Sunday 31 October 2010

Lapis Lazuli

I received a beautiful birthday gift from a very dear friend - a Lapis Lazuli pendant.

Lapis Lazuli is for Truth, Enlightenment and Developing Psychic Gifts.

What Is Lapis
Lapis Lazuli Stones resonate with the vibration of truth and enlightenment... and are powerful intense blue stones for opening the third eye and stimulating the pineal gland. This may intensify the growth of psychic abilities, intuition, and channelling.

These stones have been prized since antiquity, as they are one of the most beautiful blue crystals sold... and resonate with the energy of the inner king or queen... and are historically stones of royalty.

History of Lapis
Lapis Lazuli has remained popular over thousands of years.... and dates back a long way in ancient history, to 3000 BC... and the time of the Pharaohs. It is known to have been highly valued by the ancient Egyptians... as beautiful Egyptian amulets and pieces of semi-precious jewelry made from Lapis Lazuli stone were discovered in the tomb of the Egyptian Pharaoh, King Tutankhamun.

Classic texts have documented the facts that the people of those ancient times placed great value on these beautiful blue stones. They may have believed them to be holy stones... and those who lived at the time felt it created feelings of peace and harmony and brought them the gift of wisdom.

From the Bible... one of the stones in the breastplate of the High Priest in Jerusalem, was Lapis. Part of the Book of the Dead was written on a slab of Lapis Lazuli.... and it was a stone denoting Royalty....and spirituality.

Where Does It Come From
Some of the best Lapis comes from Afghanistan... but it has also been found in Italy, Egypt, Chile, Russia and the USA. Its name come from the Persian word 'Lazur' meaning 'blue stone'... as the best Lapis has always been of a lovely blue color. Many of the best deposits have been mined out.... so top quality stone is beginning to become hard to get... so some stone on the market may be of a lower quality.

This stone takes a beautiful polish so it is very popular. It comes in a variety of different colors... caused by a variety of inclusions which make this stone so unique. It is an opaque predominantly blue stone... and contains inclusions of white calcite and silvery pyrite... so there are quite a few color variations of Lapis Lazuli stone available. The more blue in the stone... the more valued it has always been.

Why Would You Use It
Lapis is a prominent third eye chakra stone.... that will develop your intuition as well as amplifying and expanding psychic visions and clairvoyant abilities. Used at the third eye...it may initiate psychic powers... as it will activate the pineal gland and open your connections to spirit.

By opening the third eye it will bring through enhanced visionary abilities and allow you to unlock your imagination. Like most blue stones... Lapis will stimulate and activate the throat chakra.

It has a strong and unique energy that may challenge many people... and this makes Lapis an amazingly powerful stone for spiritual growth and spiritual health.

As it is a highly spiritual stone.... it will work through the fifth chakra to aid your creative and psychic communication abilities.... in alignment with Divine Will.

It is powerful to create depth and clarity in your thinking and in your communications. It may be called a truth crystal... as it also ensures that the words you speak are in alignment with your personal truth.

Lapis Lazuli stones are highly valued for their beauty... but their alchemical value is also very important. Most of us understand the idea and value of truth... but many are unsure of enlightenment.

So what is this concept "enlightenment" and what is the role of Lapis?

The vibration of Lapis Lazuli aids you to develop a profound conviction and depth of faith... along with an understanding of your own spirituality... and the challenges that come your way. From this comes enlightenment... an immediate and often startling discovery of your own understanding of your spiritual journey... and self confidence and belief in this discovery.

Wearing Lapis Lazuli Crystal
Lapis Lazuli crystal makes beautiful jewelry... that will both balance your inner self with your external self.... and relax you. It may be an aid to heal weakness within the thyroid gland and throat. It is such a beautiful stone that many people choose to wear it as jewelry.

If you do buy Lapis Lazuli jewelry... and are concerned whether you may react to it... wear it for shorter periods until you adapt to it. It is a stone that has many benefits...so it is worth persisting with.

As an alternative to jewelry... it is easy to buy pieces of Lapis stone in many different sizes and types. The main thing to remember is to use the stone... so that you may benefit from its unique energy.

It is a zodiac birthstone for quite a few months... including being a Libra birthstone, and a Taurus, Scorpio and Sagittarius birthstone... so you are sure to find lovely birthstone jewelry pieces, in a wide range of styles and prices to suit.

How To Use It
Lapis Lazuli is a useful stone to wear as it is said to relieve anger and negative thoughts... as well as easing frustrations causing the anger. If you keep it within the area of the throat chakra or third eye chakra... it will accentuate the energy in this area ... for the highest use of its vibration.

The vibration of Lapis earrings work well.... as worn at the ears... they are located close to the third eye as well as within the throat chakra. Lovely Lapis pendants worn near the throat are also very effective to stimulate psychic abilities.

Its capacity to stimulate the development of psychic gifts makes it a stone that will be in demand. Using Lapis Lazuli stones in meditation is very powerful... and is very helpful to aid you to learn to be psychic.

Some people may find it too strong for them to use for long periods straight up.... yet others adapt quickly. This stone is very stimulating... sometimes too much....but it is an individual thing.

By starting to use it only during your daily meditation... then working up to using it for longer periods... you may avoid it impacting you too strongly. By assimilating it more slowly... you can adapt to its energies and avoid feeling uncomfortable.

Tansy
x


Information from http://www.healing-crysals-for-you.com/

Saturday 30 October 2010

Preseli Bluestone

Lately I have been drawn to Merlin, everywhere I turn I find him, today was no different. I was gifted a wonderful piece of Preseli Bluestone – the stone that the inner Stonehenge circle is made from. So I did some research…

Around 2100 BC the Preseli Bluestones were brought from West Wales to Stonehenge and erected in a circle (the X and Y Holes). Around 100 years later, this first Bluestone circle was dismantled and work began on the final stage of the site. The Bluestones were rearranged in the horseshoe and circle that we can still see today.

Information from www.britannia.com:

Although we now believe that we know how the stones were erected, the reason why the Bluestones were brought from over 250 miles away from the Preseli Hills in Pembrokeshire, West Wales has remained a mystery. There has been much speculation and research as to how the feat was achieved.

The mythology attached to the moving of the Preseli Bluestones to Stonehenge has been attributed to the magic of Merlin. In Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia, Aurelius Ambrosius sends his brother Uther to bring the Giant's Dance from Mount Killaraus in Ireland, at the suggestion of Merlin, to be used as a memorial for the dead slain in the Night of the Long Knives. It is probable that this account contains a trace of an oral tradition that the stones were transported from a great distance, over water, by 'superhuman' powers. At this time, the Preseli Hills were ruled over by the Kings of Ireland. However, the Merlin talked about in the 12th Century and the Merlin of the Welsh legends supposedly existed during the Dark Ages, some 4,000 years after the Bluestones were moved.

To medieval man in Geoffrey of Monmouth's time, the stones were so huge and unwieldy that none of their own engineering techniques would have been capable of moving or erecting them, so it is only natural that they believed that such an undertaking was a magical one. As Arthur C Clarke said "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic", although perhaps in this case it should be considered as any sufficiently different technology.

One current theory speculates that the stones were dragged by roller and sledge from the inland Preseli Hills to the sea at Milford Haven. From there they were sailed along the Welsh south coast to Bristol, then up the Avon to a point near what is now Frome in Somerset. From there the stones were probably pulled overland to a place near what is now Warminster in Wiltshire and then floated down River Wylye to Salisbury, up the Salisbury part of the Avon river to West Amesbury, near Stonehenge.

In 2000 a group of local volunteers from Pembrokeshire gathered to attempt to re-enact this ancestral journey by moving one three-ton Preseli Bluestone block from its source in the Preseli Hills to Stonehenge as a Millennium Project. The idea was to use wooden rollers for the land routes and a curach raft for the sea route from Milford Haven to Bristol and then to take it up the River Avon with the final overland journey to Salisbury Plain. Unfortunately the design of the raft failed and the project was abandoned through lack of funds.

In fact, this was not the first time that such a project had been undertaken. In 1954, the boys from Bryanston and Canford Schools in Dorset attempted a similar feat. They moved a four-ton concrete block over a short distance of land and floated it to show that such a thing was possible. Another recent Stonehenge project was the raising of a 40-tonne trilithon made out of concrete that a team of engineers successfully completed for the BBC series "Secrets of Lost Civilisations", using the ancient technology of levers and wooden A frames.

There are still some academics who believe that the stones were moved by glaciation as 'erratics', but our having recently submitted Preseli Bluestones to geological analysis and that of previous researchers concludes there is no doubt that all of the 45 Bluestones left at Stonehenge come from the Preseli Hills, with each stone identifiable to specific areas of those hills and they have no glaciation markings on them. There are certainly no other stones on Salisbury Plain showing glaciation markings. The environmental archaeology of the area also disputes this geological theory (see Boscombe Bowmen).

The 45 remaining stones at Stonehenge, now called Bluestones, are in fact a mixture of spotted dolerite, blue dolerite, rhyolite, volcanic ash and one of Cocheston sandstone (which is a pale green stone studded with garnets). This particular stone is commonly called 'The Altar Stone' and also has its source near Preseli. It would thus seem that they had a very particular 'shopping list' when they chose their stones, although the effort in obtaining them was considerable. Of course, there is no reason to suppose that these primitive people were not able to harness the use of beasts of burden to move the stones across land and so the difficulties of the movement and the erection of the stones are now overcome but we are still left with the question why? Why these stones? Now at last, after 5,000 years, we believe that we have uncovered this part of the mystery.

The geological name for Preseli Bluestone is Dolerite which is an intrusive volcanic rock of plagioclase feldspar and is in fact harder than granite. Forms of dolerite are found all over the world and were used for making tools to work on granite statues in ancient Egypt. Polished Bluestone axe-heads from Preseli have also been found but whether these were ceremonial axe-heads or actually used as tools is unknown. In 2001 I discovered a memorial stone in the Preseli Hills which had been polished and then, during a geological survey, the Bluestones were cut open and then the proverbial penny dropped. Inside the stones we found feldspar crystal formations and mica. When polished, the stone looks like the night sky studded with stars and now, having seen its beauty when polished, it seemed obvious to me that this was reason enough to move them and erect a circle of them. The ancient Egyptians revered Lapis Lazuli (Blue Stone) for the same reason.

The Preseli Hills themselves are crisscrossed with ley lines, ancient trackways, standing stones, burial chambers and stone circles and the hills sparkle with shining white crystal quartz. Even during early Christian times, the place was considered almost as holy as Jerusalem and Rome. This is also the land of Druids who still continue this 5,000-year old tradition of building stone circles in Wales each year for their National Eisteddfods.

Locally, the stones are considered as stones of healing and magical and as stated in the early Welsh mythologies, such as the Red Book of Hergest and the Black Book of Carmarthen, Merlin transported some of them to build Camelot, thus Preseli is Merlin and Arthur territory, home to the fairies and gods of the Underworld.

Tansy
x

Thursday 28 October 2010

Samhain

What is Samhain?
Samhain is known by most people as Halloween, but for Witches and Pagans it's considered a Sabbat to honor the ancestors who came before us.

The most magical night of the year. Exactly opposite Beltane on the wheel of the year, Samhain is Beltane's dark twin. A night of glowing jack-o-lanterns, bobbing for apples, tricks or treats, and dressing in costume. A night of ghost stories and seances, tarot card readings and scrying with mirrors. A night of power, when the veil that separates our world from the Otherworld is at its thinnest.

Religious scholars agree that the word Samhain (pronounced "sow-en") comes from the Gaelic “Samhuin". The Celts called it Samhain, which means 'summer's end', according to their ancient two-fold division of the year, when summer ran from Beltane to Samhain and winter ran from Samhain to Beltane. According to the later four-fold division of the year, Samhain is seen as 'autumn's end' and the beginning of winter.

Around the eighth century or so, the Catholic Church decided to use November 1st as All Saints Day. This was actually a pretty smart move on their part – the local pagans were already celebrating that day anyway, so it made sense to use it as a church holiday. All Saints’ became the festival to honor any saint who didn’t already have a day of his or her own. The mass which was said on All Saints’ was called Allhallowmas – the mass of all those who are hallowed. The night before naturally became known as All Hallows Eve, and eventually morphed into what we call Halloween.

The Witch's New Year:
Sunset on Samhain is the beginning of the Celtic New Year. The old year has passed, the harvest has been gathered, cattle and sheep have been brought in from the fields, and the leaves have fallen from the trees. The earth slowly begins to die around us.

This is a good time for us to look at wrapping up the old and preparing for the new in our lives. Think about the things you did in the last twelve months. Have you left anything unresolved? If so, now is the time to wrap things up. Once you’ve gotten all that unfinished stuff cleared away, and out of your life, then you can begin looking towards the next year.

Honoring the Ancestors:
For some of us, Samhain is when we honor our ancestors who came before us. If you’ve ever done genealogy research, or if you’ve had a loved one die in the past year, this is the perfect night to celebrate their memory. If we’re fortunate, they will return to communicate with us from beyond the veil, and offer advice, protection and guidance for the upcoming year.

Customs:
Perhaps the most famous icon of the holiday is the jack-o-lantern. Various authorities attribute it to either Scottish or Irish origin. However, it seems clear that it was used as a lantern by people who traveled the road this night, the scary face to frighten away spirits or faeries who might otherwise lead one astray. Set on porches and in windows, they cast the same spell of protection over the household. (The American pumpkin seems to have forever superseded the European gourd as the jack-o-lantern of choice.)

Bobbing for apples may well represent the remnants of a Pagan 'baptism' rite called a 'seining', according to some writers. The water-filled tub is a latter-day Cauldron of Regeneration, into which the novice's head is immersed.

The custom of dressing in costume and 'trick-or-treating' is of Celtic origin. However, there are some important differences from the modern version. In the first place, the custom was not relegated to children, but was actively indulged in by adults as well. Also, the 'treat' which was required was often one of spirits (the liquid variety). And in ancient times, the roving bands would sing seasonal carols from house to house, making the tradition very similar to Yuletide wassailing. In fact, the custom known as 'caroling', now connected exclusively with mid-winter, was once practiced at all the major holidays.

Finally, in Scotland at least, the tradition of dressing in costume consisted almost exclusively of cross-dressing (i.e., men dressing as women, and women as men). It seems as though ancient societies provided an opportunity for people to 'try on' the role of the opposite gender for one night of the year.

To Witches, Halloween is one of the four High Holidays, or Greater Sabbats, or cross-quarter days. Because it is the most important holiday of the year, it is sometimes called 'THE Great Sabbat.'

Samhain Blessings
Tansy
x


The image I have used here is available as a card from:
http://www.goddessandgreenman.co.uk/

Wednesday 27 October 2010

Selenite & Fluorite

I have been gifted the most beautiful selenite wand with a fluorite tip – it is gorgeous!

Selenite
Selenite is a variety of Gypsum, a common mineral found in sedimentary rocks. It is formed through the evaporation of salt water from ancient seas. Its essence as salt resonates with our own salt water bodies in the most primal fashion. It resonates with all human beings.


Selenite looks like ice clear or partly cloudy, striated, fine, delicate crystals. It is extremely soft as a salt crystal would be and is fragile. In fact you can scratch it with your fingernail. It is found in the sunshine, in the desert and thrives on light. It is not meant to be kept in a box or drawer but is a carrier of light energy.

Even thinking negative thoughts or handling it roughly will cause it to splinter or break. Selenite is usually striated meaning the long lines running along the length of the crystal, channel high energy through the crystal from the sun and other sources of light. It is nature’s own transceiver, natures own fiber optic crystal which is able to conduct light like those pretty fiber optic lamps that are so popular. This quality proves that it is also is the fiber pathway for the Light of Spirit.

Selenite exists at the doorway between spirit and nature. It is the fiber holding these two worlds in communication with each other and is a receiver for information from the causal plane. It provides its owner with more facility to reach these planes and communicate with the higher spiritually evolved beings, masters and teachers who are willing to use Selenite as a means of communication.

It has such a high frequency that its physical manifestation is quite fluid. Selenite brings Light into the subtlest of things manifested. It bends pure white light to manifest things on the earth planes.

Selenite comes originally from ancient oceans and seas. So it is a water element just as the emotions are associated with the element water. . It has been found that Selenite has a direct effect upon balancing the emotions. Selenite goes to a higher level and activates our spiritual feeing sense, our inner sense of feeling. Selenite has been attributed with the power to stabilize the 4 body system (physical, mental, emotional, spiritual) using spiritual light force
That feeling of complete balance when you are in a very spiritual state of calm and joy. That is the sense of spiritual light force that Selenite can bring to you. And in this feeling, this state, you are connected to the causal self experience.


Selenite is able to balance and lift you above your emotional feelings to the feelings of the soul as it emanates from our hearts.

Selenite can increase the frequency of physical matter to a more spiritual plane as well as lower the frequency of light into a more physical plane. Yes, it becomes a bridge between the spiritual and physical. It can create new electrical synapses with your own physical body allowing your light body to manifest more clearly for you in this physical world. Selenite light transmission will eventually strengthen and change your nervous system and other organs to allow the messages of non physical planes to manifest in the third dimension.

This crystal is not to be used without understanding and care. Many changes will occur within your 4 body system, that is physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. You must desire this transmission of light energy and be ready to process these changes into your being. If you are meant to work with this crystal, you will feel the calling to do so.

Selenite’s beautiful and rare clarity can be used to balance the mind and bring light rays into any environment.

Selenite can be used to send messages and images too. Select a thought or image you wish to send to a particular person and then holding a piece of Selenite to your third eye as you intend for this to occur. This is a wonderful way to send healing and protection to family, friends, groups, populations or the world at large.

Selenite in crystal healing is also used in assisting the death process to release connections between the physical and emotional bodies and the spiritual body.

As you sit with your Selenite and learn more and more about it and how to use it you may notice that it bends or waves or curls or changes color before your very eyes. You are seeing into a 5th dimensional plane when you look into Selenite, the causal plane, the place where your guides and teachers come to teach you, where you see the world from without, where you stand in the presence of all things as one thing and realize your connection to the Source.

The Causal Plane:
This body resonates at a higher frequency than the mental body. This is the place where we begin abstract thought. We need to balanced in the first three bodies to reach any mastery here. The beginnings of reaching the causal state happen in your spiritual body. We all start out with an awareness of our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual bodies. Your spiritual body also needs to be balanced to reach the causal state. This is the place where, when we are balanced, we can get an overview of those things happening around us both in the physical world and in the mental world. We reach a place that is over our normal emotions, over our physical selves, over our own mental selves to see the bigger picture and understand things more deeply. It is easier to make better decisions from here. It is easier to see why people believe what they do and how their beliefs affect their lives. It is a place of non judgment here. There is no room for judgment because that yanks you right off the tower and back down to your mental body. There is no room for emotional poor me stuff because that yanks you right back to your emotional body. There is no room for physical over-stimulation or tiredness as that yanks you right off the fire tower and into your physical body.


It is from here that the Shaman can make contact with his or her guides, totems and teachers. This is the state required while sitting at the entrance to the inner worlds that you wish to accomplish.

Flourite
Fluorite is a mineral composed of Calcium Fluoride.
Chakras - Heart Chakra, Throat Chakra, Third Eye Chakra

Fluorite cleanses and stabilises the aura. It absorbs and neutralises negative energy and stress. An excellent learning aid, Fluorite increases our powers of concentration, self-confidence and helps us in decision-making. It encourages positivity, balances the energies, and improves balance and coordination, both physically and mentally.

Fluorite boosts the immune system, stimulates the regeneration of cells, particularly in the skin and respiratory tract, and heals ulcers and wounds. Fluorite strengthens bone tissue, and alleviates rheumatism, arthritis and spinal injuries. It improves the discomfort of shingles and other nerve-related pain.

Fluorite promotes spiritual and psychic wholeness and development, truth, protection, and brings peace. It protects psychically and in the physical realm. It helps one meditate and learn to go past the "chatter" that our minds tend to generate when first learning to meditate. It can help get rid of mental blocks and similar mental issues. Physically it helps general health throughout the body's main skeletal and muscular systems. All colours are also good for auric cleansing. Mixed colours bring enhanced protection in the areas enhanced by all combined types. Clear fluorite guards against psychic attack and strengthens consciousness. Purple fluorite strengthens mystical insight, psychic awareness, and can open the third eye. Green fluorite is an excellent all purpose healing stone that promotes healing on all levels. It also promotes self-love.

I am really looking forward to using this crystal wand in my channeling and shamanic courses.
Tansy
x

Sunday 24 October 2010

Werewolves

Werewolves

Belief in the werewolf probably dates back to Paleopagan times when the spirits of animals were both revered and feared. Further on in history, we discover that lycanthropy (werewolfism) finds its root name from Apollo Lycaeus (Wolfish Apollo), who was worshipped in the famous Lyceum or Wolf Temple where Socrates taught. Apollo was mated to Artemis, known in some mythos as the divine Wolf Bitch. The She Wolf was another aspect of the goddess trinity, and her legends move through various races and cultures. Significance here is placed on the belief that the goddess or god could shapeshift into an animal form. The werewolf legend of people turning into wolves and back again stems from this tribal belief.

Many myths, from Celtic Ireland through German, insist that if a person wears a wolf pelt, he or she can transform into the spirit beast. In Mercia during the tenth century AD, there was a revival of Pagan learning under two Druidic priests, one of whom was named Werewolf. This name of spirit wolf seems to have been applied to opponents of Chrisitanity in general. About 1000CE the word werewolf was taken to mean outlaw, probably with its association to the renegade Druid priest. Criminals were hanged beside wolves, and the Saxon word for gallows means wolf tree.

Another story traceable to wolf clan traditions, which may have its source in Germany is the story of Little Red Riding Hood. The red garment and the offering of food to a grandmother in the deep woods (the grandmother wore a wolf skin) are symbolic of devouring and resurrection. It is thought that a woven read hood was the distinguishing mark of a prophetess or priestess. As death and resurrection are a large portion of the early Samhain beliefs, it is no wonder we find werewolves associated with the holiday of Halloween.

Medieval tales of numerous executions in France and Germany show that it was as dangerous to be a werewolf as it was to be a Witch. Historical records indicate the torture and murder of several men and women who were made to confess that they had acquired this shapeshifting ability, naturally through a pact with the Christian devil. It is possible that serial killers are not all that modern (skipping Jack the Ripper of course) and that some of the earliest mass killers were considered vampires and werewolves, for killing without guilt is attributable to the animal condition, not the human one. We find the case of Peter Stubb, the infamous Werewolf of Cologne, accused of killing numerous women and children, to be one of the most frightening trials of an individual accused of actually being a werewolf. Two women, his daughter and his mistress, were sentenced as accomplices and Peter Stubb met an incredibly horrendous death at the hands of his judges, while the women suffered the fate of burning at the stake. Although this could be another urban legend gone wild – as with the Witch torture, hangings and burnings mentioned earlier, this might be the case of a real medieval serial killer. France appears to have the worst case of werewolf mania, where many people were burned during the sixteenth century, including suffers from porphyria (a genetic disease), rabies victims, ergot poisoning and of course the true criminal.

Were wolves have resided, many tribes around the world have associated great power and mysticism to the animal and in several cultures the wolf was not seen as a bad beast. In reality we know that the wolf is a highly social, intelligent, and friendly animal.

Tansy
x

Source – Halloween by Silver Ravenwolf

Saturday 23 October 2010

Black Cats

Black Cats

Our modern Halloween just wouldn’t be the same without the traditional pictures of the black cat – claws extended, back arched and tail fluffed. How did your kitties wander into Halloween?

We first find cat mythology in ancient goddess worship; the Teutonic Freya rode in a chariot drawn by cats, Artemis-Diana often appeared in cat form and of course we have the Egyptian deity Bast.

Domestic cats were not introduced into Northern Europe until after 1050 CE and the wild cat in Scotland sometimes cited by historians appears to be a wild hare. A language conversion might be responsible for this error.

White hares were thought to be sacred by the ancient Celts, and they believed that these animals could contain the souls of the dead who wished to visit the living. This does not mean they thought the rabbits were dead, but that the rabbit could be a vessel for a temporary and welcomed visitation. There is no evidence that the Celts believed in reincarnation or in permanent transmigration of the soul.

Checking history, we find only one fully developed centralized religion that honoured our feline friends. During the cat’s two thousand year incarnation in Egyptian history, the cat came to symbolize the goddess energy of the religion. The earliest known portrait of Bast was found in a temple of the fifth dynasty (about 3000BCE). When the people wanted a fierce goddess to protect them, they called on Sekhmet; when they wanted a gentler goddess or more personal assistance, they called upon Bast. The Egyptian trinity was known as Sekhmet-Bast-Ra.

The negative superstition tied to cats could have begun with the Romans when a foolish Roman soldier killed a cat and a mob broke into his house and removed him from this earthly plane. Several centuries later, the negative association with cats came from Inquisitor Nicholas Remy, who claimed that all cats were demons. In 1387 Lombard Witches were said to worship the devil as a cat and medieval Christians exposed cats to torture and fire along with Witches. At certain festivals, such as Midsummer, Easter and Shrove Tuesday, it was customary to burn cats in wicker cages in accordance with these church beliefs. The cats, however, appear to have gotten their revenge as the Black Death, a form of bubonic plague, killed over twenty seven million people during the Middle Ages. Had the church let the people keep their cats, the fleas (which carry the disease) on the rats may not have brought Europe to its knees.

The cat, with its association to goddess worship, was not a favourite of the Christian Church. As the church had already devalued women, subjecting human females to torture and murder, what was a mere cat? Once the early Christians got it into their heads that Witches could change themselves into cats, there was no stopping them. Trial after trial, women were tortured into babbling that they had turned themselves into these sleek and sneaky animals. The myth gained momentum and has continued to live in horror films of today.

As superstition began to abate in the 1930s and 40s, the black cat became a fun and familiar symbol of Halloween. Already linked for centuries to Witches, these furry friends vaulted into the limelight of Halloween parties without any difficulty at all. Once seen as unlucky visitors in any household, the modern Halloween feline does his or her duty by scaring away the nasties that go bump in the night. Cats, however like to show off their catches to their human mommies and daddies, so you might not want to open the door to see kitty’s surprise on Samhain Eve!.....

Tansy
x

Source – Halloween by Silver Ravenwolf

Thursday 21 October 2010

Skeletons and the Mexican Day of the Dead

Skeletons and the Mexican Day of the Dead

We can’t have Halloween without jiggling bones and skeletal leers. The fascination with skeletons dates back to the Paleopagans and later European mythos, where many tribal peoples preserved the heads or skulls of their ancestors, which were painted, dressed and displayed in prominent positions at clan gatherings, or were consulted as oracles with appropriate offerings. The doctorine of the church forbade the burial of a headless body and the custom eventually passed from practice, though in European households, shrines to the dead continued in use.

It is likely that our fascination with skeletons in our modern Halloween celebrations has a strong link with El Dia de los Muertos – the Day of the Dead – and the tossing of Mexican culture into the melting pot of America. This delightful celebration begins on the eve of October 31. Often called Los Dias de los Muertos (because more than one day is involved, depending on the local celebration) it is considered by many Mexicans to be their most important festival. Some scholars believe that the Mexican holiday is a conglomeration of Celtic, Catholic and Aztec mythos and when you look at the festival as a whole, you can see where that determination came from.

The Day of the Dead includes the belief held by the Aztecs that the souls of the dead returned to Mexico with the migration of the monarch butterfly each fall.

The word somber does not figure into this Mexican celebration, as this is a time of parades, brilliant costumes, feasting and the act of honouring the dead with love. The townspeople dress as skeletons, mummies, ghosts and ghouls, parading through town carrying an open coffin complete with a live passenger dressed as a corpse.

Skeletons and skulls abound, made from chocolate, bread, moulded sugar, and assorted candies. Handmade puppets, called calacas add to the fun and frivolity. Each family sets up an altar in their home to honour those who have passed away in their family or close friends. On November 1st family members go to the gravesite of their loved one and perform required maintenance such as weeding and raking. Some families go at night on October 31st with picnic baskets, candles and musical instruments to serenade the dead, remaining there until dawn breaks over the horizon.

In Texas, traditional names for the holiday reflect the difference between the Mexican holiday and the Tex Mex holiday. In Texas the day is called El Dia de los Difuntos (the Day of the Deceased) or El Dia de los Finados (the Day of the Finished and/or Departed). The Tex Mex remembrance of the dead acknowledges the importance of the deceased’s separation from this world. Celebrations symbolically affirm this separation while acknowledging reconnection with the loved ones through memory. Here we find both a community celebration and a religious practice. For many communities this day serves as a social gathering. Memories of the dead are often framed by graveside encounters between old friends and relatives, family stories, and limited feasting (as food is not the central element of these get togethers).

In Texas, the central meeting for the family is All Souls’ Day and in Mexico the focus of the holiday is around a special alter in the home, church, or sometimes the cemetery, where flowers, candles, incense and offerings of favourite foods are placed. The altar is the power point, a door between the living and the dead. It is believed that those items on the altar will attract and soothe the departed spirit. In Texas, many families prefer to perform grave maintenance at this time, then add handcrafted items, fresh flowers, wreaths and due to increasing inflation, mass produced materials such as pumpkins, black balloons, paper ghosts and other images of the holiday.

It is through the Spanish-Catholic folk customs of the Day of the Dead that we can best see the original European Celtic festival and early Christian practices surrounding Hallowmas and All Souls’ Eve. Rather than destroy the custom, as the American Puritans tried to do, the Mexican and South American peoples pulled this early Celtic holiday into their local customs and expanded on the celebration.

Tansy
x

Source – Halloween by Silver Ravenwolf

The picture comes from http://www.kitchenwitch.org

Tuesday 19 October 2010

Vampires

Can you tell Samhain (Halloween) is round the corner? ;-)

Vampires

The legend of the vampire found its lasting existence fueled by superstition surrounding historical acts of cruelty by select European leaders and peasant fears, including the horrendous historical character Vlad the Impaler.

The legend of the vampire appears to be an amalgam of various superstitions that rolled into one entity. The widespread belief that the dead could return to visit the living through Samhain, Halloween or All Saints Day. The existence of real maniacs running around and hurting people and allowing a superstition to cover their evil tracks. Premature burial, which often occurred before embalming became a necessary practice. Gossip – a person who was an outcast when alive remained outcast after death and plagues and epidemics.

Ever since Homer’s time, western nations had the fixed idea that blood combined with the light of the moon could recall the dead to life, at least temporarily. Churchmen of the middle ages claimed that a woman who exposed her body to the moonlight would conceive and bear a vampire child. The church sanctioned the belief in vampires and taught that vampires could only walk under the light of the moon. Their prime concern? Finding blood.

We find the belief in vampires appearing in Babylon and Assyria, where it was thought that the dead could rise and walk the earth, seeking sustenance from the living. The vampires of Crete, called Katalkanas, were blamed for ill deeds, and were said to live in the mountains. In Germany food was buried with the dead, or rice and grain scattered on the grave, to assuage the hunger pangs of the Nachzehrer, who might issue forth from the grave in the form of a pig. In Bulgaria the Vrykolaka were said to be passive vampires in life who became active after death. Up until the twentieth century, vampire depictions contained horrendous faces, malformed body parts, little hair and drooling spittle - sometimes appearing more as an ugly beast on two feet rather than carrying pleasant human attributes. (Until Anne Rice made them sexy!).

The more modern vampire tends to go in two directions – the bad vampire and the good vampire (where the good vampire finds true love in a human woman and kills only bad people – or in the case of Twilight – is a veggie vampire!). The association with the lifestyle of the vampire leads him or her to the logical link with Halloween – a night of the dead, undead (perhaps the correct term these days would be living impaired) and quaking living.

The vampire’s association with Halloween/Samhain is tenuous, as the vampire legend does not depend on or encompass this holiday, but if ghosts can walk this night, then why can’t vampires? Our association with the vampire, the bat and the Witch come from two different sources. First, we all know that there is a type of vampire bat that drinks the blood of animals, which is therefore associated with the mythical vampire. Historical references link bats to Samhain bonfires, where the light of the fire drew moths, which in turn provided a feeding frenzy for bats. When the burning of the Witches commenced, the same principle applied, thus the superstitions believed that a Witch could turn herself into a bat, or that her spirit could fly away in the shape of a bat, because moths and bats were drawn to the burning Witches.

Tansy
x

Source – Halloween by Silver Ravenwolf

Monday 18 October 2010

The BAT

Being nocturnal Bats have long been associated with evil, and seem to have had a lot of bad press. Personally I love them, when we were out in France earlier this year we saw little tiny baby ones flying around - beautiful!

In some parts they were thought to be Witches, and one flying close to you it was said to be a Witch over looking or trying to bewitch you.

Having said that I have heard it said that bats flying close to the house indicate that the spirits of Witches past are looking out for you. Should one fly into the house it portends death or very bad luck for someone you know. In other places the bat is considered lucky, and carrying a bat’s bone will ensure good fortune (although not for the bat ;-))

It used to be thought that carrying the right eye of a bat will render a person invisible. A bat hitting the side of a building is said to foretell rain whilst seeing them fly near the house in the early dusk means good weather is coming.

Some people believe that ghosts can take the form of bats, therefore a house with bats in it is haunted.

There is also a superstition that if you carry the dried heart of a bat in your pocket it will turn a bullet or stop you from bleeding to death. Another belief is if you wash your face in bat’s blood you can see in the dark.

In Scotland, it is said that a flying bat, rising and then descending, does so near a witch’s house.

Contrary to many beliefs, bats do not get entangled in long hair. Experiments have proven that not only do bats try to avoid people, but that no amount of hair will prevent one from immediately freeing itself. Furthermore, although a couple of varieties will drink the blood of animals, most bats are vegetarian and will not bite unless provoked.

In many parts of the world it is considered very unlucky to kill or harm a bat and could even shorten your life. This is probably just as well as many bats are endangered and need all the protection they can get.

Bat Animal Symbolism

Let's face it, the bat isn't the most popular of animal totems. In fact, it's largely misunderstood and so therefore many of its symbolic meanings are inappropriately fear-based.

However, the very savvy Native Americans approached the realm of animals from a position of honor - knowing that all things are connected.

The Native American animal symbolism of the bat comes from a keen observation of this magnificent animal. These people recognized that the bat was highly sensitive to their surroundings and so therefore was considered a symbol of intuition, dreaming and vision. This made the bat a powerful symbol for Native American shamans and medicine people. Often the spirit of the bat would be invoked when special energy was needed, like "night-sight" which is the ability to see through illusion or ambiguity and dive straight to the truth of matters.

It is a symbol of communication because the Native Americans observed the bat to be a highly social creature. Indeed, the bat has strong family ties. They are very nurturing, exhibiting verbal communication, touching, and sensitivity to members of their group.

Here is a quick-list of bat animal symbolism:

• Illusion
• Rebirth
• Dreams
• Intuition
• Initiation
• Journeying
• Inner Depth
• Communication

The bat is a symbol of rebirth and depth because it is a creature that lives in the belly of the Mother (Earth). From the womb-like caves it emerges every evening at dusk. And so - from the womb it is reborn every evening.

If you have the bat as your totem you are extremely aware of your surroundings. Sometimes you can be overly sensitive to the feelings of others. Additionally, you are quite perceptive on a psychic level, and are prone to have prophetic dreams.

If you work with the bat as your totem, you will be put to the test, because it demands 100% commitment to spiritual growth. The bat will never accept half-hearted or lukewarm attempts at self-improvement. Indeed, if the bat senses that you are slacking in your psychic/spiritual training it will likely move on to someone else who is more willing to learn the lessons the bat has to offer.

As with most of our hardest challenges, working with the demanding bat will reap some of the most profound rewards you could ever dream of. But be warned, the bat asks a lot of us, like:

• Dying to our ego
• Loving our enemies as ourselves
• Going within to touch our inner demons
• Exploring the underworlds of reality (which can be scary)
• Renewing our thoughts and beliefs on a moment-to-moment basis

All of these tasks can be harrowing experiences. This is why the Native American symbolism of the bat deals with initiation; because this creature takes us to outlandish extremes. But rest assured, the bat is never leaves our side while we are journeying.

Furthermore, once we are tested to satisfaction, the devotion of the bat will never fade. It will eternally support us on our spiritual path - ever faithful and forever loving us on our journey to maintain our highest potential.

Tansy
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Sources: A Witches Year by Kate West

Wednesday 13 October 2010

The Pythia

More seer research, but today it is on The Pythia.

The ancient oracle whose fame has best survived is of course that of Apollo at Delphi. The classical Greeks believed that before Apollo took possession of the shrine, Gaea and her daughter Themis had spoken prophecies at Pytho, a village nearby. An earlier myth held that Apollo had slain a monstrous python which was threatening his mother, and so acquired the holy place, after which he established the oracle. Note that we have just seen the conjunction of water, prophetic females, and a serpent of ambiguous intentions in the northern mythology. It is possible that writers in newly Christianized Scandinavia were influenced by exposure to European culture, but we may also be seeing here the survival of an ancient archetypal relationship. If Apollo's cult did not displace that of an oracular goddess at Delphi itself, the myths may reflect a memory of it having done so elsewhere.

Another story held that the the inspirational qualities of Delphi had been discovered by chance by a shepherd, who was overcome by its influence and began to prophesy. Later, Apollo recruited priestesses for the job. Historically, however, the major settlement of Mycenean times was located a little to the southeast, where a temple to Athena Pronaia had been built near the Castalian spring. Apollo moved into the neighborhood, so to speak, without displacing her.
Many stories are told of the Delphic tradition, some of them apparently folklore. There is, for instance, no geological or archaeological evidence for inebriating "fumes" arising from the earth below. What we have in the Greek texts, instead, are references to pneuma, a word which can mean breath or soul, or an atmos entheos, an atmosphere which causes "enthusiasm", emanations from the earth which affect the psyche rather than the senses.
The ancients themselves debated the source of the inspiration, and suspected that it had something to do with water. This does, in fact, fit with certain theories popular in metaphysical circles regarding the movement of earth energies along underground watercourses. The fluctuations of the earth's magnetic field are affected by the terrain. The area around Delphi, though not volcanic, is rocky enough to cause such perturbations, and many of the other oracles were located in rugged country and associated with springs and caves. The Chinese geomancers evaluate the power of specific sites according to what they call the "dragon force", which John Michell equates with this magnetic current and identifies with ley lines. In England, at least, dragon legends are often associated with springs.

There is the suggestion that the invisible pneuma which inspired the Pythia at Delphi might indeed be an upwelling of the magnetic current of the earth to which the seeress was sensitive. If the dragon, or serpent, image for such a current was as universal as Michell believes, it could account for the legend of the Python at the Delphic site, and the retention of the title of "pythoness" or Pythia for its priestess. It suggests that sensitivity to the "serpent power" of the earth, whether in a particularly powerful location or in general, may play a role in prophecy.
Be that as it may, the vehicle through which the divine information was transmitted was a priestess, called the Pythia. In earlier years she seems to have been a simple country girl. Later, however, the priestesses were recruited from wealthier families and were better educated. The Greek historian Plutarch dedicated a book on Isis and Osiris to one of them, a woman called Clea, and wrote a second work, The Brave Deeds of Women, in her honor.

Prophetic methods. In the shrines of Apollo we also have an analogue of the seidhjallR of Scandinavia. The Pythia at Delphi sat upon a "tripod", a three legged stool about the height of a bar stool. In Didyma, the priestess sat on something called an axon, which was apparently a vertical cylinder, next to a small sacred spring.

Another element found in both the north and south is song. In the third century, Apollo, speaking through his priestess, informed a questioner that the immortal gods did not need possessions or expensive offerings. What he himself preferred was song, especially when sung just before the delivery of the oracles. Choirs of boys made pilgrimage to Delphi every year to sing hymns of praise to the god. The timing of the singing, just before the oracle was given, suggests that it might have had a function in inspiring the priestess.

We have seen how the volvas of the north delivered their prophecies. An analysis of the practices at Delphi may help us to identify the essential features of the process. One major difference of course is in the setting, in a site originally chosen for its natural impressiveness rather than inside a farmer's hall. It should be noted, however, that in more temperate parts of Scandinavia, seidh magic was often done outside. The Pythia also seems to have answered only one question at a time. On the other hand, in both cases some kind of preparation was required-- for the volva, eating specific kinds of food, and for the Pythia, fasting.

In Scandinavia, the need of the people seems to have been enough to draw forth a response. In Delphi, the willingness of the god to provide inspiration was ascertained by pouring cold water over the sacrificial goat. If the unfortunate animal shivered, oracles would be given. In one instance, when the goat did not shudder and the priests, to please the questioner, forced the Pythia to try to prophesy anyway, she had a kind of hysterical fit, ran about raving and died soon afterward. I would interpret this as a rather extreme example of the damage that can be done to a sensitive individual whose psyche is already wide-open when trance is mishandled.
The normal procedure in Delphi seems to have been for the Pythia to purify and prepare herself by bathing and drinking water from the spring of Kassotis which was brought by a channel to the shrine. At Didyma, another Apolline oracle, questioners made offerings outside the shrine. The Seeress fasted for three days beforehand, went into a deep trance and awaited them inside.
The Delphic priestess burned bay leaves and barley meal on an altar and then ascended her tripod in the inner cave. She wore a wreath of laurel leaves and held a sprig of laurel in her hand. Some sources say that she chewed the leaves as well. Her seat was called a holmos, a hollowed stone set in the ring of the tripod. By the time her questioner arrived, she had been exposed to the influences of the place long enough to pass into a trance state.

According to Plutarch's account as summarized by Fontenrose,
Apollo moves her to speak, but she speaks with her own voice, and each Pythia according to her native endowments. The god does not speak with the Pythia's vocal chords and lips: Apollo puts the visions in her mind and a light in her soul that causes her to see the future; and she reveals the visions in her own words. As the sun makes use of the moon in reflecting light, so Apollo makes use of the Pythia in speaking oracles.

It should be noted, however that despite Plutarch, in some of the responses the seeress seems to be relaying the words of, if not actually possessed by, the god. Her mantic performance was mania in its Greek meaning-- enthusiasm, inspiration, ecstasy. After such a session, we are told, the Pythia would feel calm and peaceful, as a warrior feels after battle or a corybant after the dance, a normal response to the catharsis of trance.

Oracular responses. At some periods the seeress at Delphi provided her answers in verse, while at others (or from other seeresses) the answers were in prose. The responses seem to have been articulate, although sometimes ambiguous. Sometimes poets attached to the temple would then put them into poetic form. The Pythia was attended by priests, who managed the session and wrote down the answers.

The format of oracles follows a number of patterns. According to Fontenrose's analysis, the most common is a command "to perform a certain act in order to have success or to avoid misfortune..." or the converse, not to do a certain action. Other forms include clear instructions, especially those concerning the kinds of offerings or worship desired by various gods, or confirmation of a proposed course of action, such as founding a new colony. Another class are "conditioned commands" of the sort familiar from Macbeth; if an impossible or unlikely condition is met, then the questioner should act, or sometimes, will meet his doom. A variation is an instruction to do something when a strange or ambiguously stated event occurs. There are also a large variety of statements about past or future events.

Tansy
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Tuesday 12 October 2010

Seiths

More seer research ;-) This time on the meaning to the name 'Seith':
Since humans first became conscious beings we have sought to foresee the future and make wise choices. Every culture has some kind of oracular practice, from the pythia of Delphi and the völva of the Viking Age to the nabhi of ancient Israel and the nakaza of Japan. Today, modern seers are seeking to rediscover ancient techniques and develop a practice that will serve the community as the oracles did of old.

Old Norse literature
In the Viking Age, seid had connotations of ''ergi'' ("unmanliness" or "effeminacy") for men, as its manipulative aspects ran counter to the male ideal of forthright, open behaviour. Freyja and perhaps some of the other goddesses of Norse mythology were seid practitioners, as was Odin, a fact for which he is taunted by Loki in the ''Lokasenna''.
Sagas

As described by Snorri Sturluson in his ''Ynglinga saga'', seid includes both divination and manipulative magic. It seems likely that the type of divination practiced by seid was generally distinct, by dint of an altogether more metaphysical nature, from the day-to-day auguries performed by the seers (''menn framsýnir'', ''menn forspáir'').

In ''The Saga of Eric the Red'', the seiðkona or ''völva'' in Greenland wore a blue cloak and a headpiece of black lamb trimmed with white cat skin; she carried the symbolic distaff (''seiðstafr''), which was often buried with her; and would sit on a high platform. In ''Örvar-Odd's Saga'', however, the cloak is black, yet the seiðkona also carries the distaff (which allegedly has the power of causing forgetfulness in one who is tapped three times on the cheek by it).

Mythology
The goddess Freyja is identified in ''Ynglinga saga'' as an adept of the mysteries of seid, and it is said that it was she who taught it to Odin: ('Njörðr’s daughter was Freyja. She presided over the sacrifice. It was she who first acquainted the Æsir with ''seiðr'', which was customary among the Vanir').

In ''Lokasenna'' Loki accuses Odin of practicing seid, condemning it as an unmanly art. A justification for this may be found in the ''Ynglinga saga'' where Snorri opines that following the practice of seid, the practitioner was rendered weak and helpless.

One possible example of seid in Norse mythology is the prophetic vision given to Odin in the ''Völuspá'' by the ''völva'', ''vala'', or seeress after whom the poem is named. Her vision is not connected explicitly with ''seiðr'', however: the word occurs in the poem in relation to a character called Heiðr (who is traditionally associated with Freyja but may be identical with the völva). The interrelationship between the ''völva'' in this account and the Norns, the fates of Norse lore, are strong and striking.

Another noted mythological practitioner of ''seiðr'' was the witch Groa, who attempted to assist Thor, and who is summoned from beyond the grave in the Svipdagsmál.

Oracle work requires the seer to be able to move into an altered state in which s/he becomes extremely receptive to rapport with the questioner, while at the same time retaining the inner discipline and skill to find and communicate an answer.

Basic skills include relaxation and breathing, working with power animals and spirit guides, structuring a journey, using archetypes and imagery, grounding and reintegration. An accurate understanding of our own strengths and vulnerabilities is essential. We develop these skills by learning to sense and manipulate energy and establish rapport, to clear the channels for information to come through, and acquire and remember information. We must also be prepared to deal with psychological effects and ethical issues.

Seið, transliterated in English as Seidh or Seith, can also appear as SeiðR (Old Norse nominative form). It is used in the Viking-Age lore for a variety of magical practices involving altered states of consciousness. The list of seidh-skills attributed to the god Odin in Ynglingasaga VII includes:

• knowing the fates of men and predicting events
• causing harm by magic
• causing mental and physical illness
• taking or giving luck
• spirit journeying in altered shape while the body lies in trance
• controlling fire and weather

The first is clearly the oracular form (Oracular Seidh) which is the practice that appears most often in the sagas, especially in The Saga of Eric the Red IV. Modern writers such as H.R. Ellis Davidson refer to the oracular form as seidh, and this is still the best-known term.

Spá (Old Norse) or Spæ (Scots), is a more specific term for Germanic oracular practice. Etymologically it is related to spy, or words from the Latin spectio, "look or contemplate".
Oracle can refer to the medium, or person who gives a prophecy or commandment, the prophecy itself, or the place where the prophet practices. It comes from the Latin oro, "to speak".

The prophetic seance is common to most of the Indo-European peoples. Among the Celts, the bean-drui, or she-druids, learned the skill as well as their male counterparts. The nine priestesses who lived on the isle of Sena off the Breton coast were said to be skilled in prophecy. Farther south, the well known Sibyl of Cumae and the Delphic Oracle were only two of a multitude of prophets. From ancient times to the present people have sought to understand the present and foresee the future.

Norse Oracles
Seidh. The northern version of oracular divination is one of the practices referred to as "seidh", which also includes spell casting, weatherworking, and trance journeying of various kinds and is usually translated as "witchcraft". The oracular tradition was very strong in northern Europe, and a variety of titles-- "volva", "seidhkona", "spákona", are used for its practitioners.

In earlier days there had apparently been many who were trained in this skill, both men and women, who travelled in companies from community to community. Their expertise seems to have been the result of long training. The procedure, as described in Eiriksaga and others, was for the seidhkona to come to a farmstead and take at least a day to "tune in" to the environment before performing. It is possible that the ceremonial meal of hearts from different animals found on the farm also assisted in linking her to the land. In order to prophesy, she was seated on a seidhhjallR, a high seat or raised platform, a detail which appears most consistently in the accounts.

Trance was induced by the singing of a sacred song, the vardhlokkur, the "ward lock" or "spirit lock", from which our "warlock" comes. This might result from the repetition of the chant, or from a conditioned response to the song. In the Greenland story, the volva seems to have gotten her information from the spirits. Elsewhere the source of the knowledge is not mentioned. The Volva in Voluspá, who is herself almost a divine being, seems to apprehend it clairvoyantly. Astral journeying is not specifically mentioned in this context, but such journeys are not only found elsewhere in Norse literature, but are standard practice in most shamanic cultures, so they are at least a possibility. In some of the Eddic poems it is also possible that the person providing information is possessed by a god.

The seidh groups seem to have been led by a senior priestess, assisted by her students. As Christian influence increased, their numbers grew fewer, and the craft was only practiced by women. It is not surprising if women clung to this skill, for the Germanic peoples traditionally ascribed exceptional spiritual power to women. In the first century, the Romans learned to fear the influence of such prophetesses as Veleda and Aliruna on the German tribes.

Oracular goddesses.
Because of this tradition, all Norse goddesses to some extent seem to possess prophetic talents, but two, Frigga and Freyja, are particularly associated with it. Of Frigga, it is said that she "knows all fates but says nothing,". In her manifestation as Vor, however, "She is wise and enquiring, so that nothing can be concealed from her. There is a saying that a woman becomes aware (vor) of something when she finds it out.". This passage appears to suggest that clairvoyance may in fact be an intensification of so-called "women's intuition".

Freyja, known to most as the Norse analogue of Aphrodite, has also an aspect in which she is mistress of magic. It is she who is credited with having taught the craft of seidh to the Aesir, the gods. Heide is sometimes considered to be her "witchy" aspect. In the sagas, many of the seeresses whose deeds are reported have the name "Heide", to the point where modern translators sometimes render it as "witch".

The Volva whom Odin seeks out in the underworld is a primal being of great power. She it is who delivers the great prophecy called "Voluspá", the sayings of the Volva, in which the beginnings of the world are recounted, as are the events that will lead to Ragnarók at its end. Wagner drew upon this material for the figure of the "Vala", mother of the norns and the valkyries, who appears in the operas Rheingold and Seigfried, and is also identified with Erde, Mother Earth.
The Norns. Finally, we must not forget the three Norns, who play a role similar in some ways to that of the Fates of Classical myth in the cosmology of the north. According to the Younger Edda,
There stands ..one beautiful hall under the ash by the well, and out of this hall come three maidens, whose names are UrdhR, Verdandi, Skuld. These maidens shape men's lives. We call them norns. There are also other norns who visit everyone when they are born to shape their lives. . . ." ("Gylfaginning": 15)

The meanings of their names have been much discussed. The name of the first norn, UrdhR, may come from a word which means the past, and is often translated as "wyrd", which means in the old sense something like "fate". The destiny which the word indicates, however, is not so much a thing predetermined as an outcome that is shaped by the interaction between events and an individual's reactions. The second norn, Verdandi-- "being" in an active sense, or "happening"-- knows the present. The name Skuld, the third, is related to "shall". She is sometimes referred to as "Necessity" and is held to know the future. Together, they understand how the events of the past have shaped the present that is coming into being, and how that, in turn, will affect the course of future events. They seem to have fulfilled the same function as the Romano-Celtic Matronæ, or the Parcae in Roman theology, with particular influence on the fates of the newborn, and sometimes three places were laid for them at the table. There are stories in which they give life-gifts like the good fairies. (Ellis-Davidson,1964).

The well referred to in the Edda lies under one of the roots of the Worldtree, and is called the Well of Wyrd. This is of some significance, for the combination of a subterranean location and a sacred spring are elsewhere also associated with prophecy. The Norns have the task of pouring water from the well onto the roots of the Worldtree, which is being gnawed by the Serpent Nidhogg, in order to renew it. We shall see this association of prophetic women with water and a serpent in the archetypes associated with the oracle at Delphi as well.

Tansy
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Monday 11 October 2010

The Sibyls

I have been researching The Sibyls - the original seeresses.

The dictionary definition of a Sibyl is:
A woman supposed to be endowed with a spirit of prophecy.
The number of the sibyls is variously stated by different authors; but the opinion of Varro, that there were ten, is generally adopted. They dwelt in various parts of Persia, Greece, and Italy.
A female fortune teller; a pythoness; a prophetess. "An old highland sibyl."

The word sibyl comes (via Latin) from the Greek word σίβυλλα sibylla, meaning prophetess.

Persian Sibyl – was said to be a prophetic priestess presiding over the Apollonian Oracle, she is said to have foretold the exploits of Alexander the Great.

Libyan Sibyl – was prophetic priestess presiding over the ancient Zeus Amon oracle at the Siwa Oasis in the Western Desert of Egypt. The oracle here was consulted by Alexander after his conquest of Egypt.

Delphic Sibyl – was a legendary figure who gave prophecies in the sacred precinct of Apolloo at Delphi. The Delphic Sibyl was not the same as the Pythia, the priestess of Apollo who was also known as the Oracle of Delphi.

Cimmerian Sibyl – The Cimmerian Sibyl, by name Carmentis, was the prophetic priestess presiding over the Apollonian Oracle at Cimmerium in Italy, near Lake Avernus (i.e. Cumae).

Erythraean Sibyl – was sited at Erythrae, a town in Ionia. She is said to have predicted the Trojan War and prophesised to the Greeks who were moving against Ilium both that Troy would be destroyed and that Homer would write falsehoods.

Samian Sibyl – The Samian Sibyl was the priestess presiding over the Apollonian oracle near Hera's temple on the Isle of Samos, a Greek colony.

Cumaean Sibyl – this was the sibyl that most concerned the Romans, located near the Greek city of Naples, whom Virgil’s Aeneas consults before this descent to the lower world. It was she who supposedly sold to Tarquinius Superbus, the last king of Rome, the original Sibylline books.

Hellespontine Sibyl – or the Trojan sibyl presided over the Apollonian oracle at Dardania. The sibylline collection at Gergis was attributed to the Hellespontine Sibyl and was preserved in the temple of Apollo at Gergis. Thence it passed to Erythrae, where it became famous.

Phrygian Sibyl – The Phrygian Sibyl appears to be a doublet of the Hellespontine Sibyl.

Tiburtine Sibyl – To the classical sibyls of the Greeks, the Romans added a tenth, the Tiburtine Sibyl, whose seat was the ancient Etruscan town of Tibur. An apocalyptic pseudo-prophecy exists, attributed to the Tiburtine Sibyl, written c. 380 CE, but with revisions and interpolations added at later dates. It purports to prophesy the advent of a final Emperor named Constans, vanquishing the foes of Christianity, bringing about a period of great wealth and peace, ending paganism and converting the Jews. After vanquishing Gog and Magog, the Emperor is said to resign his crown to God. This would give way to the Antichrist. Ippolito d'Este rebuilt the Villa d'Este at Tibur, the modern Tivoli, from 1550 onward, and commissioned elaborate fresco murals in the Villa that celebrate the Tiburtine Sibyl, as prophesying the birth of Christ to the classical world.

The name 'Sibylline Oracles' was given to a collection of prophecies emanating from the Sibyls, a group of divinely inspired seeresses. According to Varro (Marcus Terentius Varro (116 BC – 27 BC), also known as Varro Reatinus - a Roman scholar and writer) there were ten Sibyls: the Persian, the Libyan, the Dephian, the Cimmerian, the Erythraean, the Samarian, the Cumaean, and those of the Hellespont, of Phrygia and of Tibur.

In the second century B.C., these pagan oracles were adapted into verses by the Helenistic Jews of Alexandria to help diffuse Judaistic doctrines and teachings. This practice was adapted by the early Christians, and the sibyls are frequently quoted by the early Fathers and Christian writers, namely Justin, Athenagoras and Augustine.

As Christianity gained in strength, the purpose of the Sibyls shifted. Balancing the Old Testamant prophets who preached to the Jews, the Sibyls, with their gifts of prophecy, were assigned to assist the Gentiles. The Libyan Sibyl had prophesied the manifestation of Christ to the gentiles.

The number of Sibyls shrank to five, with each named after the nation of her mission: the Persian Sibyl for Asia, the Libyan Sibyl for Africa, the Erythraean Sibyl for Ionia, the Cumaen Sibyl for Rome and and the Delphic Sibyl for Greece. In 1509, Michelangelo included these five Sibyls as part of his decoration of the sides and ends of the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

We can identify several features common to both the primitive earth-goddess and the Sibyl's of ancient Greece; They were invariably associated with the feminine, they were connected to both serpents and doves (birds), and shared a similar set of traditions with roots leading back to the primitive worship of an ‘earth-mother’ or ‘mother-earth’, in relation to agriculture and harvest.

A method of Divination and prophecy in which gods or spirits are consulted through a human medium. In ancient Greece, the voices or mediums of the oracles were sibyls, women priests who lived in caves regarded as the shrines of deities.

An oracle was a means of making a personal request to a deity to answer a question. Evidence for the use and belief in oracles comes from the many oracular decrees engraved on temple walls or delivered on papyrus to private persons who then wore the oracle as an amulet; references made in administrative or private records; original petitions on papyrus or ostraca and laid before the god; and statues and reliefs associated with oracles.

Oracles were regularly consulted by rulers and leaders concerning matters of state and war. In addition to prophecy, advice was sought. The oracle provided illumination as to the best of several alternative courses of action.

Women served as oracles in ancient Babylonia and Egypt, but the most famous and powerful of them were the sibyls of ancient Greece and Rome. The best known oracle of this type was seated at Delphi, near the foot of Mt. Parnassus, in a temple built in the 6th century. Consulting the oracle was a privilege determined by lot. The enquirer phrased a question and waited in an outer room of the temple while the Pythia entered a lower, inner chamber and went through the ritual of trance. She sat on a tripod, gazed into a flat dish and held a laurel branch, according to ancient art. Her trance was usually frenzied. The answers were so elliptical that they had to be interpreted by priests, who rephrased them in hexameter verse.

In ancient Egypt, deities spoke primarily through oracular dreams but also through prophetesses, who were the women of important families. During the New Kingdom (1570-1342 B.C.), cult statues served as the mouthpieces for deities, primarily Amun, god of fertility, agriculture and "the breath of life." The statues were said to be able to nod and talk but probably were manipulated by priests.

A Psychic or witch who uses Psychic gifts for Divination and prophecy, sometimes in trance, is a type of oracle.

Tansy
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Sunday 10 October 2010

The Legend of Merlin

I have been working with Merlin as one of my deities recently, so I have been doing some research on him. I found this article which is quite interesting:

The Legend of Merlin

During the Middle Ages the story of Merlin was popularized in the so-called Arthurian Romances, romantic tales first written in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. These stories were set many years earlier, in the fifth century, when Britain was in turmoil after the end of Roman rule.

Historically, following the collapse of the Roman Empire Britain declined into anarchy; native warlords fought each other and, to make matters worse, the Anglo-Saxons from Denmark and Germany began to invade. According to the Arthurian Romances, it was Merlin who saved the Britons from this chaos.

In these tales the wise wizard cleverly contrives to make Arthur Britain's sole king, thus unifying the country against the invaders. Although there is peace for a while, the Britons are eventually drawn into civil war when Arthur falls sick and his knights argue amongst themselves. To reunite the country, Merlin devises a quest. He is guardian of the Holy Grail, a sacred cup that when drunk from can cure all ills. However, rather than simply let Arthur drink from the vessel, Merlin sends the knights in search of its secret hiding place, knowing that in their searching they will acquire the wisdom to again work as one. It is Sir Perceval who eventually finds the Grail; Arthur recovers, and the land is reunited. Merlin then retires to the mysterious Grail Castle where the relic is kept, appoints Perceval as the Grail's new guardian, and ultimately sails off to the secret isle of Avalon.

Although the Arthurian Romances were obviously embellished with fanciful detail, there is compelling evidence to show that, in essence, the story of Merlin was based on the life of an historical figure.

From the time the Roman Empire collapsed in the fifth century, until the Norman Conquest of 1066, civilization fell apart in Britain, and the country endured an era of chaos and warfare known as the Dark Ages. Few written records have survived from this time; consequently, the fifth century, when Arthur and Merlin are said to have lived, is an historical period steeped in mystery. The records that do survive only provide a rough outline of events, and most contemporary figures went completely unrecorded. Although, like Arthur, Merlin is mentioned in a few surviving Dark Age manuscripts, he is only referenced in passing. The first author to provide any actual detail concerning Merlin's life was the Welsh cleric Geoffrey of Monmouth who wrote in the 1130s. In his History of the British Kings Geoffrey introduces Merlin by saying that he first proved himself as a youth when a British king named Vortigern chose him as a sacrifice. According to Geoffrey, Vortigern was building a fort on a mountain in North Wales to protect his kingdom from the invading Anglo-Saxons, but each time the fort was close to completion the foundations mysteriously collapsed. Vortigern's advisors suggest that to put things right a boy must be sacrificed, and victim they pick is the young Merlin. However, just as Merlin is about to die, he tells the king that the problems are being caused by two dragons that dwell in a pool, in a cave below the fort's foundations. When the pool is discovered and the dragons released, Vortigern is so impressed by Merlin's mystic knowledge that he makes him his chief advisor and offers him the new fort as his own. Although this story is obviously an imaginative legend, a Dark Age manuscript records a similar story which reveals an historical figure behind the Merlin myth.

Vortigern was certainly an historical figure: he is recorded by Dark Age writers as the ruler of much of Britain in the mid-fifth century. Around the year 830 one Dark Age chronicler refers to King Vortigern when recounting a similar legend to Geoffrey's story of Merlin and the two dragons. In his History of the Britons the British monk Nennius wrote about a young man who saved himself being sacrificed by Vortigern by revealing that two dragons dwelt in a cave below the king's fort. The story is almost word-for-word that told by Geoffrey; the only difference is that the youth is not called Merlin, but Ambrosius. As both accounts are virtually identical, could this Ambrosius have been the man upon whom the stories of Merlin were based?

The dragon story was obviously an invention; Ambrosius, however, was not. Like Vortigern, he was an historical figure mentioned by other Dark Age writers. Although he is not record as a wizard, Ambrosius is recorded as uniting Britain in the post-Roman period. The work of a sixth-century monk named Gildas (The Ruin and Conquest of Britain, written around the year 545) refers to Ambrosius as a Roman aristocrat who led the British forces in their war against the invading Anglo-Saxons shortly after Vortigern's reign. Additionally, the English historian Bede (in his Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation, written in 731) says that Ambrosius' family name was Aurelius. The Aurelius family was a powerful Roman dynasty descended from the second-century Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, and archaeology has shown that when the Roman legions departed members of this family remained in Britain. This Ambrosius Aurelius was therefore undoubtedly an historical figure, and the works of Geoffrey of Monmouth and Nennius taken together imply that Merlin was originally thought to be him.

Why, though, if Ambrosius was the historical figure behind the story of Arthur's wise advisor, has he gone down in legend under the name Merlin? The answer seems to be that the name Merlin was actually a title. Many British warriors of the time adopted the battle names of animals. The monk Gildas, for example, refers to a number of British kings of his time by such titles as the Lion, the Hound and the Leopard. Even the name Arthur seems to have been a title coming from the old British word Arth, meaning Bear. The name Merlin appears to derive from the old British meaning "the Eagle". (In fact, there is still a bird of prey called a merlin to this day.) A number of Dark Age poems are preserved as copies in a medieval manuscript known as The Red Book of Hergest, now in the Bodleian Library at Oxford University. One of these poems clearly demonstrates that Merlin was named after this bird: concerning a prediction Merlin is said to have made, it is entitled The Prophecy of the Eagle.

Ambrosius Aurelius does have many things in common with the Merlin of later romance. Like Merlin, he united Britain in the period after Vortigern's reign: both Gildas and Bede say that he successfully halted the invasion of Britain in the last few decades of the fifth century. There are no such records concerning what actually occurred in Britain immediately after Ambrosius' victories over the Anglo-Saxons, however; but as this is the time Arthur is said to have been king, it might well be that the aging Ambrosius relinquished power in favor of the younger Arthur and remained as his advisor. Also like Merlin, Ambrosius may have been regarded as a mystic.

Surviving writings concerning Britain in the Dark Ages are found mainly in Welsh manuscripts and in the Welsh language. The reason being that by the seventh century the Anglo-Saxons had resumed their offensive and successfully conquered what is now England. The native Britons were forced to retreat west, into what is now Wales. It was therefore here that most records concerning the earlier Dark Age period survived. The Welsh language developed directly from Brythonic, the language spoken throughout most of Britain in the immediate post-Roman period, while English developed from the language of the Anglo-Saxons. As the Welsh language had very different inflections to the English and Latin tongues, the Welsh had their own rendering of both Roman and English names, making them easier to pronounce. In Welsh writings the name Merlin appears as Myrddin, and Ambrosius is rendered as Emrys. (Ambrosius Aurelius is referred in Dark Age Welsh documents as Emrys Gwledig – "Prince Emrys".) One Dark Age Welsh reference actually links the names Myrddin and Emrys together. In a list of bards (Dark Age British poets) found in The Red Book of Hergest, one of the bards is called Myrddin Emrys – Merlin Ambrosius (see Triad 87). If this is the same person as Ambrosius Aurelius, then it means that the Britons at the time would almost certainly have regarded him as having mystical powers. Although today the word bard is associated simply with poets, during the Dark Ages bards were also accredited with the gift of prophecy, as was Merlin in the Arthurian Romances.

So where did this Merlin/Ambrosius live? According to Geoffrey of Monmouth, Vortigern gave Merlin his fort on a mountain in North Wales. Today, there is an identifiable location that might have been the mountain in question. A mountain in the North Wales Snowdonia range is still called Dinas Emrys – Fort Ambrosius. In the 1950s excavations near the summit uncovered the remains of a post-Roman fortification built sometime in the mid-to-late 400s, precisely the time Vortigern is known to have reigned and Merlin is said to have lived. There is, however, a more likely location.

The mountain of Dinas Bran (named after a pre-Christian Celtic god) stands close to the English Welsh border near the North Wales town of Llangollen. The ruins of the castle that still survive on the summit date from the thirteenth century, but archaeology has revealed that the hilltop had been fortified for many centuries before that. The earliest fort dates from around the mid fifth century so, like Dinas Emrys, it was probably built during Vortigern’s time. What makes this a more probable location for the fort in the story of Merlin and the two dragons is that it directly overlooks the heart of Vortigern’s kingdom in what is now Shropshire, just over five miles to the south-east. This is strategically a more feasible site: it stands on the edge of the Welsh Mountains, whereas Dinas Emrys, although possibly later used by Ambrosius to protect the Welsh coast from incursions by invaders from Ireland, is over fifty miles further west, on the other side of the Welsh mountains in an area the Anglo-Saxon’s never threatened.

So it seems that the story of Merlin was based on the life of Ambrosius Aurelius, an historical figure who united the Britons in the mid-to-late fifth century. He could well have been advisor to his successor King Arthur and, if he was a bard, he would have been accredited with the gift of prophecy.

Source - grahamphillips.net


The picture shown here is from www.legendarycreations.com I also have this image incorporated into a tattoo on my arm.

Tansy
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Wednesday 6 October 2010

The DARK MOON

This morning felt like a 'duvet day', I really did not want to get up, it was dark and raining outside. I felt very unmotivated (although I have lots to do!), then I realised that it is a New Moon tomorrow, which means today is the Dark Moon - no wonder I feel like I do!

With the Moon phases, the Goddess as Maiden is celebrated at the waxing crescent, as Mother at full and as Crone at the waning crescent. These phases make up the typical symbol of the Triple Goddess. However, even in the emblem, the reverse side of the Full Moon portion is the hidden face, or fourth aspect of the Goddess – the Dark Moon. The waning crescent honours the Crone of wisdom and age, but the Dark Moon is the Goddess of Tomb and Womb.

Meditations rather than magicks are normally practiced on the Dark Moon. It is a time for contemplating and uniting with the mysteries of the Dark Aspect of the Divine.

Ordinarily magick work during the Dark Moon is not likely to be very successful simply because this phase signifies the quiet time, the sleep or dreamtime, of post or pre-embodiment. The rest of Death is celebrated now – the comfort of being embraced by the Lady and the Lord of Shadows for a quiet moment – no magick spellwork calling on them for power, no calling down of the Goddess, but reverie and comprehension of the Passage through Death. This is the silent power that exists after death and prior to rebirth. It is the moment of being received into the Underworld and the moment of departure from the Shadowland to be reborn into the world. It is a time of change and transition.

Dark Moon Goddesses: Kali, the Morrigan, the Cailleach, Lilith, and Hecate.

Magick can be done on a Dark Moon for:

• Addictions
• Change
• Enemies
• Justice
• Obstacles
• Removal
• Separation

The Dark Moon is two days before the New Moon.

Although I can't actually spend the day under my duvet, I will take some time for myself today, a cup of herbal tea and a while to reflect, meditate and plan the rest of my week.

Tansy
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