Bull leaping in Syria

Yesterday, I came across the paper entitled "Bull leaping in Syria" by Dominique Collon. Which talks about early 2nd millennium BC depictions of bull leaping found in Syria. In it, I saw this amazing hematite seal, which was most likely made in Aleppo, around 1700BC...

Showing, well, bull leaping 🙂Among animal calendar markers...Which could help us to determine when the bull leaping festival took place...

First, the bull leaping scene is positioned under the depiction of a charging bull...

And bull is the most common animal symbol for summer (May/Jun/Jul)...I talked about animal symbols for seasons in my post "Symbols of the seasons"...

Summer starts in Taurus (Apr/May), the ancient animal calendar marker which marks the time of the year when Wild Eurasian cattle used to start calving...I talked about this in my post "Cow and calf ivory" and many others...

The summer, which started with the calving of Wild Eurasian cattle, ended with mating of Wild Eurasian cattle...Mating which was marked by vicious bull fights...Where bulls charged at each other...Like this...Like the charging bull...

Anyway, what finally ends summer is the beginning of autumn. Autumn begins in Jul/Aug. In Leo...See the lion sitting down and looking at the charging bull of summer with the "where do you think you're going" expression on its face? That's Leo, ending summer...

Most commonly, this moment in the solar year is depicted with "lion killing bull" scene...

Leo is an ancient animal calendar marker which marks the beginning of the main mating seasons of the the Eurasian lions...

Lion is also the most common animal symbol for autumn (Aug/Sep/Oct)...Because the mating season of the Eurasian lions spans the whole of autumn...I talked about this in my post "The king killing Angra Mainiu" and many others...

Moving further to the left, we see a priest (?) holding the ankh symbol, symbol of life...He is standing facing a god, Ishkur, Hadad, Adad, Baal...basically the thunder and rain god, whatever name you want to give him...

How do I know that this is a thunder and rain god? 

The climatic year in Syria is divided into hot, dry half (Apr/May - Oct/Nov) and cool, wet half (Oct/Nov - Apr/May)

The rains (rain god 🙂) arrive in Oct/Nov...When ibex goats start their mating season, marked by vicious goat buck fights...

This turned ibex goat into The Goat of Rain in Crete, Cyprus, Levant, Mesopotamia, Iran, Central Asia...All the places with the same climatic year, in which life bringing rains arrive in Oct/Nov, when ibex goats start mating...You can find links to related articles in my post "Goats and tree of life from Çatalhöyük"...

See on our seal, the Ibex "Goat of Rain" looking at the "God of Rain"? With his front leg up? Like a pet? This goat marks the moment of the arrival of the God of rain, in Oct/Nov, the beginning of winter and mating season of ibex goats...

The mating season which spans the whole of winter (Nov/Dec/Jan)...Which makes goat the most common animal symbol for winter...

Now do you see these two symbols? The "rosette" above the goat is not a decoration. This is Sirius, which is the most prominent winter star...And the other symbol is the winter moon. Crescent moon points up during winter...I talked about this in my post "Lions vs buffalos" and many others... 

Soooo...From right to left, we have summer, autumn, winter...Bull leaping is placed under summer...The season symbolised by a bull...I think that the bull leaping ceremony was performed during the summer, and more precisely, at the end of summer...

BTW, did you know that the bull leaping scene was found depicted on Bronze Age artifacts found from Indus Valley, though Central Asia, Levant to Crete? Pic from "Myths of ancient Bactria and Margiana on its seals and amulets" by Sarianidi Victor

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...

PS: I know I am getting probably boring by now, but HOW EFFING AMAZING IS THIS SEAL? And how the hell did no one else see what's really depicted on it?

Nanshe

In this article, I will tell you a story about a chance discovery I made today about geese...From the end to the beginning...

Terracotta plaque showing seated goddess Nanshe and geese. From southern Iraq. 2003-1595 BCE. Iraq Museum...Pic by Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin... 

In Sumerian mythology, Nanshe was the daughter of Enki (god of sweet water) and Ninhursag (earth and mother goddess). 

Her functions as a goddess were varied, but like her father, she was heavily associated with water...

Here is another depiction of the goddess Nanshe. She is accompanied by two geese and holds a vase in hand. Two streams of water and fish emerging from the vessel...Ur, 2100 BC...

She is depicted as the source of  Tigris and Euphrates...Just like her father Enki...

The most common depiction of Enki is with two streams pouring out of his shoulders or out of a jar which he is holding in his hands. This portrays Enki as the god of water who controls the source of Tigris and Euphrates...You can read about it in my posts "Utu or Enki", "Goatfish" and many others...

So why geese...Well geese, water...Kind of obvious, right? True, but there is a lot more to it. Geese here are used as a animal calendar marker...

If we check the list of birds of Iraq, we can see that three large geese species found in Iraq (the geese depicted next to Ninshe are large birds): A: Graylag goose, B: Greater white-fronted goose, C: Lesser white-fronted goose...

Now all these geese are winter visitors to Mesopotamian marshes. They spend summers near arctic circle, where they breed, and spend winters in Mesopotamia, where they arrive in Oct/Nov...

The fact that the geese arrive to Mesopotamia at the beginning of winter is very important and explains why the goddess Nanshe, the goddess of water and fertility, was depicted with geese...(apart from the fact that geese like water 🙂)

The climatic year in Mesopotamia is divided into hot/dry half (Apr/May-Oct/Nov) and cool/wet half (Oct/Nov-Apr/May). And all the sweet water which makes Mesopotamia fertile and habitable is the result of the rain and snow that falls during the cool/wet half of the year...

And geese arrive from the north, right at the beginning of the rain season, bringing rain with them...And stay in Mesopotamia during the cool, wet, fertile season...

They arrive from the direction of Abzu, the source of sweet water, and the place where Enki, the god of sweet water lives. 

"Abzu, place that is a big mountain, princely crown of the heaven and earth. To the lord Nudimmud (Enki), (give) praise!"

Basically, Abzu are the North-Eatern mountains, which are the source of Tigris and Euphrates...

Now have a look this. This is (most likely) Jemdat Nasr style seal 3100-2500 BC (?). From the Leroy Golf collection of Sumerian Seals...

Officially it depicts "animals in two rows: three gazelles next to a column of two flying birds over two walking birds". 

Actually what this seal depicts is: 

1. Birds, which look very much like ducks or geese, landing...

2. Gazelles or Ibex goats...Left: gazelle, Right: ibex

Both Gazelles and Ibex goats are a common animal calendar marker for the beginning of the rain season in Mesopotamia. Why? Cause the beginning of their mating season (Oct/Nov) coincides with the beginning of the rain season in Mesopotamia...

I talked about goat as a symbol for the rain season in "Goat carrier", "Dancing goat men from Luristan", "Vessel from Tepe Hissar" and many others

I talked about gazelle as a symbol for the rain season in "Pissing gazelle", "Ashur", "Mysterious creature", "Abu" and many others

And the migratory geese (ducks) arrive to Mesopotamia right at the time when gazelles start mating and when the rains arrive... Which is what this seal depicts... Beginning of rain season...

And as I said, the geese arrive from the north, from the northern mountains, Abzu, the mountain home of Enki, the God of water, source of fresh water, which is source of fertility... 

Hence geese as the companions of Enki's daughter, Nanshe, the goddess of water and fertility...

Now in "Alternate fortunes? The role of domestic ducks and geese from Roman to Medieval times in Britain" we can read that "...in ancient Mesopotamia geese were kept in herds and were used for sacrifices and food, but this does not necessarily prove domestication..."

Well, I can tell you that geese were definitely not domesticated during the time when Sumerian language was developing in Mesopotamia...We can see this from the Sumerian lexicon where the word for goose is: 

kur-gimušen: ('mountains'+'to return') 🙂

The birds which arrive from Enki's mountains in the north at the beginning of the rain season, and go back to Enki's mountains at the end of the rain season...

And this is where the story began...With me finding the Sumerian word for goose...

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...

Tigers tigers everywhere

Open bracelet decorated with feline heads. 9th - 8th century BC. Bronze, Luristan, Western Iran, currently in Louvre Museum...

Which feline? Tiger or Lion? I would say tiger...See all the stripes everywhere, including the neck...

If Tiger, this becomes very interesting...Here is Luristan on the 1900 AD Caspian tiger distribution map. Did tigers live further south during Iron Age?

It seems like it, considering that people in Luristan made tiger bracelets...

Why is this important? Cause of the "monster" Humbaba and the story about the Erin forest he (it) protected...Humbaba was described as a frightening roaring monster "whose face is that of a lion" but stripy...And he guarded the eastern mountains, the residence of the sun god Utu, from where all the wood came from to Mesopotamia. Until Mesopotamian heroes killed him...And cut all the trees...

"My friend! We have reduced the forest to a wasteland...How shall we answer God Enlil in Nippur?" 

Enkidu talking to Gilgamesh, after they have killed Humbaba, the guardian of the forest, and have cut all the trees down... 

Now in my post "Humbaba", I proposed that Humbaba, the guardian of the ancient eastern forests was a tiger...

And based on the above distribution of tigers in Western Asia, and the fact that Enkidu and Golgamesh transported felled trees "down Euphrates westward", I proposed that the original location of the Erin forest which Humbaba guarded was here, in upper reaches of Euphrates...

In the time before "Civilisation came to Sumer"...

Now when I was in Louvre, I came across this bowl, with felines. It was found in Tepe Djowi, south western Iran, and was dated to 6th millennium BC

When I saw this bowl, I couldn't believe what I was looking at. Were these cats tigers? But Tepe Djowi is all the way down south, at the bottom of Mesopotamia... Did tigers live there during late Neolithic period?

The cats depicted on this bowl are definitely not leopards, so often depicted on early Iranian pottery. For comparison, have a look at this vessel also currently kept in Louvre. The vessel is from Tepe Sialk, Iran, and was dated to 4th millennium BC. The animals depicted on the vessel are leopards.

Leopards are depicted above flowing water, because they are used as an animal calendar marker for the end of winter, beginning of spring. I talked about this in my post "Spots and stripes"...

The zig zag lines symbolically depict flowing water, making leopard "the cat of flowing water"...And the reason for this is that snowmelt in Iranian mountains stats when leopards start to mate, Jan/Feb. In Aquarius 🙂

Pic snow cover Iranian mountains

And it is this snowmelt that makes Iranian rivers flow...

 Pic: water flow in Iranian rivers

And so it is possible that the felines depicted on the Tepe Djowi bowl are leopards with "flowing water" zig zag line drawn on their bodies, to symbolically turn them into "cats of flowing water"...But that would be the only such depiction of leopards I have seen so far...Which makes it a lot more likely that these cats are actually tigers...Now extinct Caspian tigers...Which is kind of amazing...

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...

Yule log in English tradition

Have you cut your Yule log yet?

"The ancient fire-festival of the winter solstice...has survived...in the custom of the Yule log...[once]...widespread in Europe, it seems to have flourished especially in England, France, and among the South Slavs"...From "The Golden Bough"... 

I wrote about South Slavic Yule log customs in my posts "Badnjak" and "First footer"...

I wrote about old French Yule log customs in my post "La buche de noel"...

In this post I will write about Yule log customs from England:

Robert Chambers, in his 1864 work, "Book of Days" notes that "one of popular observances belonging to Christmas is more especially derived from the worship of our pagan ancestors: the burning of the Yule log."

Clement A. Miles in Christmas in "Ritual and Tradition" published in 1912, says: 

"...within the memory of many [Yule log] was a very essential element in the [Christmas] celebration...not just for warmth, but as possessing...magical properties..."

"In some remote corners of England it probably lingers yet. English customs, they can hardly be better introduced than in Robert Herrick's words:  

"We may note especially that the [Yule log] must be kindled with last year's brand; here there is a distinct suggestion that the lighting of the log at Christmas is a shrunken remnant of the keeping up of a perpetual fire..."

Another tradition and its origin are thus described by Sir Laurence Gomme in "Folk Lore Relics of Early Village Life"...

"From there being an ever-burning fire, it has come to be that the fire must not be allowed to be extinguished on the last day of the old year, so that the old year's fire may last into the new year"...

"In Lanarkshire it is considered unlucky to give out a light to any one on the morning of the new year, and...if the house-fire has been allowed to become extinguished recourse must be had to the embers of the village fire [on New Year's Eve a great public bonfire is made]"...

J. Ashton, in "A righte Merrie Christmasse!!" says: "In the north of England...[over Christmas] it was useless to ask a neighbour for light, so frightfully unlucky was it to allow any light to leave the house between Christmas Eve and New Year's Day"...

Georgina F. Jackson say in "Shropshire Folk-Lore: A Sheaf of Gleanings": 

"In Shropshire the idea is extended even to ashes, which must not be thrown out of the house on Christmas Day, 'for fear of throwing them in Our Saviour's face'"...

"Perhaps such superstitions may originally have had to do with dread that the 'luck' of the family, the house spirit...might be carried away with the gift of fire from the hearth"...

"In the 1880s there were still many West Shropshire people who could remember seeing the Christmas Brand drawn by horses to the farmhouse door, and placed at the back of the wide open hearth, where the flame was made up in front of it"...

"The embers, says one informant, were raked up to it every night, and it was carefully tended that it might not go out during  the whole season, during which time no light might either be struck, given, or borrowed"...

"At Cleobury Mortimer in the south-east of the county the silence of the bells during 'the Christmas' points to a time when fires might not be extinguished during that season"...

In 1849 "Notes and Queries" George Bell says: "The place of the Yule log in Devonshire is taken by the "ashen faggot" (sticks of ash fastened together by ashen bands), still burnt in many a farm on Christmas Eve...

In 1740 "Observations on Popular Antiquities", Henry Bourne writes: "Our Fore-Fathers lit up Candles of an uncommon Size, which were called Christmas-Candles, and layed a Log of Wood upon the Fire, which they termed a Yule-Clog, or Christmas-Block"...

"The Yule-Clog therefore...seems to have been used, as an Emblem of the return of the Sun, and the lengthening of the Days. For as both December and January were called Guili or Yule, upon Account of the Sun's Returning, and the Increase of the Days"...

"So, I am apt to believe, the Log has had the Name of the Yule-Log, from its being burnt as an Emblem of the returning Sun, and the Increase of its Light and Heat"...

H. J Rose says in 1923 "Folklore Scraps": "In the last generation the Yule log was still burned, and a piece of it saved to light the next year's log"...

In the 1790 "The Gentleman's Magazine", we can read that: "In England the Yule log was often supplemented or replaced by a great candle"...

"At Ripon in the eighteenth century the chandlers sent their customers large candles on Christmas Eve, and the coopers, logs of wood"...

And finally: In 1841 "Medii Aevi Kalendarium", Hampson says: "Candle that is lighted on Christmas Day must be so large as to burn from the time of its ignition to the close of the day, otherwise it will portend evil to the family for the ensuing year"...

So basically Christmas candle is just a Yule log in disguise...

Anyway, may your fire burn bright...

Merry Christmas eve to all who celebrate Christmas tomorrow...

Holy carp

Ancient Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, ca. 1352-1336 BC. Ceramic vessel in the form of a fish, with a narrow, flared-mouthed spout projecting from the top where a fin would be...

According to the object description, "the fish depicted is a Nile carp which plays a significant role in the Osiris mythology"...

So apparently, Set, the brother of Osiris, was pissed off that Osiris was made the Pharaoh of Egypt instead of him after the death of their father Geb...

Set believed that he was the rightful heir to the throne of Egypt, and that Osiris was the usurper...So he decided to kill his brother and take what's rightfully his own...

And so he did...And after killing Osiris, Set then cut his body into bits and scattered these bits all over Egypt. Finally, he threw Osiris's penis into the river Nile, where it was promptly eaten by a Nile Carp...

Apparently, this legend explains why Nile was seen by the Ancient Egyptians as "the water of life", as "fertilising semen emanating from the severed phallus of Osiris"...

This story was reenacted every year as part of the "great mystery festival". This festival which commemorated the death and resurrection of Osiris, was celebrated at the end of the Inundation (Annual flood), on the same day that grain was planted in the ground...

One of the rituals performed during the festival was the construction of "Osiris Beds". They were originally wooden, and later ceramic containers in shape of Osiris, filled with fertile black silt brought in by the Nile river during the Inundation, and sown with barley seeds...

The germinating seeds symbolized Osiris rising from the dead. Basically rebirth of nature, and most importantly, rebirth of grain. These Osiris beds were also placed in tombs, symbolising resurrection...

Interestingly, Horus, the son and the avenger of Osiris, was the lord of the black, fertile (soil) land. While his enemy, Set, the killer of Horus's father, was the lord of the red, infertile (desert) land...

In all fairness, when we look at Egypt, we can see why Set, the lord of the desert, might have thought that he should have been the Pharaoh...It's all red desert...Except for this thing green line in the middle, the land of the black soil...

In "Isis and Osiris", Plutarch says that...[during]...the festival "the priests bring forth a sacred chest containing a small golden coffer, into which they pour some potable water...and a great shout arises from the company for joy that Osiris was found (or resurrected)...

Then they knead some fertile [black] soil with the water...and fashion therefrom a figure, which they cloth and adorn, this indicating that they regard these Isis and Osiris as the substance of Earth and Water"...

Symbolic, right? It is this fertile black soil, the mix of Earth and Water, which every year allowed Horus (the lord of the black, fertile, Nile valley land) to defeat Set (the lord of the red infertile, desert land)...

That black soil is brought to Egypt from the southern highlands, by the the annual Nile flood, without which, Egypt wold have been swallowed by the desert, making Set, the god of the desert, the (rightful) Pharaoh of Egypt...

So what does this have to do with Nile Carp? Well, this is the annual flow chart of the river Nile. You can see that the river flow peaks during the period July-September. This is the flod that brings the black fertile soil which makes life possible in the middle of the desert...

According to the research data found in this paper "Study of Some Biological Aspects of the Nile Carp, Labeo niloticus (Pisces, Cyprinidae) from Khashm El-Girba Reservoir and Atbara River, Sudan: I Abundance; Sex Ratio; Gonado-somatic Index and Breeding Season" "gonado-somatic index of Nile Carp...starts rising in late Apr, reaches its peak between Jul and Sep, then starts to decrease decreases until February...

Translated into normal English, this means that Nile Carp mating season coincides exactly with the Nile flood...Sounds like a great candidate for an animal calendar marker?

As the water starts to rise, the carp starts to mate. And when carp mate, you know about it. The fish all come to the shallows, where males fight each other over the right to fertilise female's eggs...Lots of jumping, splashing, wallowing...And fish fucking...

Not a chance to miss this, if you were living by the river, from the river...No wonder that the Nile Carp ended up in the Osiris myth...

If anyone should eat the penis of the god of fertility, which was thrown into the Nile River, who better than Nile Carp whose copulation coincides with the annual flood, the outpouring of the "water of life" (semen) of Osiris...And the source of fertility in Egypt...

This could have been maybe stretching it a bit, if we didn't find animal (and plant) calendar markers embedded into the core of the Egyptian religion since the Pre Dynastic period...I wrote about this in my post "Markhor goat from Naqada"...

Have you ever wondered why we have all these cow mother goddesses in Egypt? Because the beginning of the calving season of the wild Eurasian cattle, Aurochs, which once also lived in Egypt, coincides with the beginning of the rise of the Nile...I talked about this in my post "Holy cow"...This is also the reason why we find the worship of the holy calves in Egypt too...I talked about this in my post "White calf"

Have you ever wondered why sun was worshiped as the source of life in Egypt? In the desert! Cause life giving Nile flood starts at the beginning of the hot part of the year (Apr/May), and ends at the end of the hot part of the year (Oct/Nov)...Hence Ra, the dude...

And have you ever wondered why lionesses are so important in Egyptian mythology? Cause the Nile flood peaks in Leo, which marks the beginning of the mating season of the Eurasian lions...But if the Nile doesn't flood, the season of life becomes the season of death...

Which is what is described in the stories about runaway "goddess of moisture" who got pissed off and left Egypt, bringing famine and destruction had to be "brought back" by baboons...Who mate at the beginning of the monsoon season which feeds the Nile flood...I wrote about this in my post "Baboon"...

I wrote about the monsoon season in my post "Menat" about the holy couple "Shu" (wind) and "Tefnut" (moisture) who together mean "wet wind" = eastern monsoon...

And then we have dogs and dog days, the beginning of the mating season of the old dog breeds, which coincides with the peak flood and the helical rising of Sirius...I wrote about this in my post "Dog days"...

And cats and their veneration around the time of the harvest, when rats multiply and cats give birth to lots of hungry kittens...I wrote about this in my post "Bastet"...

And there's more...

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...