Picture Postcard #7 - Unto the Goddess

At midsummer, the island earth bakes beneath Helios’ gaze. Insects whirr, peasants retreat to their hovels and animals laze in orchard shade.

Hues of green, brown and ochre blanket the fertile valley from salt sea to rocky peak. Splashes of yellow and orange, purple and red abound amid tangles of ivy and grape vine.

As the fiery sun at last dips into the western waves, a hush falls over all, a sigh to melt troubled limbs and sorry spirits. Crickets join the chorus and the lady Selene rises silver and full.

When the fire within the temple kindles, it is time.

At the edge of a grove, a young satyr sits on a moss-covered rock. His eyes take in the moon, the valley and the temple before he closes them and raises his reed pipe to his lips.

The music is soft and sweet as the dew that gathers upon the ground about his hooves. Night comes on and the constellations wink.

From all directions comes laughter like crystal water, the voices of Nymphs, Naiads and Dryads come to frolic beneath the full moon and pay homage to their lady. They skip and dance and twirl, barefoot upon the dewy grass with crowns of flowers in their long-flowing hair.

More satyrs come, jumping with excitement, mischievous grins beneath craggy brows topped with ivy and grape vines. They crash onto the scene to embrace the spirits of wood, field, grove and stream.

Cries of delight and jollity lift into the sky and they all spin and laugh and lift olive wood cups brimming with wine to their lips.

Cornucopia overflow with the fruits of the land and baskets of bread, tenderly made of the goddess’ grain, pass among the throng.

Then the centaurs come down out of the mountains, dark and lean and warlike. But this night, their cudgels lay at home. They come to celebrate, to shake the earth with their rhythmic dance - war made merry.

The torches are burning bright and the music reaches a fevered crescendo as flute, tambourine, aulos, systrum and drum rise and fall with the voices of all. Faster and faster the gathered whirl and laugh and jump and roll…

Until it all stops.

Upon the road, lit by moonlight, approach the Kouros and Kore. They are young and beautiful and loving, new blossoms to the world about them.

The gathering parts for them, a sea of smiles and admiration as they approach the temple where offerings pile high against the walls. Before the door, a throne is set and the Kouros and Kore kneel before it.

All sound goes out of the world as the goddess steps out of her house, her bare feet soft upon the marble step, barely touching the blades of grass beneath her as she steps down.

Demetra.

All know her here, love her. And she loves them, and gives to them.

The goddess’ white robes flow about her like a clinging mist and her wheat-gold hair falls in perfect strands down the length of her back. Her head is high and proud, and the stars spin in her sky-blue eyes.

A hand upon the cheek of the Kouros and Kore welcomes youth to the gathering and all bow before the goddess as she sits with the youths to either side.

The goddess smiles and laughs, a sound to lift the hearts and spirits of all. She nods and the revels explode once more in the midsummer night.

There is yet time before the dawn and the heat of day, for song and dance, for laughter and love.

Demetra smiles and all is well with the world…

A Brief Halloween History

Scare the Spirits of the Dead

Tomorrow night is the night that many children, and adults, have been looking forward to for a long time, to get dressed up, carve a pumpkin, eat lots of candy and party it up incognito. Halloween, as we know it, has evolved over time and like many of our current traditions, has its roots in the distant past.

There are many theories about what exact tradition or ancient festival is at the heart of our modern Halloween or, All Hallow’s Eve. Some maintain that it is a Christian festival linked to All Saints’ Day on November 1 and All Souls’ Day on November 2. Historically, during these two Christian festivals, ‘soul-cakes’ would be made and handed out to the poor who would go door-to-door. This was seen as a way of praying for the souls that were then in Purgatory. Halloween is indeed a good time to pull out your copy of Dante’s Inferno. 

Another candidate thought to contribute to the origins of Halloween is the ancient Roman festival of Pomona. Unlike many Roman divinities who had their original Greek counterpart, Pomona was a uniquely Roman goddess or wood nymph who watched over and protected the fruit trees at this harvest time of year. The connection to Halloween seems a little less likely to me but it is still an interesting festival and apples do figure largely in some Halloween activities. Who hasn’t bobbed for apples?

However, when it comes to Halloween the most likely candidate for its origins still seems to be the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain (pronounced ‘saw-wen’). This was a sacred time of year for the ancient Celts of Gaul, Britain, Scotland and Ireland, a time of the death of summer. In Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man it was known as Samhain, in Wales and Cornwall, Calan Gaeaf and Kalan Gwav respectively.

Never step in a Fairy Ring!

This was the time of the harvest, of bounty but also of death, a part of the cycle of life. It was also a time of year when the door to the Otherworld was opened, the veil at its thinnest. The souls of the dead were said to revisit their former homes where people would set places for them at table. Other beings, such as fairies, roamed the land as well, some good, some mischievous and others harmful.

One way in which people, young and old, would avoid being noticed by spirits of the departed was by wearing a costume or ‘guising’ as it was called. If you had wronged a family member in the past, or even trampled a fairy ring, you were better off having a good costume! The idea of trick-or-treating in 19^th century Ireland was a way that folks went door-to-door gathering food as offerings for the fairies or fuel for the purifying bonfires of Samhain. Fire and its light served as protection during the thinning of the veil and the carving of pumpkins into Jack-O-lanterns served to scare spirits and fairies away.

Even if you don’t celebrate Samhain or Halloween in some way, shape or form, it is nonetheless interesting how ancient traditions survive thousands of years, from the feeding of the dead in ancient Egypt and Greece to the Roman and Celtic festivals of the harvest. Halloween seems to be a melding of many different aspects of various cultural traditions.

Samhain Bonfire

So, tomorrow night, whether you are lighting a candle, carving a pumpkin, handing out candy or going all out with your ‘guising’, take a moment to remember that it is not just some modern day, consumer-driven tradition that you are taking part in. Remember that you are taking part in an ancient rite at a sacred time of year for many cultures and that maybe, just maybe, you are being watched from the other side of the veil between this world and the next…