Un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique.
This paper gives new evidence that Upper Palaeolithic societies of western Europe would have interpreted stars as patterns or constellations. It also shows how we can scientifically reconstruct the prehistoric mythology. In Eurasia and North America, the stars in the handle of the Big Dipper are oft...
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ftunivnantes:oai:HAL:hal-00825883v1 2023-05-15T15:18:17+02:00 Un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique. d'Huy, Julien Centre de Linguistique Anthropologique et Sociolinguistique - Institut Marcel Mauss (LIAS - IMM) École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) 2012 https://hal.science/hal-00825883 https://hal.science/hal-00825883/document https://hal.science/hal-00825883/file/2012.4._Un_ours_dans_les_A_toiles_recherche_phylogA_nA_tique_sur_un_mythe_prA_historique._-_PrA_histoire_du_sud-ouest_20_1_91-106.pdf fr fre HAL CCSD Association Préhistoire quercinoise et du Sud-Ouest hal-00825883 https://hal.science/hal-00825883 https://hal.science/hal-00825883/document https://hal.science/hal-00825883/file/2012.4._Un_ours_dans_les_A_toiles_recherche_phylogA_nA_tique_sur_un_mythe_prA_historique._-_PrA_histoire_du_sud-ouest_20_1_91-106.pdf info:eu-repo/semantics/OpenAccess ISSN: 1268-7944 Préhistoire du Sud-Ouest https://hal.science/hal-00825883 Préhistoire du Sud-Ouest, 2012, 20 (1) (1), pp.91-106 Mythology Evolution Genetics Cultural evolution Horizontal transmission Phylogenetics Archeoastronomy Folktale Mythologie Génétique Evolution culturelle Transmission horizontale Phylogénétique Archéoastronomie folklore [SHS.ARCHEO]Humanities and Social Sciences/Archaeology and Prehistory [SHS.STAT]Humanities and Social Sciences/Methods and statistics info:eu-repo/semantics/article Journal articles 2012 ftunivnantes 2023-02-22T00:01:40Z This paper gives new evidence that Upper Palaeolithic societies of western Europe would have interpreted stars as patterns or constellations. It also shows how we can scientifically reconstruct the prehistoric mythology. In Eurasia and North America, the stars in the handle of the Big Dipper are often interpreted as hunters and the Dipper itself as an elk or a bear, killed or pursued. This motif is not known on other continents, nor in the Arctic where the Big Dipper is seen better than everywhere else. The link between the Big Dipper and the Cosmic Hunt could only be explained by particular and very ancient historical links between the corresponding traditions. We postulate that the more two myths diverge, the more distant is their genetic relationship, geographically and temporally. We construct a database including the typological variations of the Big Dipper / Cosmic Hunt versions, where the mythological structural features were coded for their presence (1) or absence (0) in each of the target myths. They were selected to provide broad typological coverage, reflecting the known mythological variations of the myth. The whole data matrix contained 44 binary features coded for 18 Amerindian, Asian and European myths. Then we have treated the feature of the studied stories as character traits distributed among taxonomic units (myths). Indeed, there are many analogies between the ways that genes and myths evolved: e.g. both are system of replicators comprising discrete, heritable and highly conservative units (genes and mythemes); they are naturally or socially selected and generally vertically transmitted they evolve by a system of descent with modification they split into new versions and sometimes go extinct. These connections give hope that the use of phylogenetic methods will succeed and that historical signal can be found. First, the binary-coded mythological feature were computed thanks to a phylogenetic distances algorithm: Bio Neighbor Joining (tree 1), implemented in SplitsTree4, to find the optimal ... Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic elk Université de Nantes: HAL-UNIV-NANTES Arctic The Handle ENVELOPE(161.983,161.983,-78.000,-78.000) |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Université de Nantes: HAL-UNIV-NANTES |
op_collection_id |
ftunivnantes |
language |
French |
topic |
Mythology Evolution Genetics Cultural evolution Horizontal transmission Phylogenetics Archeoastronomy Folktale Mythologie Génétique Evolution culturelle Transmission horizontale Phylogénétique Archéoastronomie folklore [SHS.ARCHEO]Humanities and Social Sciences/Archaeology and Prehistory [SHS.STAT]Humanities and Social Sciences/Methods and statistics |
spellingShingle |
Mythology Evolution Genetics Cultural evolution Horizontal transmission Phylogenetics Archeoastronomy Folktale Mythologie Génétique Evolution culturelle Transmission horizontale Phylogénétique Archéoastronomie folklore [SHS.ARCHEO]Humanities and Social Sciences/Archaeology and Prehistory [SHS.STAT]Humanities and Social Sciences/Methods and statistics d'Huy, Julien Un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique. |
topic_facet |
Mythology Evolution Genetics Cultural evolution Horizontal transmission Phylogenetics Archeoastronomy Folktale Mythologie Génétique Evolution culturelle Transmission horizontale Phylogénétique Archéoastronomie folklore [SHS.ARCHEO]Humanities and Social Sciences/Archaeology and Prehistory [SHS.STAT]Humanities and Social Sciences/Methods and statistics |
description |
This paper gives new evidence that Upper Palaeolithic societies of western Europe would have interpreted stars as patterns or constellations. It also shows how we can scientifically reconstruct the prehistoric mythology. In Eurasia and North America, the stars in the handle of the Big Dipper are often interpreted as hunters and the Dipper itself as an elk or a bear, killed or pursued. This motif is not known on other continents, nor in the Arctic where the Big Dipper is seen better than everywhere else. The link between the Big Dipper and the Cosmic Hunt could only be explained by particular and very ancient historical links between the corresponding traditions. We postulate that the more two myths diverge, the more distant is their genetic relationship, geographically and temporally. We construct a database including the typological variations of the Big Dipper / Cosmic Hunt versions, where the mythological structural features were coded for their presence (1) or absence (0) in each of the target myths. They were selected to provide broad typological coverage, reflecting the known mythological variations of the myth. The whole data matrix contained 44 binary features coded for 18 Amerindian, Asian and European myths. Then we have treated the feature of the studied stories as character traits distributed among taxonomic units (myths). Indeed, there are many analogies between the ways that genes and myths evolved: e.g. both are system of replicators comprising discrete, heritable and highly conservative units (genes and mythemes); they are naturally or socially selected and generally vertically transmitted they evolve by a system of descent with modification they split into new versions and sometimes go extinct. These connections give hope that the use of phylogenetic methods will succeed and that historical signal can be found. First, the binary-coded mythological feature were computed thanks to a phylogenetic distances algorithm: Bio Neighbor Joining (tree 1), implemented in SplitsTree4, to find the optimal ... |
author2 |
Centre de Linguistique Anthropologique et Sociolinguistique - Institut Marcel Mauss (LIAS - IMM) École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
d'Huy, Julien |
author_facet |
d'Huy, Julien |
author_sort |
d'Huy, Julien |
title |
Un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique. |
title_short |
Un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique. |
title_full |
Un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique. |
title_fullStr |
Un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique. |
title_full_unstemmed |
Un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique. |
title_sort |
un ours dans les étoiles, recherche phylogénétique sur un mythe préhistorique. |
publisher |
HAL CCSD |
publishDate |
2012 |
url |
https://hal.science/hal-00825883 https://hal.science/hal-00825883/document https://hal.science/hal-00825883/file/2012.4._Un_ours_dans_les_A_toiles_recherche_phylogA_nA_tique_sur_un_mythe_prA_historique._-_PrA_histoire_du_sud-ouest_20_1_91-106.pdf |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(161.983,161.983,-78.000,-78.000) |
geographic |
Arctic The Handle |
geographic_facet |
Arctic The Handle |
genre |
Arctic elk |
genre_facet |
Arctic elk |
op_source |
ISSN: 1268-7944 Préhistoire du Sud-Ouest https://hal.science/hal-00825883 Préhistoire du Sud-Ouest, 2012, 20 (1) (1), pp.91-106 |
op_relation |
hal-00825883 https://hal.science/hal-00825883 https://hal.science/hal-00825883/document https://hal.science/hal-00825883/file/2012.4._Un_ours_dans_les_A_toiles_recherche_phylogA_nA_tique_sur_un_mythe_prA_historique._-_PrA_histoire_du_sud-ouest_20_1_91-106.pdf |
op_rights |
info:eu-repo/semantics/OpenAccess |
_version_ |
1766348485908496384 |