which changes slowly due to the precession of the equinoxes. The wide variance of these dates from historically accepted ones led the architect and archaeologist William Bell Dinsmoor to mistrust dates established by the slowly changing obliquity of the ecliptic or by stellar alignments, which involve an arbitrary selection of a star that rises on the proper azimuth. Instead he proposed a method employing what was already known from historical records concerning the dates of construction of Greek temples, the festivals associated with specific temples, and the nature of the Greek Lunisolar calendar. Since the date of a festival in the Greek lunisolar calendar only recurs on the same date in the solar calendar every eight or nineteen years, Dinsmoor identified a festival connected with a specific temple and was able to determine the exact year near the historically recorded construction date when the Sun rose in alignment with the temple on the date of the festival. See also Astronomical chronology Age of the Earth Age of the universe Chronological dating, archaeological chronology Absolute dating Relative dating Phase (archaeology) Archaeological association Geochronology Geologic time scale Geological history of Earth Notes References Neugebaer, Otto. A History of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy, (3 vols). New York: Springer, 1975. Vol. 3, pp. 1071–1076 provides a brief introduction to astronomical chronology. Bibliography Gingerich, Owen and Barbara Welther. Planetary, Lunar, and Solar Positions, A. D. 1650 to 1805, Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society, 59S. Philadelphia, 1983. Neugebauer, Paul V. Astronomische Chronologie (2 vols). Berlin: De Gruyter, 1929. Steele, John M. "The Use and Abuse of Astronomy in Establishing Absolute Chronologies", Physics in Canada/La Physique au Canada, 59 (2003): 243-248. Tuckerman, Bryant. Planetary, Lunar, and Solar Positions, 601 B.C. to A, D. 1, Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society, 56. Philadelphia, 1962. Tuckerman, Bryant. Planetary, Lunar, and Solar Positions, A. D. 2 to 1649, Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society, 59. Philadelphia, 1964. External links van Gent, R.H., Astronomical Chronology Chronology Dating methods Time in astronomy