Female pots from Sudan

Fur women from Sudan making clay pots...Pic from "Sudan Notes and Records Vol. 22, No. 1 (1939)". 

And in there we read that Fur people regarded pots, their making and their use, as "female" only and a taboo for men...

For instance, in the above article we can read that when ethnographers asked Fur men how do you say in their language "he lit fire under "burma" (pot used in brewing beer)", the reply was that "you can't say that in our language, cause only women can do that"...

The authors then say that this taboo most likely originates from the ancient association between pots and goddess [mother earth] as for instance "in Nigeria, pots are still associated with mother goddess and a pot is a symbol for a female genitals"...

In "Nile Valley archaeology and Darfur ethnography: the impact of women on cultural evolution. A personal reflection" Randi Haaland gives us further info about this association between pots and women in Fur society:

"The Fur used terms for body parts to describe parts of pots in addition they explicitly associated pots as females, and in particular with motherhood occasionally manifested by placing two protrusions called nansu (breasts) on pots..."

"...Grain storage pots were made by women and only accessed by women...Body terms are used for different parts of the container such as stomach, neck and mouth. And these granary pots are made with features resembling breasts."

It seems that not only pots were exclusively in the female domain. Any grain processing and storing equipment was under strict female control too...Like a cooking fireplace, which is exclusively controlled by a woman. And grinding stones...

"Women in the village were making their own grinding stones. Suitable raw material was found in only one area, where a fine grained sandstone was located. Women had their own quarry where they extracted the raw material and did the rough shaping of the grinders..."

"...The making and using of grindstones were closely associated with female identity, so much so that when grinders are used in male dominated activities like iron production, it is only women who perform the task of grinding the ore."

These taboos are all linked with tools used for storing, grinding, cooking grain. Which indicates that they all come from the grain cult, which directly links woman, mother and female fertility and earth, mother earth and earth fertility...

This is confirmed by this taboo:

"Porridge and beer, both made from the same raw material – millet – are both made by women. In Fur tradition, they were set apart from other food items in the sense that the selling of these products would imply an activity classified as shameful, similar to selling sex."

This elevation of grain, grain food and grain drink to a level of holy food is very interesting...It must be very very old, coming from the time when grain was rare luxury. I believe that this grain cult most likely arrived to Sudan with the Neolithic farmers.

And got preserved in Sudan isolated until present time. We actually find evidence of the existence of such cult in archaeological, historical and ethnographic data throughout Eurasia from Neolithic until present day...

The remnants of this female grain cult were preserved in European "folklore" to this day, particularly among Slavs...I talked about this a lot already, like in this post about the "Mother of grain"...

The symbolic link between women and earth depicted on this Early Vinča Culture terracotta figurine from Jela, Iron Gate region of the Danube, Serbia, c. 5200 BC, H. 5.3 cm, which has a branching plant growing out of the womb...

I have been meaning to talk about the female cult of the bread baking pottery from Serbia for a while, but I always get distracted with something else, so...But I promise I will get to it soon...

PS: I want to thank my friend @dalaygiz for reminding me of this amazing Bronze Age terracotta couple from Tell Marlik in Iran. The man is depicted with a knife and a woman with a...pot...

The Blood Run stone

This is a cup marked granite boulder located on the "The Blood Run" archaeological site in Iowa, USA. The site once contained an extensive complex of burial mounds, stone circles, village areas, and an enclosure...

According to "The Cupmarked Boulders of Blood Run, Iowa" and "Ethnographic Analogy and the Folklore of Cup and Ring Rock Art" by Kevin L. Callahan, Department of Anthropology, University of Minnesota, this stone is one of the so called "death stones"...Death stones? Could this be in any way related to what I wrote about the in this post, "Lapis manalis", about "Blessed dead stone"? 

Of course it is 🙂

Here is what Kevin says (paraphrased):  "We examined the pitted boulders and nearby burial mounds at Blood Run, Iowa and Fort Ransom, North Dakota and we reviewed the ethnohistoric sources of historic period Plains Indians, and Indians from the Far West"...

"The data suggests the possibility that the primary social function of these cup marked boulders may have been as “death stones” to mark each new death or burial"... 

Very very interesting, right?

Kevin then says: "Such sacred stones were not considered inanimate objects, but the occasional dwelling place of spirits, and may have had related functions as a place for contacting the spirit world, vision questing, and as “baby rocks” for couples wishing to conceive"...

Ahh, so they believed that spirits lived in stones...Interesting...But what does this have to do with Old European culture? Well, a lot. In my post, "Lapis manalis", I wrote that Slavs believed that stones can "capture" souls of the deceased, who then continued to live in them...

Today, I came across this paper: "Portals to Other Realms: Cup-Marked Stones & Prehistoric Rock Carvings" by Gary Varner. And in it I found this being said about cup marked stones and the dead:

"The link to the dead is illustrated also in Swedish folklore which refers to cup-marked stones as “elfstenar.” Elfs are believed to be the souls of the dead who frequent, if not live in or below the stones"...

"The cups are often used for offerings to ensure that the elfs are not offended or their peace disturbed...Some of these gifts were rag-dolls left by women who wished to become pregnant"...🙂

"One cup-marked stone on Seil island...Scotland, has been used into contemporary times to appease the “wee folk”. Each spring the cup is filled with milk in the belief that if it wasn’t, the Little People would ensure that the cows did not produce any milk in the summer"...

Drought causing spirits who live in stones? Interesting, really interesting...In Finland these cup marked "sacrificial stones" were used to pour the first cows milk or first grain harvested as an offering to the spirits living in the stone...And they were offered first fruits? 🙂

"In Estonia as well 'offering stones' were used to mark the passing of people: "a close relative of each dead person had an obligation to bore a hole in the offering stone"...

"A large number of ancient cup-marked stone sites in the UK are associated with cremations, tombs and burials...Like Witton Gilbert cist burials near Durham City in the UK"...

"One of these cists, which dates to the Early Bronze Age (2300 BCE to 1500BCE), was covered by a slab of sandstone which was decorated on one side with cups and rings and on the other with only cups"...

"The current theory is that cup-marked stones, often associated with burials, resulted from the introduction of farming in Europe and the UK and may have been part of fertility rites and sacrificial offerings to the dead as a part of ancestor worship"...

But also with fertility...Interesting, and not at all surprising, considering the ancient belief that the fertility of the people, animals and the land is the gift of the dead...I wrote about this in my post, "Lapis manalis"...

Anyway, very interesting indeed...

PS: In this old article, "Rebirth", I proposed that the cup and ring mark cut into this Bronze Age tomb in Ireland, and illuminated every equinox, represented rebirth of the sun, solar year, which was then linked to the rebirth of the people buried in the tomb...

Vinča bread

One of several similar cult models of a loaf of bread, from the Neolithic Vinča culture. This one was found at Banjica-Usek archaeological site in Belgrade, capital of Serbia, and was dated to 4500 BC. Length 18 cm, width 6 cm. Collection of Belgrade City Museum...

Here is another one...

Another Vinča culture votive bread...This one could have found its way to Ireland...

From this post ritual hiding behind giant breads and about Neolithic Newgrange temple from Ireland and a very strange similarity between its entrance stone and this votive bread...

Einkorn and emmer wheat were an important part of the diet of ancient Vinča-culture. Cereals were ground using small quern-stones and the flour was made into dough which was then baked in ovens found in every Vinča house...

Photograph of the excavation of the Vinča Belo Brdo site, showing archaeologist Miloje Vasić standing next to a clay oven "in situ" and local villagers employed as excavators standing in the background. Early 20th c.  

Are you an experimental archaeology fan? Do you want to know how to make Neolithic Vinča culture style bread oven? And Bake bread in it? If you are any of the above, then this paper entitled "Late Neolithic ovens in central Balkans region" is a must... 

This is Pločnik archaeological site in Toplica District, Serbia. The 120 hectare settlement was built by people of the Neolithic Vinča culture around 5500 BCE and was used for 800 years, until it was destroyed by fire in 4700 BC... 

Local archaeologists reconstructed several houses and created a small replica neolithic village... 

The houses are equipped with the replicas of furniture, figurines and bread ovens found during the excavation... 

Local archaeologists use the archaeo village to run educational programs for kids. During one of these programs kids were thought how to make bread "neolithic style"...

 

Kids absolutely love kneading dough and making flat bread patties...

These are then placed in clay ovens, baked and then eaten by children themselves...

BTW, Vinča culture guys inherited their obsession with bread from the ancestral Starčevo culture. These where the guys who adopted grain agriculture, originally developed in the climate of the fertile crescent, for the European climate...

I wrote and article about one of their sites, Blagotin, where a temple dedicated to grain was found with many votive clay grain seeds...

Goatfish

In this article, I would like to talk about goatfish, the sacred (mythical) animal of Enki/Ea, the Mesopotamian god of fresh water...Mythical animal 🙂 Of course not. Anyway, let's begin...Lots to talk about...

First who was Enki? Enki was the Sumerian god of sweet water. Actually, he was the source of fresh water, which was seen as his semen, which he emptied into Tigris and Euphrates...

More importantly, he was the god of the annual flood of Tigris and Euphrates...The flood that made land fertile and agriculture possible in Mesopotamia.

When king Ur-Namma built a temple for Enki, he called Enki in his dedicatory inscription: "Enki the flood of heaven and earth"...

I talked about this link between Enki and The Flood, and him being effectively the god of the flood, in my posts "Rain and flood" and "Enki's little boat"...

Enki was mentioned in the earliest extant cuneiform inscriptions throughout the region and was prominent from the third millennium down to Hellenistic times...

On cylinder seals, Enki is most often depicted with two streams of water flowing out of his body: one representing Tigris, the other Euphrates. This portrays Enki as the source of Tigris and Euphrates...

The other most common depiction of Enki is holding a jar from which two streams pour out. This portrays Enki as the god of water who controls the source of Tigris and Euphrates...

Or both

The late 3rd millennium BC text "Debate between Bird and Fish" tells us that it was Enki who: "laid out side by side the Tigris and the Euphrates, and caused them to bring water from the mountains"...

Did you notice that Tigris and Euphrates were made by Enki "to bring water from the mountains"? 

Do you remember Abzu, Enki's home, the source of the water flowing down Tigris and Euphrates?

And how I argued in my post "Shamash young and old" that Abzu was not "the underground sea of fresh water, the aquifer", but that instead, Abzu was the name for the mountains from which the two great rivers emerged?

Now have a look at this: This is part of the Stele of the Vultures, a monument from the Early Dynastic III period (2600–2350 BC) in Mesopotamia celebrating a victory of the city-state of Lagash over its neighbour Umma. 

On another fragment we see a large male figure holding a mace in his right hand and an anzu or lion-headed eagle in his left hand. The hammer and the anzu identify the figure as the storm god Ningirsu. Below the anzu is a large net filled with the bodies of naked men...

In the "The God Enki in  Sumerian Royal Ideology and  Mythology" by Peeter Espak we can read this interesting bit about this monument:

The text on the Stele of the Vultures has a long list of curses intended to frighten the rulers of Umma if they ever decided to overrule the terms of defeat and start another dispute. One of the gods invoked in the curses is Enki who is titled “the king of Abzu”:

"When I (Umma) transgress the border, the great battle-net of Enki, the king of Abzu, according to the oath taken (or: curse given) upon (Umma) from the sky let cover!" 

So the net we see on the above image must be "the net of Enki"...

The text continues with the king Eanatum releasing carp-fish said to be sent or going to Abzu. 

"(To) the carp-fish released/sent to Abzu Eannatum swore"...

Very interesting indeed...

Peeter Espak concludes that "It looks like Eanatum uses carp-fish to intermediate the oath taken or superimposed on the state of Umma to Enki situated in his Abzu. The carp-fish are therefore carriers of the message and informers of Enki"...

This is very interesting, as most of the seals which depict Enki as the source of Tigris and Euphrates, also depict fish...

The fish are either depicted swimming within the two rivers flowing out of Enki...

Or fish are depicted somewhere near the streams...

But regardless where the fish are, they are always facing Enki. They are always swimming towards Enki...Towards Abzu...

Now, the goatfish was to Sumerians known as Carp-goat...This is super important...As the fish which Eanatum sent to Enki, to Abzu, was also carp-fish...

What does all this mean? Why is this important? Because carp was directly linked with the annual flood of Tigris and Euphrates, the most important annual event in Mesopotamia...

In "The God Enki in Sumerian Royal Ideology and Mythology" we can read that the poem written by the king Ur-Namma, he says that "Enki treats me favourably, flood...for me he gives". Now the word Ur-Namma used for flood was actually "a-eštub" which literally means "carp(-filled) water"...

In "A study of Sumerian faunal conception..." we can read that an Ur III text calls Enki "the (wielder of) the a-eštub (carp flood)”...

Now remember all these depictions of Enki with Tigris and Euphrates pouring out of him, full of fish swimming towards Enki? That fish is carp. And not just any carp. A mother of all carps...Barbus esocinus (L. esocinus)...

Barbus esocinus (L. esucinus) is a large fish that can reach a weight of 140 kg (300 lbs) and can be over 2 metres long. It is one of the largest freshwater fishes in the world....It is distributed in most parts of the Tigris and Euphrates and their main tributaries.

Common names for this fish are: “soong, bach, anzeh, anzah, narbach, and anzeh-bach, balzard” in Iran, “bizz, farkh-el-biz” in Iraq, “Yerli Turna, Kurşun, Cero” in Turkey. 

The English called it Tigris salmon, Euphrates salmon. Why?

Cause just like salmon, this Mesopotamian carp is synchronous spawner migrating to the upper reaches of the rivers to spawn. Their spawning beds are at the springheads of the rivers where banks are covered with gravel...

Based on collected observation data, B. esocinus spawned over a relatively short period of time, from mid-April through late June with a peak concentrated in April/May when the water temperature exceeded 19–24° C...

Which is the ideal time to catch these mighty fish which spends the rest of the year in deep waters of the lower Tigris and Euphrates system...

So the migration of B. esocinus is not an event you would miss, if you lived by the river...

Guess what happens at the exact same time when, millions of giant carps all start swimming upstream, towards the shallow waters of the source of Tigris and Euphrates? 

The peak of the annual flood. Enki's flood...It peaks in Apr/May...

Tigris flow

Euphrates flow

The carp flood, "a-eštub", "carp filled water"...This is why all the fish depicted on the seals showing Tigris and Euphrates pouring out of Enki, Abzu, are facing Enki, Abzu. 

Because these seals depict the peak of the flood. When giant carp swim towards Enki who is (in) Abzu...

Do we need better proof that Abzu is not "the underground sea of fresh water, the aquifer"? 

These fishes are not swimming "towards Abzu, an imaginary underground sea of the fresh water". 

They are swimming Abzu, the mountains from which the two great rivers emerge...

So now we know what the fish part is in the goatfish. What about the goat part?... 

Climatic year in Mesopotamia is divided into hot/dry and cool/wet halves.

The first rains (and snow) of the cool/wet season arrive to Mesopotamia when Ibex and Markhor mountain goats start to mate, Oct/Nov...

Ibex

Markhor

The beginning of the Wild Goat mating season signals the beginning of the cool, wet season, Winter. And it is the rain and snow which fall during Winter (Nov-May) that are the source of all the fresh water that flows down Tigris and Euphrates...And of Enki's flood...

This is such an important event in these arid lands that wild goats were basically deified. I talked about this in my post "Goat carrier" and many others...

The gestation period of the wild goats that live in Northern Mesopotamia is 150 days...So the first baby goats appear just before the water levels peak in the two Holy Rivers....Which is why we see baby goats being brought to Enki as offerings on so many seals...

Mesopotamian hydrological report states: "Tigris and Euphrates have two flood periods: an irregular, rain-fed rise of minor proportions lasting from November to the end of March (this is basically a slight increase in water levels) and the main snowmelt flood of April and May"...

Which means that the flood starts when Ibex goats start to mate and peaks when eštub carp start to mate...Hence goatfish as the symbol of Enki, the god (source) of fresh water and the annual flood of Tigris and Euphrates....

So not a mythical animal after all. Just a complex animal calendar marker, marking the time of the year ruled by Enki...Which is why Enki is often depicted standing on a goat fish...His "mythical animal" 🙂 I told you. There are no such things as mythical animals...

Oh, by the way, did you notice that sometimes, the "goatfish" also has bull horns, and not goat horns? Like this one...Why?

For the same reason Enki is depicted standing on a bull on this seal...

The annual flood, carp flood, peaks during the calving season of the wild Eurasian cattle...Apr/May. Time of the year which has been marked by the bull, calf, cow and calf symbol all over Eurasia and North Africa since Neolithic...Taurus...

I talked about this in my posts "Green pastures" and "Rain and flood"...

Hence bull-goat-fish 🙂 subspecies of the goat-fish mythical animal of Enki...

I think that this is quite significant article which explains so many "mysterious things"...Very little mystery left, I am afraid. Just Climatology, Biology and Hydrology...

What do you think?

To read more about ancient animal and plant calendar markers, start here…then check the rest of the blog posts related to animal calendar markers I still didn't add to this page, and finally check my twitter threads I still didn't convert to blog post...I am 9 months behind now...