The motion of planetary bodies is the archetypal clockwork system. Indeed, clocks and calendars were developed to keep track of the relative motions of the Earth, the Sun, and the Moon. However, studies over the past few decades imply that this predictable regularity does not extend to small bodies, nor does it apply to the precise trajectories of the planets themselves over long timescales. [S...

Animals have evolved many season-specific behavioural and physiological adaptations that allow them to both cope with and exploit the cyclic annual environment. Two classes of endogenous annual timekeeping mechanisms enable animals to track, anticipate and prepare for the seasons: a timer that measures an interval of several months and a clock that oscillates with a period of approximately a ye...

It is widely accepted that the traditional culture of Aboriginal Australians has a signi cant astronomical component, but it is unclear whether this component extended beyond ceremonial songs and stories. Here I summarise a growing body of evidence that there was a deep understanding of the motion of objects in the sky, that this knowledge was used for practical purposes such as constructing ca...