Name: 追逐春分！(完整集) | 紀錄片特輯 | 國家地理頻道 (Chasing the Equinox (Full Episode) | DOCUMENTARY SPECIAL | National Geographic)
Uploaded: 2026-03-19T17:02:16.000Z
Duration: 44 min 25 s

Hidden in the world's iconic monuments is an incredible ancient knowledge of the Sun.

在世界各地標誌性的建築裡，藏著關於太陽令人驚嘆的古代知識。

情態副詞

This connection with the sun and the sky is actually timeless.

這份與太陽和天空的連結，其實是永恆的。

基礎被動語態

Twice a year, as light breaks across the Earth, their secrets are revealed.

一年兩次，當光線劃破大地時，它們的祕密就會被揭曉。

This entire space is engineered around this one moment in time.

這整個空間都是為了這個關鍵時刻而精心設計的。

Across thousands of years and unrelated civilizations, ancient monuments unite in perfect alignment to the Sun.

跨越數千年和不同文明，古代建築都與太陽完美對齊，展現了它們的共通之處。

On the same single day, the equinox, they go and build these fantastic temples, unique in the world.

在同一個日子，也就是春分/秋分，他們建造了這些獨一無二、舉世無雙的奇妙廟宇。

So there must be a driving force, each a miracle of engineering and astronomy.

所以一定有個驅動的力量，每一座都是工程學和天文學的奇蹟。

With the technology that they had at the time, it's amazing how much they could have achieved.

以當時的技術來說，他們能達成這麼多事情真的很不可思議。

But how did the ancient astronomers create this global event, the human race, in a simultaneous celebration of the sun on the equinox.

但古代天文學家是如何創造出這個全球性的事件，讓人類在春分/秋分這一天，同時慶祝太陽的呢？

Today is the equinox, an event that happens only twice a year, when day and night are almost the same length.

今天是春分/秋分，一年只有兩次的時刻，這時候白天和黑夜的時間差不多一樣長。

All over the world, Southeast Asia waits for the Sun.

全世界，東南亞都在等待太陽。

Huge crowds gather at the world famous temple of Angkor Wat.

大批人群聚集在世界聞名的吳哥窟。

They've come to witness an ancient but spectacular special effect.

他們來見證一個古老卻壯觀的特效。

The sun is up and rising just to the east behind the central tower.

太陽升起，正從中央塔樓後方的東方冉冉升起。

But the real moment of truth is still to.

The sun is important in all cultures, particularly in ancient cultures, because the sun is the thing that allows people to survive.

太陽在所有文化中都很重要，尤其是在古代文化中，因為太陽是讓人們得以生存的關鍵。

It's not a coincidence that it has been deified in ancient cultures throughout the globe.

全球各地的古代文化都將太陽神化，這絕非巧合。

我們仍然覺得這種連結非常深刻。

Every society that we have studied all over the world and since prehistory, seems to have had an interest in the sun, the moon or the stars.

我們研究過的全球各地、從史前時代至今的每個社會，似乎都對太陽、月亮或星星感興趣。

And on the equinox, our human obsession with the sun is revealed in ancient sites around the world.

而在春分/秋分這一天，我們人類對太陽的著迷，在世界各地的古代遺址中顯露無遺。

2,000 miles to the west, the windows of the Indian temple of Sri Padmanabhaswamy frame the setting sun with exquisite precision.

往西兩千英里，印度斯里帕德馬納巴斯瓦米寺的窗戶，以精緻的精準度框住了落日。

In Egypt, more visual fireworks from the setting sun as it merges into the shoulder of the Sphinx.

在埃及，落日與獅身人面像的肩膀融合，呈現出更視覺化的煙火。

With the pyramid of Khafri directly behind.

In Europe, the megalithic temples of Manajra predate the pyramids by a thousand years.

在歐洲，馬納加巨石廟宇的年代比金字塔早了一千年。

Here, too, is a solar phenomenon that occurs only on the equinox in the Americas.

在這裡，美洲也出現了一種只在春分/秋分發生的太陽現象。

At Chichen Itza in Mexico, dating back 1,000 years, an hour long light show as a snake in shadow form slithers down the side of the snake God's temple.

在墨西哥的奇琴伊察，這個有千年歷史的地方，會上演一場長達一小時的光影秀，一條影子蛇沿著蛇神廟的側面蜿蜒而下。

Peoples from different continents, centuries and cultures all independently celebrated the Sun.

來自不同大陸、不同世紀、不同文化的人們，都獨立地慶祝太陽。

They were keen observers of natural cycles, keen observers of what was happening in the sky.

他們是自然週期、是天空中發生之事敏銳的觀察者。

And they built that knowledge into these structures themselves.

他們也將這些知識融入了這些建築裡。

When we examine these sites, what we see is not just the skill that these cultures had, but

當我們檢視這些地方時，我們看到的，不只是這些文化擁有的技巧，

also the importance of time and astronomy and the sun in human life.

還有時間、天文學和太陽在人類生活中扮演的重要角色。

It's mind boggling that they had the capability to make these monuments.

他們有能力建造這些紀念碑，這真是太令人驚嘆了。

In the modern world, it's easy to forget that since the dawn of humanity, every culture on Earth has relied on the sun.

在現代社會，我們很容易忘記，自人類誕生以來，地球上每個文化都依賴著太陽。

Prehistoric societies before the invention of writing or farming were already interested in the sky.

在文字或農業發明之前的史前社會，就已經對天空感興趣了。

And we find evidence for that all over the world.

而我們在世界各地都能找到證據。

Only astronomy makes a reliable calendar possible.

只有天文學才能製作出可靠的日曆。

You can't perform agricultural farming practices, you can't sow, you can't plow, unless you know what time in the year it is.

你無法進行農業耕作，無法播種，無法耕犁，除非你知道一年中的哪個時間。

They had to know the movement of the sun in order to be able to survive.

他們必須知道太陽的運行軌跡才能生存。

In summer, the northern hemisphere tilts towards the sun and the days are longer.

夏天時，北半球會朝向太陽傾斜，白天也就變長了。

In winter, it's tilted away and it's cold and dark.

冬天則相反，會遠離太陽，又冷又暗。

But when the seasons change, the sun is directly over the equator and both halves of the planet face our star equally.

但當季節轉換時，太陽會直接位於赤道正上方，地球的兩半都能平等地朝向我們的恆星。

Everywhere on Earth, day and night are Almost the same length, 12 hours.

在地球的任何地方，白天和黑夜的長度幾乎都一樣，都是12小時。

The word equinox comes from the Latin equinoctium, which encapsulates the idea that the night has the same length as the day.

"equinox" 這個詞來自拉丁文 equinoctium，它概括了晝夜長度相等的概念。

You come out of the darkness of the winter and your days now from the equinox onwards, start to grow and become longer because light brings life.

你從冬天的黑暗中走出來，從春分/秋分開始，你的白天會逐漸變長，因為光明帶來生命。

The equinox is the reaffirmation that the world is waking up, the cosmos is waking up again, the Earth is waking up again, and

春分/秋分是重申世界正在甦醒，宇宙正在甦醒，地球正在甦醒，

Ancient civilizations developed the astronomical knowledge to plot the sun's movements with precision, and

古代文明發展出了精確描繪太陽運行軌跡的天文學知識，

then the engineering skills to celebrate those movements in stone.

然後是將這些運行軌跡用石頭慶祝的工程技術。

神祕之處在於他們是怎麼做到的？

Sarah Klassen, the alignment with the sun at the equinox is one of the most spectacular features of the temple at Angkor Wat.

Sarah Klassen 來說，在春分/秋分時與太陽對齊，是吳哥窟寺廟最壯觀的特色之一。

Sarah is using new technology to discover the secrets of ancient structures.

Sarah 正在運用新科技來發掘古代建築的祕密。

This is a total station and we use it in the field to collect very high precision geographical location for points of interest, so we can use it for architecture like here at Angkor Wat, that we can then load into a computer to understand how the temple was built, what angles, what the different lengths are between the different features.

這是一臺全站儀，我們在現場用它來收集興趣點的超高精度地理位置，這樣我們就可以用它來進行建築測量，就像在吳哥窟這裡一樣，然後將這些資料載入電腦，以瞭解寺廟是如何建造的，角度是多少，不同結構之間的長度差異是多少。

The temple of Angkor wat was built 800 years ago by Emperor Suryavarman II and stood at the heart of his empire.

吳哥窟寺廟是 800 年前由蘇利耶跋摩二世皇帝建造的，矗立在他帝國的心臟地帶。

We can tell that the ancient Khmer were extremely sophisticated when it came to their engineering, both in terms of the scale and the precision of the types of things that they engineered.

我們可以說，古代高棉人在工程技術方面極其精湛，無論是在規模上還是他們所建造事物的精確度上。

It's on the equinox that this sophistication becomes clear.

正是在春分/秋分這一天，這種精湛的技術才變得清晰可見。

Angkor is aligned towards the rising equinox sun.

吳哥窟是朝向正在升起的春分/秋分太陽而建造的。

One set of grid lines runs north to south.

The others run west to east into the rising equinox sun.

其他網格線則是東西向，朝向正升起的春分/秋分太陽。

From the western gate, a dead straight avenue leads directly to the heart of the temple.

從西門進去，一條筆直的大道直通寺廟中心。

But modern measurements reveal that the alignment is not quite due east.

但現代測量顯示，這個方位並非正東方。

The one thing that's really unusual about Angkor is it's not built exactly on the cardinal direction.

吳哥窟最特別的地方在於，它並非完全依照正北方、正南方、正東方、正西方來建造。

For these ancient masters of geometry, half a degree would be a huge margin of error.

對這些古代幾何學大師來說，半度會是很大的誤差範圍。

It's a deliberate stroke of mathematical genius.

這是一次深思熟慮的數學天才之舉。

We think they did this so that during the equinox, the sun would rise directly over that central temple.

我們認為他們這麼做是為了讓太陽在春分時，正好從中央塔樓的正上方升起。

The trick is that the equinox sun rises at due east, but

巧妙之處在於，春分的太陽是從正東方升起，但

in the minutes it takes to rise to the height of the tower, it also moves right across the sky, half a degree off due east.

在它升到塔樓高度的幾分鐘內，它也會偏離正東方半度，橫跨天空。

If the tower was due east, the sun would be out of line when it reached the top.

如果塔樓位在正東方，太陽升到頂部時就會對不準。

所以建築師的解決方案很簡單。

They rotated the entire layout to compensate by exactly half a degree to create an alignment between the western gate, the top of the tower, and

他們將整個佈局旋轉，精確補償了半度，以便在西門、塔頂和

the sun on the day of the equinox is huge amount of skill.

春分當天的太陽之間形成對齊，這展現了極高的技巧。

Eight centuries later, it's still a calculated mathematical miracle, one that proves the equinox was a vital moment for which the entire temple was constructed.

八個世紀後，這仍然是一個經過計算的數學奇蹟，證明瞭春分是一個至關重要的時刻，整個寺廟就是為此建造的。

The beauty of Angkor Wat is in the mathematics of it.

吳哥窟的美在於它的數學計算。

It looks and feels like everything was minutely planned and detailed to a mathematical level of precision.

它看起來和感覺起來，就像一切都經過了細緻的規劃和詳細設計，達到了數學級別的精確度。

After working here for over five years, it's really exciting to kind of finally be here for this moment that this entire structure was built around.

在這裡工作了五年多，終於能親眼見證這個建築物建造的核心時刻，真的太令人興奮了。

The energy of the crowd, all the excitement of everyone being here.

現場的氣氛，大家齊聚一堂的興奮感。

A fraction, half a degree makes all the difference.

差了零點幾度，就會有很大的差別。

To actually capture the sun right at the top of the central tower of Angkor.

捕捉到陽光正好在吳哥窟中央塔樓頂端的那一刻。

They were using the sun to make a statement about their own beliefs and in this case, their own power and their place in the cosmos.

他們利用太陽來闡述自己的信仰，以及他們自身的權力與在宇宙中的地位。

The temples that we see today are not what the temple would have looked like in the past.

我們今天看到的寺廟，跟過去的樣子已經不一樣了。

The temple may have been coated entirely in gold, so you can imagine what it would look like with the sun rising over the central tower.

這座寺廟可能曾全身覆蓋著黃金，你可以想像日出時陽光照耀在中央塔樓上的景象。

The Emperor's architects had got it right to the last tiny detail.

皇帝的建築師們，連最細微的細節都掌握得恰到好處。

Angkor Wat is one of the world's greatest ancient sites, but

吳哥窟是世界上最偉大的古代遺址之一，

just one of many across the Earth that celebrate the equinox sun with a spectacular light show.

但它只是地球上眾多慶祝春分/秋分太陽的壯觀光影秀之一。

As the equinox sun leaves Cambodia, it continues its journey around the globe.

隨著春分/秋分太陽離開高棉，它繼續環繞地球的旅程。

In Kerala, 2000 miles to the west, on the south coast of India, the crowds have to wait for sunset to witness the effect.

在西邊兩千英里外的喀拉拉邦，印度南海岸，人群必須等到日落才能見證這個景象。

The stunning temple of Sri Padmanabhaswamy has a beautifully carved tower dated 400 years after Angkor Watts.

令人驚嘆的斯里帕德馬納巴斯瓦米寺廟，有一座雕刻精美的塔樓，比吳哥窟晚了四百年。

Through its series of precisely aligned windows, the equinox sun sinks into the west like an elevator, lighting up stories at five minute intervals.

透過一系列精確對齊的窗戶，春分/秋分太陽像電梯一樣沉入西方，每五分鐘照亮一層樓。

Another quarter of the way around the world.

In ancient Egypt, the setting of equinox sun hits two of the most iconic structures on earth.

在古埃及，春分/秋分太陽的落下，照射到地球上兩個最具標誌性的建築。

The Great Sphinx of Giza and the pyramid of Khafre are both believed to have been built 4,500 years ago.

吉薩獅身人面像和卡夫拉金字塔，據信都是在四千五百年前建造的。

On the equinox, the setting sun merges into the Sphinx's shoulder with the pyramid of Khafre behind.

在春分/秋分這天，落日餘暉與卡夫拉金字塔一同融入獅身人面像的肩膀。