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Hello, and many thanks for allowing me to engage with others, in pursuit of my growing obsession with ancient rock art.
I suspect that like many people who come to take an interest in cup and ring, my head is buzzing with quasi theoretical speculation, most of which even I know, is most likely garbage.
HOWEVER ... Looking at the spirals and concentric circles around many cups, I am drawn toward an idea which I know I share with many, that such patterns may represent radial activity, such as that emenated by stellar bodies, not least the sun. No suprises in that, but whilst looking at some Ogham inscriptions of the pointed; or to be a little more precise and geometrically generous, semi circular variety; I began to wonder about the similarity with concentric cup and ring markings. Somewhere in my musings I remembered the 'ladder' type markings to be variously seen on some sites and wondered if the Ogham inscriptions and the ladders, denote a partial pattern or radial energy? Maybe not ... But! If you draw a cup on a piece of paper, draw some concentric rings around it, then draw two lines, not too far apart, away from the cup and through the rings... thou hast a ladder. Rub out the circles outside of the ladder lines and you have something akin to the cup and ring ladder markings. IF.... there is and juice in the idea that the the concentric circles are representative of sunlight for example, and that the ladders are a partial representation of solar rays, the direction in which the ladder points (to or from) may be associated with solar or even lunar phenomena such as soltices etc?
Of course I don't know because I have never as yet actually lined one up with anything, but I certainly intend to. If anyone has any thoughts or even better... data, on this idea i would be most grateful to hear from them.
In fact I will be grateful for any response, even if people only respond by telling me I'm a total loony who is completely barking up the wrong tree. I won't be offended as I am no stranger to such endeavour.
Thanks for reading this.
dave.
I suspect that like many people who come to take an interest in cup and ring, my head is buzzing with quasi theoretical speculation, most of which even I know, is most likely garbage.
HOWEVER ... Looking at the spirals and concentric circles around many cups, I am drawn toward an idea which I know I share with many, that such patterns may represent radial activity, such as that emenated by stellar bodies, not least the sun. No suprises in that, but whilst looking at some Ogham inscriptions of the pointed; or to be a little more precise and geometrically generous, semi circular variety; I began to wonder about the similarity with concentric cup and ring markings. Somewhere in my musings I remembered the 'ladder' type markings to be variously seen on some sites and wondered if the Ogham inscriptions and the ladders, denote a partial pattern or radial energy? Maybe not ... But! If you draw a cup on a piece of paper, draw some concentric rings around it, then draw two lines, not too far apart, away from the cup and through the rings... thou hast a ladder. Rub out the circles outside of the ladder lines and you have something akin to the cup and ring ladder markings. IF.... there is and juice in the idea that the the concentric circles are representative of sunlight for example, and that the ladders are a partial representation of solar rays, the direction in which the ladder points (to or from) may be associated with solar or even lunar phenomena such as soltices etc?
Of course I don't know because I have never as yet actually lined one up with anything, but I certainly intend to. If anyone has any thoughts or even better... data, on this idea i would be most grateful to hear from them.
In fact I will be grateful for any response, even if people only respond by telling me I'm a total loony who is completely barking up the wrong tree. I won't be offended as I am no stranger to such endeavour.
Thanks for reading this.
dave.
If you wanna follow your astronomical lines of enquiry a bit further though, check out Martin Brennan's book, The Stars and the Stones: an excellent work showing with considerable probability the relationship between the cup&rings and celestial activity. 
). Good luck!