Thoughts For the Season

I took this image more than a week ago and I think it's got some brilliant red colors to enjoy and mark the important, but often forgotten, point of the whole season of holidays: the return of the sun after the longest night of the year. Unfortunately, my monitor crapped out on me and I've had to temporarily replace it with an ancient Compaq monitor that only has 32 bit color. So, I'm not quite sure if this photo is very red or not. Either way I seem to remember liking this image, so I hope you do too!

I read on The Wild Hunt how some 300 people came to Stonehenge to celebrate the Solstice on the wrong day and I just couldn't believe it. Or, rather, I was incredibly dismayed by it. I know I'm a hardass about celebrating the solstices, equinoxes and cross quarters at the right time (I don't celebrate Samhain on Halloween, for example, but on the actual cross quarter which usually occurs a full week after Halloween) but come on folks! You call yourselves pagans? And you didn't even realize that our holydays are based on astronomical events and thus don't always occur on the same calendar date? You know so little about what it means to be pagan that it never once occurred to you to check the date? I wish I could meet those folks and slap them silly! I guess I wouldn't have to slap them silly since they are already! Okay, stepping off soapbox now.

I stayed up all night on Yule and kept the fireplaces and candles burning all night. I like the idea of making it a tradition; it's a beautiful way to not only recognize the solstice but show respect for the sun. I've read before how keeping candles/lights burning all during the Yule night will help draw the sun back or otherwise help the sun find its way back. I don't think the sun needs our help but I like the idea showing my support. There's also that little fact of it being seriously cold to encourage one to keep fires going!

Here's hoping you and yours stay warm and happy during this season and all the years to come!

Spring the Green Man

Click for larger version.

This is really creative journaling and expresses my frustration regarding the local weather. I'm tired of being cold and am so ready for spring so I just went with it. The flowers and trees came from magazines and the little green man pendant comes from a new age catalog. All the inverted colors are just my way of trying to make a collage I wasn't truly happy with a little better. I think the look also speaks to the duality of our weird weather consisting of two or three days being warm enough to wear shorts and sandals and the next night temps dipping to around or even below freezing. It's also just fun to mess with stuff like that.

Lodestone and Lightning

Lodestones, or loadstones, are magnetites that have been intensely magnetized by the magnetic fields surrounding lightning strikes. They consist of two different minerals: wustite and the familiar hematite. They are the most naturally magnetic mineral on the planet and act as permanent magnets to attract and magnetize iron. (But if you want a piece of lodestone don't assume you can find it at your area's gemstone and mineral show; I learned that lesson. All they could offer me was hematite which is nice but not the same.) Lodestone has had a long, fascinating history of use among ancient pagans as well as modern scientists. Lodestones were an immense help to the ancients as they were used in compasses. They can also be utilized in the study of plate tectonics. Interestingly enough, they were employed in various ancient temple magic tricks.

You see, back in the old days, there were a lot of gods, via priests, vying for the attentions and donations of the public. And one of the methods of attracting worshipers was to have engineers design magnificent creations to be used in the temples. I learned about these amazing feats of gimmickry from The History Channel Ancient Discoveries: Machines of the Gods. From the site:

Alexandria became the centre of this temple trickery. Writers from all over the ancient world flocked to document the strange devices. There are tantalising glimpses from the ancient texts which reveal some of the types of temple machines which were in operation. One of the most famous illusions was to be found at the Temple of Serapis, where an iron chariot hung suspended in mid air. The spectacle appeared to be the work of the gods. In fact, it is believed that a giant lodestone was suspended from the ceiling which would have made the iron chariot appear to be floating by an act of god. The trickery worked, attracting many new visitors to the temple.

The tone of the show is slightly condescending in terms of the gullibility of the worshipers but I'm too fascinated by the ancient inventions to care all that much. There were doors that opened automatically when an individual approached. There were statues of goddesses that seemed to pour out life-giving milk. There were rotating dancers and dragons that moaned as water pressure forced an arrow to shoot them. And the list goes on. If you have the opportunity I highly recommend you check out the show; it's worth it!

Anyway, back to lodestones. Even though I find the ancient uses of lodestone interesting my main concern is their use within hoodoo. Lodestones must be "fed" periodically with magnetic sand to keep them from "starving", magically speaking. They can be used for a variety of different spells depending on their size and their "gender" (more on that in a bit). Single large lodestones are used draw luck or money. Small, gravel-sized stones are carried singly or in pairs in mojo bags to attract love and luck. The very smallest lodestones are submerged in oils to be used for later spellwork.

Paired lodestones, either female/male, male/male or female/female are used in love and fidelity spells. A "male" lodestone is pyramidal or pointed and a "female" lodestone is cubicle or rounded. Generally speaking, paired lodestones should be about the same size and should "fit" together. According to Lucky Mojo:

The matching process consists of sprinkling the lodestones very lightly with magnetic sand to visually reveal their magnetic polarities, and then, by trial and error, finding pairs in which two edges join together well along their planar, convex, or concave surfaces AND also have the proper positive-negative charges that allow them to "draw" or attract along these selected surfaces.

I've always had a thing for hematite as well as any kind of earthbound object produced or affected by lightning, like fulgurite. And, this just occurred to me, I guess this means I have ties to Zeus/Jupiter, specifically Jupiter Fulgurator, as he is the god of lightning. Perhaps I should look at him more closely. I've read that, according to some American Indians and others, it's bad luck to burn lightning struck wood in a fire or stove. But I wonder about using lightning struck wood to, for example, make a ritual tool? It's been touched by a bit of the heavens and, while it obviously wouldn't be magnetized, I figure it would still have some powerful qualities attached to it.

What do you think of lightning in terms of its magical effects?

Winter Solstice Wishes

Winter Solstice Sunrise at Newgrange, Ireland.

We all come from the Sun God
And to Him we shall return
Like a flame of love
Rising to the Heavens

Happy Solstice!

The Winter Solstice: Neolithics to Christians

The word solstice comes from the Latin: "sol" for sun and "stictere", to stand still. Did you know that in January the Earth is about 3 million miles closer to the sun than in June? It doesn't affect our climate in any way though. After all, 3 million miles is nothing in astronomical terms. Rather, it is our planet's curious 23 degree tilt that gives us our seasons. On the winter solstice our hemisphere is tilted farthest away from the sun than at any other point during the year, giving us the shortest day of the year, the winter solstice. And there's more than that happening, astronomically speaking. From Wikipedia:

On the night of winter solstice, as seen from a northern sky, the three stars in Orion's Belt align with the brightest star in the eastern sky Sirius to show where the Sun will rise in the morning after winter solstice. Until this time, the Sun has exhibited since summer solstice a decreasing arc across the Southern sky. On winter solstice, the Sun ceases to decline in the sky and the length of daylight reaches its minimum for three days, during which the sun does not move on the horizon. After such a time, the Sun begins its ascent into the northern sky and days grow longer.

This special time of the year has been celebrated the world over from time out of mind. We're not really sure which ancient culture first began to study and honor the solstices and equinoxes, as there are monuments relating to these dates in nearly every ancient culture, but it's likely to have been of marked importance since Neolithic times. For the record, "neolithic" means new stone and refers to a particular stage of human technological development starting around 10,000 BCE. This period saw what is historically referred to as the "Neolithic revolution" in which farming and metal toolmaking reached previously unknown heights of sophistication. These advances allowed for intense population growth and the development of settled communities which leads us, via the ancient Sumerians in what is now termed the Middle East, to the first examples of recorded history. So, it would stand to reason that the Sumerians were among the first to recognize the solstices and equinoxes.


The first peoples to make monuments related to the winter solstice, however, came from Europe. Or, perhaps more accurately, the oldest surviving monuments known to modern archaeology that relate to the winter solstice come from late Neolithic and Bronze Age sites like Newgrange in Ireland and hundreds of henges and other monuments in Britain. Newgrange is one of my personal favorite ancient places, far closer to my heart than Stonehenge and several centuries older than said henge. It is older than even the great pyramids of Egypt at about 5,000 years of age. The huge monument was built to receive a ray of light into a deep chamber on the morning of the winter solstice that fell on beautiful spirals, solar discs and other symbols. At no other time of the year was this space illuminated which gives us a good indication of the significance of the winter solstice to those who built this ancient site. After all, the Neolithics were the first to perfect farming; the timing of the seasons was crucial to their very survival.

But, as stated above, the ancient Europeans weren't the only Neolithics to honor the solstices and equinoxes in stone. Sacred sites relating to the winter solstice alone have been found all over, including the Americas, Asia, Indonesia and the Middle East. Most notable, in my opinion, are the Chaco Canyon sites in New Mexico built by ancestors of the Pueblos and the Hopi and the Great Zimbabwe, AKA "African Stonehenge", site. These ancient sacred sites, and many others the world over, have fairly precise alignments involving the winter solstice. It gives me shivers to think of the ancient sites not yet discovered!

As the winter solstice sees the return of the sun after the longest night of the year it naturally lead to the incorporation of the worship of sun gods and no holyday holds more sway over us today than that of the ancient Greco-Roman period. The ancient Greeks celebrated the Chronia, in honor of Chronus, around the time of the winter solstice. Eventually, as is typical of the ancient Romans, the holyday was Romanized and became Saturnalia, and Chronus became Saturn, a deity of--you guessed it--agriculture and the harvest. The festivities were marked by the usual sacrifices, the exchanging of gifts, legal gambling-even by slaves, and a symbolic reversal of the roles of slaves and their owners (meaning the slaves were still doing all the work but things were a little more laid back than usual) and general partying all around. Originally the holyday was only celebrated for a single day, 17 December, but gradually grew in length due to its immense popularity. It was such an important and popular festival that, despite the efforts of more than one Caesar to shorten it, the celebrations eventually spread to encompass an entire week.

Saturnalia is tied up with such an important decision that a little Christian history is warranted to explain it. To understand this you must know that Saturnalia was eventually superseded by the festival of Sol Invictus, the Roman sun god imported from Syria, which borrowed many of the characteristics of the previously celebrated holyday. During the reign of Julius Caesar a great number of calendar reforms were instituted, one of which firmly placed the winter solstice, the celebration of the return of Sol, on 25 December. Later in the 4th century CE the Emperor Constantine, who considered Sol to be the same deity as Jesus, perhaps quite naturally decided upon 25 December as the birth of the savior of his new religion. So what was once Saturnalia became the festival of Sol Invictus and then became the celebration of the birth of the new sun god, the Christ child. So it would seem that some of the old Saturnalia traditions would quite naturally have survived in the more recent celebrations of Christmas, namely the gift giving and the general emphasis on food and drink.

And so, to honor his return and ask his favor I say a short prayer to Sol.

In these dark days of winter, and dark economic times of social unrest, may the light of the returning sun bless us all. Whether we honor Chronus, Saturn, Sol, Jesus or no god at all but simply welcome the return of warmth may we all be filled with the joyous potential of the season. As the calendar year turns and a new president takes the helm of my country may we all benefit from the better times to come.

Edited on 21 December: It has occurred to me that, given all the dates and facts being thrown around in the above, it might be good if I listed some sources. Duh! You'd think I'd never written an essay before. So, here are some of the sites I consulted for this post:

Free Republic
Wikipedia entry for Sol Invictus
Wikipedia entry for Constantine the Great
Wikipedia entry for Saturnalia
Wikipedia entry for Winter Solstice
Solstice at Candle Grove.com
December at Religio Romana
I also consulted "The Golden Bough" and a couple of other books that I'm too lazy to run upstairs to fetch. I've also read a lot about this subject over the years so I just consulted my memory and my pineal gland.

Athena, Zeus Born

Athena is another goddess whom I've never really cared for particularly because the classical story of her birth is one dripping with patriarchy. Zeus slept with Metis, a minor goddess of wisdom, but since it had been prophesied that any offspring would outshine the father he swallowed her whole. (And she, conveniently, is not heard from again.) Eventually there came a time when Zeus was in great pain and was aided by some of the male deities, like Hermes and Hephaistos, who split his head open. Out popped Athena fully grown and fully clothed, complete with armor ready to do battle.

Now, what this says to me is that she is not a feminine goddess and not a very natural being. Sure, Metis bore her until her "birth" but only inside the body of Zeus. Either way you look at it Athena was born from a male which just sets off all kinds of alarm bells in my head. I've never reconciled with that fact and I guess I never will. And I've wracked my brain for years to figure out just what the hell it means. And the best conclusion I've ever come to is this: the ancient Greeks, along with many ancients and moderns, considered war to be a masculine occupation. And somewhere along the lines, sometime in prehistory that we will never know about, Athena became linked with war. And to explain this the story was created that she sprang forth from Zeus, an extremely masculine deity if I do say so myself.


The fact that Athena was born fully grown is also important. If one is born fully grown there's no need for a mother to care for the child. There are no tender times of breastfeeding, no gentle nurturing, no innocence of childhood, no carefree years of youth. There is only hard adulthood and the violence of battle. There is, in short, no need for another woman's influence at all. There is only a female goddess dominated by and springing forth from the mind and brain of a male. And this is what makes Athena so very different from other war goddesses. At least they seem to have come to their positions all on their own. It seems that Athena didn't have any choice. And that's why, of all the war goddesses, she is the one I like least. I'd rather a goddess, and women in general, choose to be warriors than be forced.

Later, Athena somewhat redeems herself in my eyes when she triumphs over another male in her bid for Athens. This time, her uncle Poseidon is the male in question. See, the story goes like this. Each of them wanted to be the patron of Athens which, up until this bout was decided, was presumably known by some other name. So they had a little contest. Poseidon, as god of the seas, caused a fountain of water to spring from the ground. Unfortunately for him, the fountain contained sea water, salt water, which is useless to city-folk. Athena, on the other hand, created the first olive tree which provided timber for building and fire for heat and cooking, olives for food and olive oil which has numerous uses. Obviously, Athena won as her gift was by far the most beneficial to the people. Thus, we have a great city named Athens.

Now I say she redeems herself for two reasons. Firstly, and most obviously, she wins against a guy. Yay, good for her! She's refusing to be held down by the men in her life and family. But, perhaps more importantly, she displays features of an earth goddess by her creation of the olive tree. The olive was (and is) an incredibly important tree for the Greeks. Aside from its aforementioned uses it was also a crucial commodity that created trade across national lines. It helped Greece become a country of importance and standing. And it came from a goddess of war! How 'bout that?

So I guess I should admit that Athena isn't all bad. Even though her birth still rankles she was responsible for the all-important olive tree. Her story expresses that, even if a woman is seemingly dominated by men, she is not without hope or promise. Athena is a testament to the potential within all women. And for that I salute her.

Isms and Schisms

I have recently come to the realization, as is obvious from my updated profile, that I am a hard polytheist and have been for some time. Now we all know that poly = many and theo = god. But there's more to it than that; there are hard and soft polytheists. Soft polytheists are of the opinion that all gods are either manifestations of each other or that all gods are different aspects of the same single god. Hard polytheists, like me, view the gods as unique, separate individuals. When I first began studying and reflecting upon the gods back in my teens I was only interested in the myths as fascinating stories with perhaps some wisdom to impart (and this is how I feel about the Holy Bible of the Abrahamic folks). When I moved further into neopaganism and Wicca I was a soft polytheist, feeling that all gods were one and all religions were one and we are all one and all is one and all that happy horseshit. Now, don't get me wrong. If you are a soft polytheist and it works for you and your magic then that's great. But I see all of that "all are one" stuff that I was bombarded with in my early studies as trite oversimplification that limited my perception and worship of the gods. For me, it was happy horseshit because it was easy; it was simple because if all gods are one then there's no need to study, meditate or worship as much. I've since moved on from those early days and now, more than 11 years after I first dedicated myself to the Lord and Lady of Wicca I've come to the opposite extreme. Now that I've got a few years of study and practice under my belt I see that my past soft polytheism was really a hangover from my knowledge and experience of monotheism. I think soft polytheism made the transition from Christianity to neopaganism easier: one god, to one goddess, to a goddess and a god and now to many distinct deities. I no longer call myself Wiccan, and haven't for years and no longer see all goddesses as aspects of one superior goddess nor do I see all gods as different aspects of the Horned God. And I'm actually pretty glad about that fact. I feel that I've grown and am no longer in need of what's easy and simple. I see all gods as unique and distinct beings who are each worthy of study, reflection and worship. Hard polytheism isn't easy for me like soft polytheism was; I have to work harder, study more and think more. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

Robigalia

25 April is the date of the Roman festival of the Robigalia, a special time to beg the kindness of Robigo, goddess of mildew, mold, wheat rust and similar crop killers. Or it may be meant to honor the god Robigus depending on which source you search. On this day, a procession beginning in Rome left the city by the Flamian Gate, then crossed the Milvan bridge before reaching the fifth milestone on the Via Claudia. At that point the procession entered a sacred grove where a dog and a sheep were sacrificed and their entrails burned on the sacrificial altar. According to Ovid the flamen (priest) then said the following words:

Harsh Robigo, spare the sprouting grain and let the unblemished tops quiver above the ground. Let the crops, nursed by the heaven's propitious stars, grow till they are ripe for the sickle. Yours is no feeble power: the grain on which you have branded your mark the husbandman gives up for lost. Not the winds, nor the showers, nor the glistening frost that nips the sallow grain, harm it so much as when the sun warms the wet stalks; then, dread goddess, is it the hour you wreck your wrath. Spare, I pray, and take your scabby hands from off the harvest: Harm not the tilth; be it enough that you have the power to harm.

While I'm obviously not going to sacrifice any animals I am taking steps to control the mushrooms and fungus that like to grow in my seedling cups. A couple of years ago a very knowledgeable herb lady gave me some advice to curb these kinds of plant killers. She said to mix ash and sand and sprinkle that on my seedlings. I've never tried it before this year but I've been using this mix for the last few days and so far I think it's working. *knock wood* Nowadays only farmers and gardeners care about root rot and similar problems but just think of ancient times, or even just a couple of hundred years ago. As if propagating and planting and weeding isn't hard enough can you imagine your very life rotting away before your eyes? The food for one's family, that produce they barter for other goods, gone and all because of mold. After losing several crops of herb seedlings to root rot I can only imagine what it would be like to lose one's only food source. So, on this day I honor the goddess Robigo as well as those who have gone before me in marking this day.

The Horned God

Above is a line drawing version of "The Sorcerer" or the horned shaman from Paleolithic cave art found in modern France. The figure is quite obviously therianthropic, meaning it blends human and animals’ forms into a symbolic image. The trouble arises when one tries to pin down the meaning of said symbology. The most commonly held theory is that the image portrays one of the earliest spiritual leaders, a shaman, in the course of a ritual or trance. Pre-historic shamans used the same techniques that later shamans use to induce trance and work magic: chant, dance and various hallucinogenic or otherwise psychotropic natural substances. These shamans were the medicine men, and possibly women, of their society; they were learned herbalists and healers, intermediaries between the people and the gods and the natural world, practitioners of the earliest religion and magic. These historical horned shamans are the ancestors of later gods such as Cernunnos and Pan.

Cernunnos is probably the most easily recognizable and most popular of the Horned Gods. His name is literally "the horned one". He was worshiped all over Gaul (mostly present-day France) and in Britain; hence he is a Celtic deity. He has the antlers of a stag and is thus the lord of the wood and wild things. He is also sometimes accompanied by his symbols the torc, ram-headed snake, the stag and purse full of money. He is the god of fertility, life, animals, wealth and the underworld; he is a Great God. He is the Celtic British leader of the Wild Hunt, which makes its way across the land by night sweeping up evildoers. He is reborn every year at the winter solstice after the longest night of the year, or Yule, falling at about 21 December in the northern hemisphere, joins with the Great Goddess at Beltaine, around May 1, reaches his full strength at the summer solstice, around June 21 and dies at Samhain, October 21, which many pagans consider the end of the year; all so he can be reborn again at Yule. Most historical records maintain that Cernunnos traditionally dies at midsummer and that's very likely true. But we neopagans have felt it necessary to lengthen his life until Yule. In Gallo-Roman images he is shown alongside other Celtic deities as well as Jupiter, Vulcan and other Greco-Roman gods. After the coming of the Anglo-Saxons he became Herne the Hunter worshiped somewhat in England but more so in Germany and France.
Pan is the Greek god of shepherds and flocks, most popular in Arcadia. He is a son of Hermes the messenger god. Pan is a satyr with the horns, feet, hairy body and mountain climbing abilities of a goat. His attributes include a shepherd's crook and a crown of pine needles. As a part of the retinue of Dionysus his overwhelming lustful appetites lead him to chase nymphs throughout the forest. He is another descendent of the Paleolithic horned shaman.

The Slide into Winter

I spent some time outside tonight and got to enjoy the very beginnings of autumn. This was the first night in a long while that I could be comfortable outside. The bugs aren't as numerous and it's not as humid. It's still getting plenty hot during the day but the summer is just beginning to slow down. I like to think of it as the beginning of the slide into home. The autumn is my favorite time of year; the discomfort of summer eases and, for a while, everything keeps growing. And later, when it really starts to cool down and the trees lose their leaves, it's nearly time for Samhain, probably my favorite holyday. It's always, to me, the most magical time of the year. I don't necessarily always do a ritual on Samhain for various reasons but mostly because I don't always feel the need for ritual; I can already feel the magic and energy and spirits moving around me, through me and everyone near me. All living things are different during the Samhain season, not everyone recognizes it but I'm certain everyone feels it. Some people misunderstand it and therefore fear it, calling Samhain or Hallowe'en "evil", but I confess I don't care. It's doesn't even bother me that the candy industry makes a huge buck on treat-or-treating. It's an American tradition I hope lasts forever.

Every child should have the opportunity to take on different personas with makeup, masks, colored hairspray and costumes and troll their neighborhoods for sweets. Every family should get to decorate their home with fake spider webs and purple lights and freaky music and smoke machines. And pumpkins, let's not forget pumpkins! Even if left uncarved they're still gorgeous. I don't know how many times I've taken a pumpkin or two, a handful of orange, red and brown leaves, thrown them in a basket and enjoyed it for months on end. These are American autumn rituals that everyone should feel free to experience. The magic of this season is hard to pin down. Traditionally this is the time of year when the division between the lands of the living and the other world(s) is at its weakest or thinnest. I honestly don't know about that; I've never seen or experienced anything that would make me think an otherworldly spirit was around, so I can't vouch for that. I just feel different during Samhain; the vibe of every plant, animal and human is different: more vibrant, more aware, more in tune with each other and the natural world. Many pagans consider this to be the end of year, the annual death of the Horned God or Green Man, hence the dying of plant life and the colder temperatures. He will eventually return during the season of Yule as the sun returns after the longest night of the year. But for now, he is still with us and his juices flow in the sap and blood of all living things. Here's hoping for a long, slow, smooth ride.

Lughnasadh, Harvest Celebration

The Celtic god Lugh, the one of every skill, originally intended this holyday to be a funeral feast for his foster-mother Tailtu. During this time in historical Ireland there was a 30 day celebration in which Lugh and he consort, the nature goddess Rosmerta, were worshiped. Since then, this day has become the first of three harvest festivals within neopaganism. I didn't get to celebrate the calendar holyday with my group as me and mine are under the weather and probably will still be sick when the astronomical day comes around on the 7th. We did, however, get to enjoy the first harvest of our corn on the calendar day, the 4th. And what corn it is!! Sweet and delicious!
For me, this time of year has always marked, not only the first corn, but the onset of the most consistently hottest time of the year. The plants love it, as long as there's enough water around, and everything is growing like wildfire. The days and nights are steamy and misty, the air is full of bugs and their songs, the gardens are producing lots of fresh wonderfulness, and the sprinklers, pools and air conditioners are in full use. Temperatures and electric bills are high but as Janis sang: "the livin's easy". It's a time to get out in the sun and pick some produce then go back into the cool house and eat it. The hobbit in me is very happy, even if the mosquitoes like me like I like fresh corn.

The Green Man

The above is the scariest green man I could find but I couldn't discover the artist. If anyone knows please tell me. When I was very young I was afraid to be alone in the woods. I didn't know why or what I feared. It wasn't a fear that threatened harm; it wasn't a fear of the boogeyman. I sensed a watchful presence full of distrust; I felt like my every move was being monitored. I didn't understand this feeling and couldn't articulate it until I'd grown older. I still feel this when I'm in the woods and I feel it most strongly when I'm alone. I perceive it now as the Green Man. I don't experience the same fear as I did when I was a child but I do still feel his eyes upon me. He doesn't threaten, he just knows how destructive these pesky humans can be and must watch out for his charges. The trees and other plants, the animals and insects, the fungi and the mold are all in his care. It's an important job with far-reaching effects. If the Green Man doesn't take care of his own the world would be a vastly different place and all life would suffer for it. I don't get to walk in the woods like I once did as this place has no forest. So I'm left with little opportunity to enjoy the wonder of the woods. On the rare occasions when I do get to visit a wooded area I sometimes wonder if the trees themselves are watchful, but maybe that's just wishful thinking from this Lord of the Rings fan. The Green Man has good reason to distrust us human beings, we do a lot of clear cutting and burning, we leave our trash all over the place and we kill the animals for no other reason than sport. Even we pagans are not exempt from his watchful eyes. We may be as green as we can be but we will never be as green, as wild and full of life as the Green Man and his lands and his living charges. Our blood runs red while his runs green. That said, I still try to forge a relationship with the Green Man. I still try to show that I mean no harm and that I honor him as well as all of nature. But we humans have a lot to make up for and I don't expect trust to be established by little 'ol me in my little lifetime. But I'll keep trying in this life and the next. My blood is red but the waters of my soul are green.

Fulgurite

Fulgur: Latin for lightning

Lightning flashes at about 100 times per second and nearly one third of that lightning reaches the Earth. When lightning hits rock it creates rock fulgurite, a brownish-green glass. This less common form of fulgurite usually only occurs on mountaintops. The more common sand fulgurite occurs when lightning strikes sand. It makes a hole and around that hole is where the fulgurite forms. The lightning leaves a glass tube following along the branched path of the original strike. For this reason, sand fulgurite can be enormous. The largest piece of sand fulgurite was found in Florida. Its two branches totaled 33 feet!

As a product of lightning sand fulgurite has obvious correspondences with gods such as Zeus or Jupiter, supreme among the Greco-Roman gods, who is often portrayed with a thunderbolt in hand.

Tricksters

Well, I missed All Fool's Day but I'd still like to honor the tricksters who wreak havoc on our lives and in our universe. Tricksters are devious creatures; they pull sometimes destructive pranks and, occasionally, they get people killed. They are often, paradoxically, creators of humans, the heavens and agriculture. More than this, they are the origin of divine inspiration. Everyone has heard the phrase "Necessity is the mother of invention". That's the way I feel and think about tricksters. They incite strife, they stir up trouble and they cause problems; problems that need to be solved, thus forcing humanity to find ways around those problems through invention and innovation. In many cultures they are shape shifters, changing from human-like forms to animals and back again. This reflects their many abilities and dual natures. A somewhat "typical" trickster is Anansi of West Africa: a bringer of rain, creator of the sun, moon and stars and the first man. He is a rather vile trickster but also taught mankind to grow grain. Eris is the resident troublemaker of the Greek set. As the goddess of discord and chaos she uses her shiny golden apple to stir up trouble with gods and mortals alike. Her most famous instance of stirring up strife would be rolling her apple into a godly wedding party with the inscription 'For the Fairest' on it; the resultant disagreement led to the Trojan War. A uniquely evil trickster is Kumiho of Korean mythology. He is a fox, or otherwise fox-like human, who is truly and fully evil; he is never portrayed as a beneficent being. He is such an evil, unkind creature that he is not only unique to Korean myth but to world mythology as well. Of all the many tricksters and chaos workers in the world and the heavens two of my favorites are the coyote of American Indian lore and Loki of the Norse pantheon. Coyote usually appears in obvious form but other times he takes the shape of other animals. He is responsible for changing the courses of rivers, moving mountains and, with the help of the Spirit Chief, killed Thunderbird, killer of humans. Loki is a strangely similar figure to coyote. Loki manipulates events in such a way that, Balder, god of light and innocence, is killed. He in punished for this by being eternally tied down with poison dripping into his face. As he is the son of giants he will lead the giant army at Ragnorak.

Art by John Nieto.

Roman-Celtic Religion

Above is an image of the god Sulis from the Romano-Celtic shrine at Bath. Most of our knowledge of Romano-Celtic religion comes from temple ruins, such as those at Aquae Sulis and at Lydney Park. After the Roman conquest of Gaul the religion of the Celts remained essentially the same, except for one aspect: the Druids were gone. As leaders of their people they were powerful resistors of Roman influence and as such were eliminated by the Roman military. That is a very sad fact indeed as so much lore and wisdom went with them. Of the Roman gods the one held in highest esteem by the Celts was Mercury, god of trade and profit. After him was Apollo, god of the sun, learning and medicine; Mars, god of war; Jupiter, the surpreme weather-father god and Minerva, goddess of love and desire.

There was also plenty of blending of Roman and Celtic deities as is evident in their unique names: Mercury Visucius, Lenus Mars, Jupiter Poeninus and Sulis Minerva. In purely Celtic times Epona was a major goddess of fertility as well as animal husbandry; in Gallo-Roman times she was somewhat reduced to a protectress of horses, donkeys and mules. She was especially loved by the Roman calvary and many stables contained her shrines. She was the only Celtic deity to make it to Rome in a purely Celtic, not Romanized, form.

Attis and Cybele

Attis was originally a Phrygian god of growth and fertility. He is closely linked with the great mother earth goddess Cybele, also of Phrygian origin, whose domain included mountains, caverns and animals. She has been worshiped since Neolithic times and her worship eventually spread to Greece where it became a mainstay in the Mediterranean. To the Greeks she was the "mountain mother". The story goes that Attis was about to marry a mortal when Cybele suddenly appeared and in shock Attis castrated himself. This story helps to explain, somewhat, why Cybele devotees, called corybantes, self-castrated as part of her ecstatic rituals. As Cybele's worship grew so did that of Attis. He is her son and lover and driver of her lion-drawn chariot. As such he is also a birth-death-rebirth god in which resurrection figures heavily. Legend has it after being killed by a boar he was reborn as the evergreen pine. Pictured above is Cybele on the left and Attis on the right.

Terminalia

Today is the Roman festival in honor of the god of boundaries, Terminus. On this day offerings of blood were poured on boundary stones even though the god himself did not receive blood sacrifices. Flowers were also offered to these stones which were later considered holy themselves. When Jupiter was moving into his temple on the Capitol, Terminus was the only god who did not give way. Therefore a boundary stone, representative of Terminus, was worshipped there along with Jupiter. Later lore about the sacred boundary stones stated that anyone who disturbed or moved them would be struck by a curse.

Concordia

Today is the sacred feast day of the Roman Concordia, goddess of understanding, peace and, of course, concord. Her temple in Rome served as the meeting place for the senate. In sacred images she is often shown seated, holding a sacrificial bowl in one hand and a cornucopia, provider of limitless food and symbol of fertility, in the other. My hope is that, on this day, the powers that be might possibly get their collective heads out of their asses and get something done as opposed to spending their time, and our tax money, slinging mud. On a smaller scale I'd say this is a good time to sit down with family or friends and make peace in the home and in one's daily life.

Quirinalia

This is a sacred day to the Roman god Quirinus one of the triad of state gods along with Jupiter and Mars. His rituals, and those of his consort Hora, were performed on the Quirinal hill. The myrtle was sacred to him. His worship was established by the Sabines before the founding of Rome and was later absorbed by the Roman state. It is also interesting to note that since the times of the early Roman kings Romulus was considered an aspect of Quirinus.

Parentalia

The Roman Parentalia festival starts today and last 'til the 20th when it ends with Feralia. On this day the Vestal Virgins would gather at the tomb of Tarpeia, the first of them. During this time families gather at tombs to offer grain and wine to dead parents and other ancestors. As this was a sacred time no official business or marriages took place.

Today also marks the day when Mercury goes retrograde. For those that don't know, "retrograde" applies to a specific time period when, from our viewpoint here on Earth, Mercury moves in a backward position. And as Mercury is a god of communication it is common for all sorts of communication problems to pop up during this time. I just read that a fellow pagan blogger had some computer components die on her suddenly. Hopefully, I'll be luckier.