The study of the past has become interdisciplinary so that the old boundaries between history and archaeology, among others, are increasingly being blurred if not erased. The methods of studying the past are, therefore, fluid and holistic.

The emergence of archaeoastronomy in the 1960s transformed how archaeologists, archaeoastronomers, and historians interpret the past. This session presents ongoing research, both in theory and praxis, about the importance of archaeoastronomy in writing and re-writing the history of human relationships with the cosmos and celestial elements, and how extra-terrestrial agents had acted on human society. These papers will be presented by archaeologists, historians, cultural anthropologists, and astronomers on their research across five continents. Susanne Hoffmann uses the cultural knowledge of constellations to understand history and cultural exchange in Europe and West Asia. Caroline Watson uses astronomical alignments to describe settlement history and pre-contact cosmology in Oceania. Caitlin Blanchfield takes us to Hawaii, North America as she interrogates the relationship between astronomy, archaeology, and contemporary architecture in the reading of the past. Kathryn Hudson and John Henderson explore the relationship between calendrical cycles and historical patterning in central Mexico and the Maya world, and, Olanrewaju Lasisi provides methodological approaches in archaeoastronomy useful for corroborating the studies of the past through travel accounts.

Overall, these papers will discuss the challenges, scopes, and prospects of archaeoastronomy for understanding human history. The aim of this session is to present research that challenges the canonical knowledge of what we know about the past through engagements with cultural astronomy. This session will be of interest to the public in general, and to Scientists, Historians, Anthropologists, Archaeologists, and Landscape Architects, in particular.