Living stone

Shepherds chapel, Velebit, Croatia dedicated to Holy Mary. The altar is actually bedrock, around which the church was built, indicating that this a Christianised pagan holy place. I talked about this in my post "Shepherds chapels from Velebit"... 

Bedrock is in the Balkans known as "kamen živac, živi kamen, živa stena" (living stone, living rock), called so, because it is believed to be still part of the living body of the Mother Earth.  And is venerated as sacred...

Transhumance shepherds used to bring offerings to these lumps of exposed bedrock before they took their flocks to the highlands, to ensure good weather. People believed that "Mother Earth, known as Baba, controls the bad, cold, rainy, snowy weather". I talked about this in my post "Weather stones"...

In my post "The City", I talked about an ancient enclosure in Co Kerry, Ireland which was linked with the veneration of the (D)Anu, the Irish version of Baba, The Mother Goddess. 

The enclosure was built around an exposed piece of bedrock, which served as an altar.

The City was the place where annual rituals were perform on Bealtaine, 1t of May, the middle of Taurus, at the beginning of the cattle drive into the highland pastures, "for the protection of the cattle"...

From the bedrock standing in the centre of the enclosure, both people and cattle looked towards the two round breast like hills, made even more breast like by giant stone cairns built on their tops. The hills are known as the Paps of Anu (Boobs of the Mother Earth)...

So here in Ireland, just like in the Balkans, we have association between bedrock, Mother Earth and shepherds...Mountain tops, and bedrock crags called Baba (Grandmother, Mother, Mother Earth) from the Balkans Pic: Velika Baba (Great Grandmother) peak, Slovenia. From the post "Baba, mountains and crags"