[nabla9]

>.. are aligned.

Only on Mercator projection that is younger than many of the sites on the line.

Oder of things:

1. There were bunch of monasteries (not cathedrals), not aligned on any direct line.

2. Mercator invented a projection.

3. Someone looked at map using Mercator a projection and invented story about ley lines.

[jameshart]

The Mercator projection has the property that lines on it are of constant bearing. You don’t need a map projection to follow a line of constant bearing - you just need to head towards the point where the same star rises every night (mostly. Over a short enough number of nights, it works, anyway).

[nabla9]

Nobody could have discovered that these points are in the line of constant bearing without maps.

(hiking in straight line and jumping into boat at the point where land ends is not how people travel)

[unholiness]

> Only on Mercator projection that is younger than many of the sites on the line.

People have been specifying locations in terms of NS/EW coordinates since the greeks. Celestial navigation ensures we always have a clear idea where north is, and when two locations are at the same latitude. It's the most natural way we've understood and discussed far-away places.

I don't think it's fair to say mercator invented this projection so much as he famously published maps which used it.

(btw, I agree this line is a complete retrospective coincidence, just not with this particular argument)

[nabla9]

Just like weberer you seem to think that there is only one projection of earth into 2d map.

Mercator is special projection that was not used before him. Different projections give different distortions.

[weberer]

I think too much weight in this discussion is given to the Mercator projection since that's the specific one we use today. People were making 2D maps for much longer than that. Flat maps existed in the medieval era.

[nabla9]

All maps on paper are flat. There are multiple projections into 2d map.

There is no reason to assume that the lines align in other projections.

[Maken]

You are right, not all the temples in the "line" are cathedrals, which does make the entire story less credible.

[jfengel]

"Cathedral" is a very specific kind of church, but not necessarily all that significant. It's where they happened to have centered a local bishopric. (A cathedra is a chair, specifically one that a bishop sits in.)

So there are a lot of magnificent churches that aren't cathedrals (Sagrada Familia, Westminster Abbey, St. Peter's in the Vatican), and a lot of cathedrals that are actually rather dull architecturally.

[Maken]

Precisely cathedrals are rare enough that seven of them in a line dedicated to the same archangel could no be a coincidence. I bet you can make similar lines if you look for churchess and sanctuaries dedicated to another important saint or saintess.