Calling all Druids: It's the June Solstice and you know what that means

Go to Stonehenge and get naked.

All non-Druids should disregard the previous sentence.

At 11:56 p.m. EDT (Eastern Daylight Time) today, June 20th, which is actually 3:56 a.m. GMT (Greenwich Mean Time), June 21st, summer will officially arrive in the Northern Hemisphere, even though in Australia it is now winter.

Where I live, in Canton, Georgia, USA, there will be fourteen and a half hours between sunrise and sunset (what might be called Day) and only nine and a half hours of what might be called Night, give or take a bit of twilight (dusk and dawn) at either end. In places farther north it stays light even longer. I sort of remember living in Poughkeepsie, New York, back in the 1960s and summer daylight didn't end until around 10:30 p.m., if I remember correctly. There is always the possibility that I am hallucinating. Above the Arctic Circle there will now be 24 hours of daylight for a while.

As most of you know, our Earth is tilted on its axis, 23 and a half degrees off of vertical. This causes all sorts of interesting phenomena to occur, not least of which was the establishment of the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn.

In a 2019 article at Thoughtco.com, writer Matt Rosenberg elaborated on these very Tropics:

"The Tropic of Cancer was named because at the time of its naming, the sun was positioned in the Cancer constellation during the June solstice. Likewise, the Tropic of Capricorn was named because the sun was in the constellation Capricorn during the December solstice. The naming took place about 2000 years ago, and the sun is no longer in those constellations at that time of year. At the June solstice, the Sun is in Taurus, and at the December solstice, the sun is in Sagittarius.

"Geographic features like the equator are reasonably straightforward, but the Tropics can be confusing. The Tropics were marked off because they are both places within the hemisphere where it is possible to have the sun directly overhead. This was an important distinction for ancient travelers who used the heavens to guide their way. In an age when our smartphones know where we are at all times, it's hard to imagine how hard getting around used to be. For much of human history, the position of the sun and stars was often all explorers and traders had to navigate by."

So now you know. My work here is done, at least for today. There's always tomorrow.

I feel that this post is missing something, but I refuse to show you any pictures of naked Druids.

A picture is worth a thousand words

Steve, who left a comment on yesterday’s post, suggested that lots of pictures would be better than Wikipedia’s prose. I agree.

At this website, created by someone in the Physics Department of Durham University in the United Kingdom, some of the diagrams even move.

The first diagram illustrates that the sun would always be directly above the equator if Earth’s axis were not tilted. The second diagram, which unfortunately is stationary, shows that Earth’s axis is tilted off vertical by 23.5 degrees (something we are all supposed to have learned when we were ten). The third diagram illustrates what I was trying to say, and saying so poorly, in yesterday’s post.


The northernmost point on Earth that receives the direct rays of the sun at midday (that is, the sun is directly overhead at midday and the rays are perpendicular to the surface of Earth) is called the Tropic of Cancer. The southernmost point on Earth that receives the direct rays of the sun at midday is called the Tropic of Capricorn. If you live north of the Tropic of Cancer or south of the Tropic of Capricorn, the sun is never directly overhead.

If you want to know more, you’ll have to find out for yourself.

This topic may not be exhausted, but I am.