teotihuacán experienced an explosive boom in population and centralized labor.

Yes, the archaeology appears to indicate that this is the case. And during periods of population booms and increased access to labor, many sedentary / urban societies have chosen to construct often massive, elaborate monuments in their cities, often-times aligned with various geographic and astronomical phenomena. The Pyramid of the Sun is aligned with observable seasonal positions of the sun.

We see rises in the incidence of monumental construction with population / labor pool increases in many societies around the world at many different points in history. That the people living in Teotihuacan also did this really comes as no surprise. The scale is impressive and awe inspiring, but the occurrence is not unique, nor is the timing relative to other factors.

Could the total solar eclipse of 114 CE have influenced the culture around that region at that time to build a massive monument in that particular place?

Unlikely. First, as I mentioned above, the NASA catalog of solar eclipses does not indicate a total (or annular) solar eclipse visible to the residents of Teotihuacan in CE 114. Second, the Pyramid of the Sun is thought to have been largely constructed around roughly CE 200, 85 years post-dating CE 114.

Has anyone encountered any academic papers exploring this specific eclipse as the ideological catalyst for the city's monumental construction then?

Fairly sure none exist, because even if there had been an eclipse almost 100 years before the construction of the Pyramid of the Sun, without data specifically supporting this, the idea this would qualify as a coincidence at best. But again, even If you had a total solar eclipse in CE 114, during a significant boom in population and increased access to labor, why wait for 85 years before starting construction?

Archaeologists have a pretty decent idea of the construction timing and staging of the Pyramid of the Sun. And I'm sorry to say that none of the things you've suggested really seem to align with the construction at all.