This week, with the autumn equinox being on March 21st, Roy decided it was the perfect week to show you our visit to the Marulan Meridian Line. So, he told me to 'get out of bed' so that he could tell you all about it. (For those of you who may have missed the news, Roy has been helping to look after me as I had my Appendix out this week and bought home one of those infections hospitals are famous for!)
The Meridian Sculpture is located in the historic town of Marulan outside Goulburn (NSW) on the way to Canberra from Sydney. Marulan used to be on the main road but has now been bypassed by the Hume Highway. Marulan is the only town in the world which is built on top of the 150 degree meridian and for Australians, is where the Eastern Standard Time is measured and gives us our 'true time'. As a result Marulan is the only town in the Eastern Standard Time zone where twice a year, on the Autumn and Spring equinoxes the Sun rises at exactly 6am and sets at exactly 6pm. This is because the Sun's axis is directly above the equator on those days. The word Equinox comes from two latin words - aequus (meaning equal) and nox (meaning night). This is because at the Equinox day and night are of equal length. There are two each year in March and September.
The 150 East Meridian is a line of longitude which runs around the world from the North Pole through the Arctic Ocean, Asia, the Pacific ocean, Australasia, the Southern Ocean, Antarctica to the South Pole. It joins up with the 30 degree West Meridian to circle the earth. You may have heard of Greenwich Mean Time. This is because all time is measured from Greenwich in England, and Greenwich lies on the 0 degree meridian. Meridian comes from the latin word merides which means midday. It is from this we get the terms anti meridies (a m) and post meridies (p m).If you'd like to learn more about the meridian click here.
To celebrate the meridian line running through Marulan, and the Centenary of Federation, a sculpture has been built to show exactly where the meridian line runs. This sculpture was designed by local artist Sebastian Meijbaum and built overlooking the main road from Sydney to Canberra so you might have even seen the arch as you drove along! The sculpture is called the Meridian Arch and it marks the exact middle of the eastern standard time zone, as well as marking the meridian itself. You can even stand on the meridian! At the top of the arch there is a world rotating around the sun and on either side of the sculpture are a sundial and a clock, representations of what the meridian has meant to our telling of the time. If you would like to learn more about the sculpture, click here.
You might wonder why anyone would be particularly interested in the equinox but these days were, and still are, very important to many civilizations. They were one of the ways which ancient groups worked out when to hunt or plant crops and often they were also part of important religious festivals. Some people even think Stonehenge may have an aspect of the equinox built into it, but nobody really knows! One site where the equinox plays an important role is the Loughcrew Cairn in Ireland and you can find out about it by clicking here. Western Societies have adapted pagan celebrations of the equinox to fix the dates for celebrations such as Easter. It also marks the beginning of the Iranian New Year. Of course if you live in the Northern Hemisphere you will be celebrating the Spring Equinox this weekend while we in the Southern Hemisphere look forward to cooler days and nights!