What else is it?
2011-01-11
Oort
as in "Oort Cloud", named after Jan Hendrik Oort. The Oort cloud is a large 'reservoir' of comets and similar small bodies around 2,000 to 5,000 AU (but there are estimates that put the outer limit much, much further away - beyond a lightyear). It essentially the junk left over from the vast pile of matter that collapsed to form the Sun. More info from Wikipedia, or images via Google. The Oort cloud is a convenient and reasonable solution to various conundra that supports observations about the solar system today.
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rusted old pulleys, links, and similar objects inexplicably embedded in rock on beaches, near ancient river crossings etc. applies to any examples that can only reasonably have been created by the rock forming after the Oort mechanism fell out of use. hence "old as oort", or "eccentric oort object".
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