Kličevac idol

This is the famous Kličevac idol, made by the people of the Dubovac-Žuto brdo Bronze Age culture, who inhabited parts of Eastern Serbia between 1500-1000 BC...

This large figurine (34cmX17cm) was discovered in 1881 in a grave in the village of Kličevac. The grave contained an urn with the cremated remains of the deceased, next to which were various ritually buried objects, including this idol...

Many similar graves were discovered in the village of Kličevac. It seems that today's village was built on top of the Bronze Age village and the attached Bronze Age graveyard...

This is the drawing showing both front and back of the Kličevac idol. 

The significance of this idol was that it was the first discovered idol of this type. Later more idols like this were found in Vršac and Banat...

Unfortunately, the figurine from the original post is just a replica. The figurine, was destroyed during the Austro-Hungarian bombing of Belgrade museum during WWI. This photo, taken at the beginning of the 20th c, shows what the original idol, in the state it was found in.

One interesting thing about this idol is that it is showing us how Bronze Age torcs found in female graves in the area were actually worn.

This is a reconstruction of how female jewellery set found in the Bronze Age (c 1500 BC) female tumulus grave, western Serbia, was worn. 

Woman (Goddess???, Priestess???, Aristocratic woman???) depicted by the Kličevac idol is wearing exactly the same torc around her neck...

Here is the example of a male version of the same torc with spiral ends. A middle Bronze Age (mid 2nd millennium BC) warrior tumulus grave, Jančići, western Serbia. You can see the warrior skeleton with a bronze torque in situ around his neck vertebrae. 

The same torque can be seen on this picture together with a bronze pendant.

Is that you Gilgamesh?

This is a seal from the Sumerian city of Adab, dated to "after 2350 BCE". Official interpretation is: "Gilgamesh, fighting a lion and a buffalo. Dragon, unrelated to the other figures in the scene, is depicted under the inscription: "Urdumu, Ensi (Governor) of Udnunki (Adab)"

The seal and the interpretation can be found in a great book called "The seal cylinders of western Asia" published by William Hayes Ward in 1910. 

This book, together with pile of other amazing books can be found on Abzu, a guide to networked open access data relevant to the study and public presentation of the Ancient Near East and the Ancient Mediterranean world. 

Now I would like to offer alternative interpretation for the scene depicted on the seal of Urdumu, that will show that the dragon is very much related to the other figures in the scene...And that the whole thing has nothing really to do with Gilgamesh...

As I explained in my article "Symbols of the seasons", Bull was in the past seen as the symbol of summer (May,Jun,Jul) and Lion was seen as the symbol of autumn (Aug,Sep,Oct). The other two symbols of the seasons being Ram (spring) and Goat (winter) 

In several of my articles I talked about the link between snake and sun. For instance "The enemy of the sun". Snake is the symbol of the sun, more specifically sun's heat. Because snakes are out in "our world" during the sun dominated part of the year (spring, summer, autumn) and in the "underworld" during winter...

The end of summer (bull), beginning of autumn (lion), is the hottest part of the year in the northern hemisphere. The time of droughts. The time when the sun is at its most destructive. The time when snake turns into a fire breathing dragon...I talked about this in my article "Dragon who stole water"...

Now have a look at Urdumu seal again: Dragon (hottest, driest part of the year) stands between bull (end of summer) and lion (beginning of autumn), at the end of July, beginning of August, right where it's supposed to be...

But why are men fighting the bull and the lion? I believe that they are not fighting the real bulls or real lions. They are fighting the drought...

In Mesopotamia the year is divided into hot and dry part, summer (bull) and autumn (lion) and wet part winter (ibex) and spring (ram)...

But then I could be wrong...Maybe this is just some heroes fighting bulls and lions and random dragon just wandering about minding his own business...

But then maybe not...Have a look at this seal, from the Akkadian period, kept in the Oriental Institute, University of Chicago: Official interpretation: "Cylinder seal with a combat scene between a bearded hero and a bull-man and various beasts"...

This is even more interesting. Here the bull is facing down, meaning the end of summer (bull) and the lion is facing up, meaning the beginning of autumn (lion)...

And between them, at the hottest point of the solar year in the northern hemisphere, where on the seal of Urdumu we find the dragon, here we find Sirius (???)...Exactly where it should, be in the middle of "Dog days", the hottest part of the year, the time of the dragons...Or is this just a blazing sun of the hottest, driest, part of the year???

And what are the ibex goats doing in this scene? There is actually only one ibex goat (with two imprints created during the rolling of the seal to make the image symmetrical)...This is a cylindrical seal.

Is the ibex goat, just like the dragon "unrelated to the other figures in the scene"? I don't think so.

Ibex, is the symbol of winter, also marks the beginning of the rain season. This is because the beginning of the ibex goats mating season (November) coincides with the arrival of rains...Ibex was for Mesopotamians "The Goat of Rain"...I talked about this in several of my posts, for instance "Queen Puabi's seal". 

And on this cylinder seal, ibex, symbol of winter, the wettest coldest part of the year, is placed directly opposite Sirius (Blazing sun) of the point between bull (summer) and lion (autumn), the driest, hottest part of the year...

I don't think this is a coincidence...

But again, who knows...

Hesiod on grain

Hesiod declares: "When the Pleiades, daughters of Atlas, are rising, begin the harvest". At the mid 8th century BCE in Bœotia, the heliacal rising of the Pleiades occurred about 47 days after spring equinox, which corresponds approximately to the first week of May...

He also declares: "Set your slaves to winnow Demeter's holy grain, when strong Orion first appears". At the mid 8th century BCE in Bœotia, the heliacal rising of Orion, occurred about 85 days after spring equinox, which correspond approximately to mid June, 40 days after harvest...

Threshing

Winnowing

The harvesting time of grain in the same region with the same climate never changes. It happens always at the same time with minimal variations depending on the amount of sun and rain around the harvest date...

So when James George Frazer visited Greece at the end of the 19th century, he noted, and then wrote in "The Golden Bough" that the grain harvest in lowland areas took place between the end of April (barley) and beginning of May (wheat)...

So the grain harvest at the time of Hesiod and at the time of James George Frazer happened at the same time, in Taurus...

Coin from Bithynia (340 - 320 B.C) KAΛX Bull standing left on ear of grain...Symbol of harvest in Taurus?

The other interesting thing is that threshing and winnowing, things performed on threshing floord, took place around summer solstice...No wonder threshing floors became centres of solar-agricultural cults. 

This picture shows sacrificing to the threshing floor pole, Serbia. From my article "Shield of Achilles" 

Now I have already talked about how and why bull is the symbol of summer. 

Summer starts in Taurus, when wild Eurasian cattle are calving and ends in Leo, when wild Eurasian cattle are mating...So grain harvest, threshing, winnowing and storing of grain all take place in the season symbolised by the Bull...

Harvest was in the past seen as "killing of grain (spirit)", "cutting the neck of grain (spirit)"

I wonder if Greeks, and other people from the areas with similar climate and agricultural calendar, equated "killing of grain" (harvest and all that goes with it) with "killing of the bull"? That would have interesting mythological connotations. I will leave it at this for now...

BTW, Hesiod also said this about Pleiades:

The Pleiades would "flee mighty Orion and plunge into the misty deep" just before dawn during Oct/Nov, a good time of the year to lay up your ship after the fine summer weather and "remember to work the land". Meaning to plough and sow grain...

I will finish this article with this: 

Cyprus. The pic of the "του δρεπανιού", a solo male dance with a sickle imitating harvest movements. Photo: A. Ververis 1955. from the book of Lefteris Drandakis "Ο αυτοσχεδιασμός στον ελληνικό δημοτικό χορό" (Improvisation in Greek folk dance).

And here you can see this amazing weird (looks very much like martial arts to me) dance performed live. Enjoy... 

Maltese cross seal from Elam

Proto-Elamite cylinder seal found in Jemdet Nasr and dated to 3100BC-3000BC. Depicting two Ibex goats with a 'Maltese' cross between them. 

Elam (Western Iran) was another place where Ibex (Bezoar) goat was "The Goat of Rain" (rain season started when Ibex goats began mating). Other parts of the world where we find the same link between Ibex (Bezoar) goats, rain season and fertility are Crete, Cyprus, parts of Anatolia, Levant, Arabia, Mesopotamia, parts of Central Asia (follow links to articles). 

The climate in Elam was divided into dry season (May-Oct) and wet season (Nov-Apr).

Ibex (Bezoar) goat mating season starts at the end of Oct beginning of Nov, when Ibex males, which are normally solitary, gather to fight for females...You can read more about the mating habits of Ibex (Bezoar) goats in my article "Goat".

Ibex dominates the oldest religious images in Mesopotamia, which date to the time before the irrigation was invented. During that time, people depended exclusively on rain to water their fields. Hence the veneration of Ibexes who signalled the arrival of rain season...

But what about Maltese crosses?

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...

Adam's apple

There are two main theories as to the origin of the term "Adam's apple". The "Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable" and the 1913 edition of Webster's Dictionary point at an "ancient belief that a piece of forbidden fruit was embedded in Adam's throat"...

However, neither the Bible nor other Judeo-Christian writings mention such a story. In fact, the biblical story does not even specify the type of fruit that Adam ate...

Linguist Alexander Gode claimed that the Latin phrase to designate the laryngeal prominence was very probably translated incorrectly from the beginning...

The phrase in Latin was "pomum Adami" (literally: 'Adam's apple'). This, in turn, came from the Hebrew "tappuach ha adam" meaning "apple of man"...

According to the proponents of this theory, the confusion lies in the fact that in Hebrew language the proper name "Adam" (אדם) literally means "man". At the same time the late Hebrew word for "bump" is very similar to the word for "apple"...So we get "Adam's apple"...

Also, Adam's apple, the area of the thyroid cartilage that appears more prominent on the front of the neck, is indeed mostly seen in men following puberty, but it can occur in women, too...So this apple is not exclusively "Apple of man"...

But, there is one "apple" which only men have 🙂 

The true "apple of man"? Or just me being bored...Any equally bored biblical scholars around? I bet this completely changes the meaning of "the apple Eve gave to Adam" 🙂 And why apple is the symbol of love and marriage...

Scorpion man

Official description of this seal: "During Middle Assyrian period, seal carvers expanded their repertoire of fantastic and mythical creatures. On this seal, a bird-man with a scorpion tail aims a bow and arrow at a winged lion-griffin standing on a hillock". 1400-1200BC.

I have to say I love this description. It says that officially we have no idea what this all means...

So let's try to make some sense out of this scene...

Scorpion men appear in the Epic of Gilgamesh, where they stand guard outside the gates of the sun god Shamash at the mountains of Mashu. These give entrance to Kurnugi, the land of darkness...

Now when we talk about the sun god and the land of darkness that usually means winter. Which in Mesopotamia climatically starts at the beginning of November. In Scorpio...When the first rains arrive...And the temperature drops...

I talked about this in my post "Queen Puabi’s cylinder seal"... 

But before people start complaining about precession and constellations and such stuff, I am not talking about stars at all. Or stellar zodiac. I am talking about solar year markers...

The scorpio I am talking about marks the time when temperature in the northern hemisphere falls below what scorpions consider nice. And they decide to retire. Underground or inside people's houses. Where it's warm...

By the way I am not the first one to link these scorpion men to the zodiac sign of scorpio. I am just not sure if they understood why scorpio is where it is on the solar circle...I didn't until recently. Oh and this behaviour of scorpions is not affected by the precession...

BTW, we find the same thing in Egypt, where we also find The Scorpion King...

Who turned out to be just another version of the same animal calendar marker, marking the time when scorpions disappear...Which is also the time when plowing and sowing of grain takes place...I talked about this in my post "Scorpion king"...

BTW, the scorpion archer has a body and wings of a raptor...So this is an Eagle/Scorpion...Interestingly, Zodiac sign Scorpio, which marks Oct/Nov, is the only double sign...The other sign that marks the same period is Eagle...Cool...

I talked about this in my article "Four living creatures"...  

Ok. What about the other mythical creature? Lion. Well, have a look at this. This is zodiac, with the cross marking the signs in which the seasons start. Spring starts in Aquarius, Summer starts in Taurus, Autumn starts in Leo and winter starts in Scorpio. 

And because Scorpio is a double sign, Scorpio/Eagle...

Oh BTW, the eagle marks Oct/Nov, because this is when the mating season of Old World vultures starts. I talked about this in many of my posts...For instance "Eagle dance"...

In my other article "Symbols of the seasons", I talked about why these four animals were used as symbols of the four seasons: 

The Leo is where it is on the solar zodiac because this is when the mating season of the Eurasian lions started...

So for winter to start, autumn needs to end...So winter (symbolised by scorpion/eagle) kills (ends) autumn (symbolised by lion/eagle)...It's kind of obvious...Or not...

Oh...One other thing...Autumn in Mesopotamia is the time of droughts...Which start in Leo...Which is why a winged lion is the symbol of Nergal, the God of Death, the Destructive Sun...I talked about this in my post "Winged super human hero"... 

Wait!!!! If this is the case, shouldn't there be goat on the seal, to symbolise the end of summer, beginning of autumn?

Well glad you said it 🙂. Because actually, if you look at fine print, you can see a tiny Markhor goat standing right under the scorpion man's tail...

And as we all know, Markhor goat was with Ibex (Bezoar) goat symbol of rain season...The Goat of Rain...Before there was a God of Rain...You can read more about this in my article "Goat in a tree"...

The "stars" which frame the scene are actually just one "star" just impressed twice...It's a circular seal 🙂 Originally I thought it represented our sun, but now I know it represents Sirius. Which is at the time when Scorpion kills Lion, visible in the night sky...But which also in Leo (Jul/Aug) rises with the sun...

I talked about this in more detail in my article "7 stars of scorpio"

So there you have it...Neat right?

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...

7 stars of Scorpio

This is one of many Mesopotamian seals kept in Morgan library 

The official description of the seal is: "Man prodding ox with which he is plowing; before ox, plant--In sky, crescent, star, seven globes...The scene...may have a ritual significance; perhaps...it depicts a rural ritual, in this case connected with agriculture" 

O my god! 

That's it???

Let me see if I can decipher this image:

In two of my recent posts "Queen Puabi’s cylinder seal" and "Ploughing" I explained that before irrigation was invented, in Mesopotamia the sowing was all done after the first rains. Which fell at the end of October, beginning of November. In Scorpio (the time when scorpions disappear, hide to escape the cold and wet of winter). Which is why on this seal we find scorpion positioned above the sowing plough...  

This seal dates from Neo-Assyrian period. Apparently: "The deep cutting conforms with that of such ninth or eighth century stones...and the seal may be of similar date".

Neo-Assyrians also did ploughing and sowing after the first rains, at the end of October beginning of November...In Scorpio...

Except now, scorpions were not cool any more. The stars were all the rage. Which is why around the same time when this seal was made, Hesiod declares: "When the Pleiades, daughters of Atlas, are rising, begin the harvest, and your ploughing when they are going to set"...

So the "seven globes" can only be Pleiades...They were rising in the evening, were visible in the night sky, and were setting in the morning around 800 BC at the end of October beginning of November...The time to plough and sow "the plant"... Grain...

This is the best bit...Did you notice what the seven orbs look like? Still ploughing in Scorpio, "When scorpions disappear, but seven stars in a shape of scorpion appear..."

Now what about the star? And the moon? 

The star is Sirius...

The same star that is placed above the plough on this seal

Do you see that it's always next to a crescent moon paining upward. I am beginning to believe, that this type of moon means night and winter...

Why?

During Neo-Assyrian period, Sirius was visible at night during Scorpio, t the end of October, beginning of November, at the beginning of winter... 

So the scene on the seal means: Plough when Sirius and Pleiades are visible at night. When the first rains fall. At the end of October, beginning of November. In Scorpio. When the crescent moon points upward and looks like a dish gathering rain water...

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...