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In my news feed around last year’s Winter Solstice there was a item about Icelandic Pagans celebrating at their new temple site.The report is here: https://icelandmonitor.mbl.is/news/culture_and_living/2017/12/23/icelandic_pagans_celebrate_winter_solstice_at_new_t/   For the most part, it’s a reasonable presentation, but at the end the reporter just had to put in “As to the sacrifice, there’s no blood spilled at the ceremony.” The Gothi, Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson responded “No, no, this is very child friendly. The only thing we sacrificed were clementines.” Sounds to me like he was a bit grumpy over the s-word. Quite justifiably I feel – reporters in general seem quite obsessed with their notion of ‘sacrifice’, projected onto us.

But why are they so obsessed? I am inclined to feel that it is indeed their own (that is Christian) nastiness that they desire to project onto others. The Abrahamic religions in general have something of a cheek in doing this, for their religions are absolutely founded on the principle of ‘sacrifice’, that is, of killing in the name of their big-G.  Not many people actually bother to read the Bible nowadays, other than a few cherries suitable for Sunday-school children, but its awfulness is there in black and white.

It takes just four pages to get to the first atrocity (Genesis 4:1-18) – Jehovah rejects Cain’s offering of ‘the fruit of the soil’ but accepts Abel’s choice lambs. Fratricide ensues. Sundry places in the ‘Old Testament’ document Jehovah’s delight in the “soothing aroma” of burnt offerings. Apples and lettuces clearly aren’t good enough for him. It is generally considered that the Cain / Abel story is ‘historical symbolism’, to do with conflict between pastoralists and agriculturalists. There’s no doubt some violence did occur in that historical context, as indeed similar economic difference has repeatedly through history. However, the evidence from multiple historical scenarios generally has the pastoralists causing the violence, so the story can plausibly be read as a deliberate case of ‘blame the victim’!

We refer to the Abrahamic religions as such since they claim Abram / Abraham (my ‘New English Bible’ seems to mix the names) as founder. By ‘submitting’ to J, or ‘Allah’, Abram is also considered ‘the first Muslim’. Pagans might well interpret this story somewhat differently – for me anyway, it demonstrates Abram’s absolute moral failure. Genesis 22 does not mention Abram having the slightest compunction at cutting his son’s throat (despite Isaac’s somewhat miraculous conception to a woman of 90 and a man of 100 – one might imagine the child as more valued!) Wondering what sense could be made of the story, I came across this article: http://www.chaimbentorah.com/2013/09/word-study-ram-thicket/, which describes the famous ‘Ram in a Thicket’ as illustrated. Apologetic though the article is, it suggests firstly that the Hebrew word ‘aval’ can mean any animal with horns, and then further that the image is of ‘Marduk’, also known as ‘Amar-utu’; that is, the calf of Utu (the sun god), hence ‘the young bull of the sun’. So that article argues that the ‘sacrifice’ story is really a symbolic statement of the death of the Pagan deity, with J taking things over.

If J was prepared to ‘save’ young Isaac, he was less bothered as to “Jepthah’s Daughter” – being female, she doesn’t even get a name. Her father ‘sacrifices’ her in thanks to Jehovah granting victory over the Ammonites. You can find her tale in ‘Judges’, ch. 11. Abrahamic apologists often try to deny this disgusting story.  As for animal sacrifice, it is precisely specified that two yearling lambs should be killed every day at the Hebrew Temple. (We don’t really know whether this rule was really complied with, since it’s a vast quantity of creatures for a supposedly poor folk, or whether the whole idea is all just the writer’s fantasy.)  Yet apparently, a ‘sacrifice’ of a lamb is now being performed by the ‘Jewish Institute’ in celebration of the passover festival. (Source: https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-first-passover-sacrifice-to-take-place-in-old-city/) One could go on, ad nauseam – the Bible is full of such stuff.

Archaeologists too seem to be obsessed by ideas of ‘sacrifice’. All forms of violent death, human or animal, are guaranteed press coverage and exhibits of the remains. There’s always been a big gap between ‘animal sacrifice’ and ‘human sacrifice’ – the former was clearly a widespread practice in classical (Greek / Roman) religions, yet the latter is only hinted at in myths, to the point that some question whether human sacrifice was ever actually practised. These historical Pagan cultures certainly did kill people of course, in the context of ‘execution of criminals’. What makes a ‘criminal’ is, as nowadays, not consistent – the famous philosopher Socrates famously found this out the hard way.

My own view is that ‘human sacrifice’ was always the deeply ‘political’ matter that it is to this day – a matter of power and control in which any form of spirituality is just conscience-appeasement and public relations. I would assert that there is no significant difference between ‘execution’ and ‘human sacrifice’ – we should certainly consider that the killing of ‘witches’ was the latter. So, contrary to the official view, I would argue that human sacrifice in Britain only came to an end in the 1960’s when execution by hanging was abolished. Calling the process ‘execution’ makes no difference – it was a highly ritualised killing, fully sanctioned by a representative of the state religion, the ‘Church of England’.

The media obsession with ‘sacrifice’ is particularly galling, for modern-day Pagans, in that ‘sacrifice’ is something we have (almost) completely renounced. The most famous of such renunciations is the one in Doreen Valiente’s “Charge of the Goddess” in which She states “Nor do I require aught in sacrifice, for behold, I am a gracious Goddess and my Love is poured out upon the Earth”. This is an excellent summary of Gift-Economy Theology.

Various public-facing Pagan organisations with which I am personally involved, such as the Fellowship of Isis, and Ar nDraiocht Fein (A Druid Fellowship), explicitly prohibit any form of ‘sacrifice’ in their rites. And yet, it is fascinating that at almost any Pagan event, someone will inevitably make a ‘sacrifice joke’. Few, if any, are amused, yet whereas sexist and racist ‘jokes’ would nowadays be called-out, this doesn’t much happen with ‘sacrifice jokes’. Most Pagan events are indeed considerably less orgiastic than a Sunday-School outing, and one can perhaps forgive those who wish they were rather more wicked.

Given the apparent significance of ‘animal sacrifice’, at least in the comparatively well-documented classical world it is not surprising that some Pagans have, Valiente et al notwithstanding, wondered whether some form of ‘sacrifice’ should be reinstated, for example, at major festivals where ‘hog-roast’ or suchlike would be taking place anyway. Although vegetarians might not care for this, it is argued that the creature should be killed humanely, thanked and honoured – which certainly does not happen with abbatoir meat.

It is difficult to understand any sort of rational explanation for animal ‘sacrifice’ except in the context of communal feast. Indeed, the whole business seems somewhat crazy. I read recently (in Sorita d’Este’s just-published “Circle for Hekate”) that the chronicler Hesychius of Miletus wrote that dogs were sacrificed to the Goddess Genetyllis (associated with Hekate) in order to reduce pain in childbirth, on the justification that dogs were thought to have less painful labour. He wrote in the 6^th century ce, so might well be misinformed.

Hekate is certainly known both as a ‘lover of dogs’ and as a friend to women in childbirth. But the ‘logic’ escapes me. I would have thought Hekate displeased by people killing her creatures… More generally, I absolutely reject the notion of the Deities as capricious and hostile beings that require appeasement. I similarly reject the idea that they need the ‘energy’ or ‘mana’ from killing-sacrifice – rather, the God/dess/e/s are the source of all ‘life’ and ‘energy’. Those of Hellas lived on ‘ambrosia’. (And in Asgard, Odin consumed only wine.) So they really didn’t need burnt offerings and smoke.

One can wonder therefore how the notion of ‘animal sacrifice’ might have arisen, unless one dismisses it as ‘primitive superstition’, or otherwise takes it as purely a form of manipulation of the masses by a parasitic priesthood. Those views might be taken by rationalists and Abrahamics, but surely not by Pagans. Nonetheless, I cannot see how the ‘dog sacrifice’ described above can derive from a valid spiritual vision. In pursuing these thoughts, I was inspired to the following perspective.  I haven’t worked through the vast academic literature on the subject – I would be most interested if anyone has additional reliable information in support of my thesis (or even if there is real counter-evidence!)

I was struck by the similarity of two individually well-known mythic stories. The first is Greek – the establishment of animal sacrifice by Prometheus (as related by Hesiod). The point of this story is that what Prometheus actually ‘sacrifices’ (that is, burns on the altar) is really a bundle of skin, bones and unappetizing bits, saving the meat for humankind (which Prometheus had just created). All the usual interpretations take Greek myth as ‘drama’ (by which I mean human interaction, rather than sacred story), and so this episode is regarded as a ‘clever trick’ at the expense of Zeus, who then has ‘justification’ for his subsequent sadistic cruelty to Prometheus.

The second is Norse, from the story of Thor’s visit to Utgard. Thor kills his goats, as meat for dinner at a farmstead where he stays. He specifically requires bones and skin to be set aside, and next morning, he ‘hallows’ the two piles (using Mjolnir, his ‘hammer’) and they are returned to life as goats. The whole story is usually treated as near-slapstick, and as an incidental excuse for Roskva and Thialfi being taken into Thor’s service. Alternatively, the episode might be considered an example of ‘magic’ – which doesn’t really tell us much if we consider that Thor, like all deities,, is 100% magic anyway.

For us modern folk, cursed by the Book, we tend not to realise that ancient sacred story (aka ‘myth’) was transmitted as much by visual means as by oral retelling, and not at all by fixedly printed words. In addition to wall paintings and art on ceramics, myth-depicting tapestries were highly valued (women’s work of course…) and we have specific record of wood carving being used as myth-depiction in Scandinavia. I have not been able to identify good images, neither ancient nor modern, of either of the two specific scenes (lots of Prometheus being tortured, and of Thor in chariot with live goats) – but if we imagine the two scenes, I think we might well be unable to distinguish between them. We don’t know whether Prometheus blessed his ‘sacrifice’ by hand-waving or with any implement. However, it seems to me that in the closely-linked myth of Pandora (see also my post:  Pandora Unboxed) Prometheus is in places mythically doubled by Hephaestus, who certainly is a Hammerer, so that a hammer is plausible in Prometheus’ grasp also.

My contention firstly then, is that these two stories are later reflexes of a much older, shared Indo-European spiritual tradition. I’m happy to accept the tenet (much used by Jane Harrison and the ‘Cambridge school’) that the praxis of a rite is deeply conservative and may be much older than the explanation or ‘myth’ associated with it. The story of Thor is not, of course, called a ‘sacrifice’, since he revives the goats rather than killing them. My contention is that actually, Prometheus was ‘originally’ considered to be doing the same thing. He clearly is not killing the creatures, since that happened some time prior.

Academics, for whom dinner is put on their plates by someone else, may not be aware of how time-consuming a process butchery actually is. The creature has to be beheaded, bled, eviscerated, skinned and jointed. Often, meat is ‘hung’ for at least a few days before cooking. We are told that at one festival of Panathenaia, for example, Athena received a sacrifice of 100 oxen, which were then used in a great banquet to feed the worshipers. No one ever tells us how many butchers and cooks were involved, nor how long it took them to get the meat from living animal to worshipers’ plates.

We must understand though that the myth of Prometheus is not ‘just another story’ but rather is the primary precedent, the mythic / theological justification for, and the exemplar of sacrifice in Greek religion. So if his rite is manifestly not one of killing, but rather one to effect rebirth of the dead creatures, that completely explodes all ‘rationale’ for ‘sacrifice’. Thor, being a deity, effects revivification immediately – we mortals, following Prometheus, have to trust the Gods to do things in their own time.

It seems to be universal in hunting cultures that, whilst valuing the skill of the hunter, it is always considered that the animal ‘gives itself’, generally with the mediation of a deity sometimes known as ‘Master of the Animals’ and otherwise as ‘Lady of the Beasts’. It is always the case that prayers are made at the killing: firstly for the arrow or spear to fly true, bringing a quick and clean death; secondly in thanks for the gift of life, to both creature and deity. But this is not ‘sacrifice’, just dinner. More theologically, it does not meet the criteria for the usual view of ‘sacrifice’, since it is not the hunter who ‘gives’ the animal to the deity, but rather the opposite – the deity gives the creature to us.

I do not have information as to whether the ‘skin and bones rebirth rite’ is something specifically Indo-European or more widespread. I strongly suspect that other cultures have different practices, but still focused on the rebirth of the creatures’ spirits. Anthropologists, viewing through the muddied Abrahamic lens, are all to likely to have referred to such ‘primitive’ rites as ‘sacrifices’. It would be interesting to know of other traditions in which alleged ‘sacrifices’ might more properly be revivifications. The only other such rite that I know of is the ancient Greek “Bouphonia” described in Harrison’s “Themis” – in this, after all have eaten of the flesh, the ox skin is stuffed with hay and stood up together with a plough as if alive.

Human beings have been killing animals and eating meat for as long as we have been standing on our back legs. It is now widely understood that ‘gathering’ generally produced more calories than ‘hunting’, but this tended to make meat-eating something ‘special’, as it still is for a great majority of the world, unless explicitly vegetarian. So why should killing a creature in a fancy way become something religious? I have argued that what we now call ‘sacrifice’ conflates two quite separate events of religious significance – the death of the animal and the later ‘rebirth’ rite. These events are separated by a substantial time interval. It seems to me that whilst ‘sacrifice’ is generally considered ‘nasty’, both the above are perfectly valid rites for meat-eaters. I appreciate of course that vegetarians may feel it is time for ‘spiritual evolution’ beyond all of this.

I think we have to assume that the notion of ‘sacrifice as killing’ derives from the time when humankind shifted from gathering-hunting as ‘mode of production’. It is tempting to ‘blame’ the Indo-Europeans herding culture for originating the notion, but early farmers can just as plausibly be the culprits, or indeed the fusion of these cultures may have triggered it. Both herders and farmers think that they ‘own’ animals and further that they themselves are responsible for the animals’ breeding. Freud and other psychologists have built vast theoretical edifices on the idea that killing animals for food produces ‘guilt’ within humans, and that this is the real basis of ‘original sin’ and all other religion. I find this argument wholly specious, and rather, that is the theological / conceptual shift from the twofold prayer-at-death / subsequent revivification to the notion of ‘sacrifice as killing’ that is the ‘Original Heresy’.

So where does this leave modern Pagans? Not many of us, even if meat-eaters, have the option of killing and butchering the meat we eat. Were we so forced, one suspects the number of vegetarians would rapidly increase! But it does mean that if context and circumstances allow – the festival hog-roast for example – then it’s not invalid to treat the animal’s death as a spiritually meaningful event and hence to give appropriate prayers and thanks at that act. Nor would it be invalid to perform the ‘skin and bones hallowing’ or other revivification rite. Nonetheless, neither of these should actually be referred to as ‘sacrifice’ (meaning killing). I suspect of course that it would not be good PR at present to make too much of these practices. For the rest of us, what we should be doing is re-instating the prayers of ‘Grace’. Most Pagans dislike and avoid these prayers as a result of distaste for their Christian versions. But it is proper to Hallow our meal, to Make it Sacred, whatever it might consist of, including wheat and lentils, to give thanks for the Gifts of the Deities, for Life Given that ours may continue. (In due course, the worms will have us.)

In modern English usage, the word ‘sacrifice’, with the meanings of either killing as propitiation to a deity, dates from late 13th century ce. Usage in the sense of ‘giving up something’ is more recent (1590’s). The original Latin word ‘sacrificium’ or ‘sacrificus’ had the meaning of ‘performing priestly functions’, so was in no way limited to killing animals. If you are more learned in Classical languages than myself, you will be aware that many ancient words are translated just by ‘sacrifice’. I have argued above that the whole notion of killing-as -propitiation is not just nasty, but fundamentally theologically invalid, and in fact, not actually ‘sacrifice’ as exemplified by myth.  Further to that, the entire notion in modern usage is a specious hodgepodge – to use the word at all is only to confuse and be confused.

In a subsequent blog post I intend to discuss the ideas still adhering to ‘sacrifice’ in modern Paganism and think further, not just in simple ‘rejection’ but as to a different way of thinking our relationship to all the kindreds of Spirit.

In trying to reclaim our spirituality, we Pagans can draw upon a vast range of sacred stories – usually termed ‘myths’ – about the deities we worship. This material is complex, fragmentary, and often contradictory and confusing. For those of us living in, or interested in, the land of Cymru (aka ‘Wales’) the task is more difficult. Nearly all of what we have is collected in the stories known as ‘Mabinogi(on)’, but nowhere are the characters in these stories considered as deities – rather they are wholly mortal – kings, queens, their families and hangers-on, a somewhat disfunctional bunch. Best known of the Mabinogi are the connected set of tales known as the ‘four branches’.

In ancient Greece, the philosopher Euhemerus did not ‘believe’ in deities – he claimed that the idea of such was a mis-remembering of ancient royalty and heroes (‘bad history’ we might say). Euhemerism has been a popular view of Pagan religion, taken by academics, Abrahamists, and even some modern Pagans. The first reteller of Norse myth, Snorri Sturluson, took a similar view in his ‘Ynglinga Saga’. Here in Cymru the opposite sort of process (without a fancy name) seems to have taken place. The Grimms and others suggested a form of derivation from myth with respect to ‘fairy tales’ – their view has been challenged. It is pretty universally accepted that the Mabinogi characters are deities, or ‘reflexes’ thereof, because of their close similarity to Irish myth (Don => Danu, Gofannon => Goibniu, Lleu => Lugh and so on). It remains very difficult to make any real sense of the stories, nor, apart from names, is there much correspondence with Irish material. Everyone seems to accept that the stories, as we have them, are ‘distorted’, yet at the same time, all seem also to accept a basic integrity in the plot lines.

I first found the Mabinogi nearly 50 years ago, initially via Evangeline Walton’s four novel-length retellings rather than the ‘proper’ text. (I can laugh now at how I pronounced “Pwyll” back then!) At least five translations are available into modern English, plus bowdlerisations, though how anyone can think the stories ‘suitable for kiddies’ I cannot comprehend. Academic discussion is aplenty, but seems confined to minutiae, and serious consideration of ancient Welsh religion is quite out of bounds. For these folk, the deities do not actually exist, so that the stories are studied only as things in themselves, unrooted, except perhaps as ‘perennial human drama’. The best-known Pagan commentary is by Caitlin Matthews in her ‘Mabon and the Mysteries of Britain’, which focuses on the Goddess of Sovereignty, (the) Madron, and Her Son, (the) Mabon. Matthews’ work is highly-regarded amongst Pagans, but rarely cited by academics.

The Theosophist Kenneth Morris wrote a development of the first branch in his work ‘The Fates of the Princes of Dyfed’ – he may be unique in trying to to reclaim the Deities and mythic mode. Walton’s novels have more ‘psychology’, focusing on a clash between ‘matrilinear’ and ‘patrilinear’ groups within Celtic culture – a view I can endorse in part, but she too stays with the standard plot and, I feel, misses the chance to go further. Looking around further,  found this interesting version of’ The Battles of the Trees’ interpolated into the fourth branch timeframe, shortly after Pryderi’s death: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13016638/1/When-the-Trees-Were-Enchanted. I suspect that there are nowadays a variety of shorter works to be found on the internet. Please let me know of anything original and worthwhile that you know of. Seren Press have recently released a set of novels, in modern settings, each based loosely on one of the Mabinogi stories (not only the four branches) – but although their writers are distinguished, I found these unsatisfying, lacking spiritual connection. Creative writing by present-day Pagans seems to concentrate on Blodeu(w)edd – for example, “Flower Face: A Devotional Anthology in Honor of Blodeuwedd” edited by Jhenah Telyndru. Don’t waste your money on the turgid and wholly unspiritual ‘Rhiannon’ by Roscoe Howells. You might guess that I can’t abide the ‘Prydain’ pastiches by Lloyd Alexander.

Something that must surely be relevant to our understanding of the stories, but which gets little comment, is the political scenario that was current when they took form and also when they were set down. By the time of the earlier manuscript, the White Book of Rhydderch, the four-hundred-year monarchy of Gwynedd had been destroyed by the English invaders under Edward I and Wales ‘conquered’. If the stories were actually fixed a century or two earlier (as suggested by Sir Ifor Williams), we know that relations at that time were somewhat better – Llewelyn the Great was married to Siwan (aka Joan), a daughter of the English King John, and a century or so earlier, the celebrated Nest ferch Rhys was mistress of Henry I. The range of plausible dates for the manuscript of the Red Book of Hergest covers the attempted war of liberation by Owain Glyndwr, and its failure. We simply do not know whether the stories were in their own time considered celebratory of Gwynedd, or the opposite. The stories appear in just the two manuscripts. One might imagine that if they were popular then more copies might have been made, so one must suspect that after Glyndwr was gone, the gentry preferred the more recent Anglicised ‘Arthur’ to the legends of their own land.

My own focus in this post is on a small part of the text, specifically the episode opening the Fourth Branch, usually known as ‘The Pigs of Pryderi’. My feeling is that most commentators largely ignore this story, treating it as of little significance in itself, (bearing ‘no apparent relation to the rest of the story’ according to the highly respected Patrick Ford introduction) and rather as just setting the scene – perhaps farcically – for the more dramatic business of Gwydion, Aranrhod, Lleu and Blodeu(w)edd. And yet, as often repeated, the continuity of the four branches is specifically that of the life of Pryderi, born in the first branch, warrior in the second, king in the third, and dying in the fourth.

My ‘problem’ is that the text just doesn’t make sense. Modern readers seem typically to slide over these issues, but I believe they would have been more apparent to any original audience. It’s not sufficient just to invoke ‘magic’ as the solution to them. Audiences are happy with Gwydion turning toadstools into gold – such events are surely essential to any good story – but other matters have to be consistent with the audience’s own knowledge and experience.

The story begins with Gwydion asking his uncle Math for permission to steal the pigs.This quote from the Gwyn Jones’ translation

“Lord,” said Gwydion [to Math son of Mathonwy],I have heard tell there have come to the South such creatures as never came to this Island.” “What is their name?” said he. “Hobeu, lord.” “What kind of animals are those?” “Small animals, their flesh better than the flesh of oxen. But they are small and they change names: moch are they called nowadays.” “To whom do they belong?” “To Pryderi son of Pwyll, to whom they were sent from Annwn [the Underworld], by Arawn king of Annwn.”

The first problem with the extract is that of historicity. Pigs were in no way introduced to Britain at the time when the stories are set – although somewhat vague, the most reasonable guess is to situate the tales at a point not long before the first Roman invasions. Pigs though, were first domesticated up to eleven thousand years ago, in the Tigris basin area. Marija Gimbutas suggests that the pig had become a sacred animal no later than 6000 bce. Pig culture spread westwards with Neolithic farming, and had certainly been in Britain for thousands of years before the Romans. In the past it was speculated whether a single strain was propagated as part of the ‘Neolithic package’ – but recent DNA-based research has demonstrated that pigs were ‘re-domesticated’ or ‘genetically improved from wild stock’ on multiple occasions. The Mabinogi audience did not have modern evidence to hand, but we have no reason to believe that the pig story was considered historically accurate.

Further then, is the idea that they came from Annwn. In the stories (the first branch) this is a physical place geographically contiguous with Dyfed. It can only be to the west or south-west, which makes it ‘Cantre Gwaelod’, now flooded by the sea. This land certainly did exist, and was lost not so far from the time of the stories’ setting (evidence suggests that the flooding had reached current shorelines by the second century ce ). Archaeology is difficult at the bottom of the sea. Still, there’s really no reason to believe that pigs were ever introduced to the rest of Britain from this area. Modern readers often consider ‘Annwn’ to be ‘The Otherworld’, something accessible via shamanic trance, and hence must treat Pwyll’s experiences in that way. This may work for us, but it’s not viable in the story. Some Victorian spiritualists allegedly managed to manifest a bit of ‘ectoplasm’, but I’ve never heard of even the most impressive of shamans manifesting real live pigs. It is, we may believe, possible for Deities to move physically between the worlds, and to bring material things with them. Such are usually termed ‘culture heroes’, found in the sacred stories of many peoples. Often they are Firebringers, such as Prometheus in Greece. In the traditions of North America, Skywoman falls to Earth in entirely physical form. But there is nothing else in the Mabinogi that would support interpretation on ‘culture hero’ lines.

Something further in this passage is deeply suspicious to my mind. Why is there the business of the name of the creatures? The sentence about the change of names is in quotes in both Jones and Ford translations, so should not be seen as an interpolation by a presumed narrator. The word ‘hobeu’ is apparently only ever used in the ‘White Book’ and ‘Red Book’ manuscripts. Modern Welsh always uses ‘moch’. Wikipedia has a page for a ‘Celtic boar/pig/swine god’ named ‘Moccus’, equated with Mercury (as Gwydion might well also be), surely proving pigs as well -established in the culture. Archaic / dialect English uses the word ‘hob’ for the ferret – a creature rather different from a pig. My feeling about this is that ‘hobeu’ vs. ‘moch’ is a play upon words, a pun, that is, something intended as a joke. Sadly the joke is wholly lost on us moderns, but one has to presume that the audience would have found it funny in some way. A little research in my (obviously inadequate) Pocket Welsh Dictionary just conceivably indicates a multilingual pun, not necessarily impossible at the time of the scribe – the word ‘hobaid’ is translated as (feminine noun) ‘peck’, but the English verb ‘to peck’ is translated as ‘pigo’. My only guess at the ‘joke’ then, is that it makes an equivalence of (hen)peckers and pigs, the misogyny of which indeed anticipates my larger theme.

Moving on, when Gwydion asks Pryderi for the pigs, Pryderi replies:

“there is a covenant between me and my country concerning them; that is, that they shall not go from me till they have bred double their number in the land”

This ‘covenant’ is also interpreted as a ‘geis’, a sacred vow that is often also ‘doomed’. But it is surely somewhat strange – pigs are well-known as bearing numerous piglets in each litter; so if adequately fed, and not eaten, it would not take very long for their numbers to double. How could it be such a significant matter for Pryderi?

Once Gwydion has actually abducted the pigs the story becomes truly absurd. One suspects that academic commentators are not very familiar with the behaviour of real live pigs. We are asked to believe that a bunch of twelve men, who have never before set eyes upon these creatures, let alone handled them in practice, are able to drive them from Rhuddlan Teifi (near Lampeter) to Creuwyron (just outside modern Bangor). But actual pigs are not at all happy to be driven more than a short distance, often needing a little training for that. They can balk at almost anything (including puddles); they may bunch together too tightly to move easily, or of course, try to make a run for it. One would guess, since the number appears repeatedly in other contexts, that there were twelve pigs taken. We might presume that the pigs would be distressed at being roused and chivvied by strangers. Gwydion tells his men to move quickly, since he expects pursuit by horsemen once the his illusion spell wears off. Any attempt at some secretive route would surely delay their progress, but in any case, the trail left by a dozen men, presumably their dozen horses, and a dozen pigs would be as wide as a modern motorway – just the pigs’ droppings would be ample for the most incompetent of pursuers to follow.

The story tells us that the first day of the journey takes them to Mochdref (pig-town, near modern Machynlleth). I challenge anyone to do this in reality, (it would be an extreme hike for the most vigorous of unencumbered walkers) nor are the subsequent journeys feasible. Gwydion would indeed have had to sprout magic wings for the pigs, plus golden harness of course. (We think flying pigs are fun, but you can’t put them in a story meant seriously.) The route takes them around the mountains so as to reach Bangor after but four overnight stops. Much is made of repeated onomastica (explanation of place names) – too much surely. One feels that a storyteller, singing for his supper using this stuff, might go hungry. At Creuwyron the pigs are then put into a sty, and nothing more is told of them whatsoever.

Bizarrely, when Gwydion reaches nearby Caer Dathyl, even though it is understood that he had been driving animals, he is told “Strange how very slowly you have journeyed!”. The lord of Gwynedd is already making preparations for war, with Pryderi raising twenty-one cantrefs against him (at least three times the Gwynedd population). One presumes that Pryderi had the politeness to have sent heralds in ultimatum, rather than make war unannounced. At this point one can wonder as to the scale of the war. It was not so uncommon for Celtic tribes to indulge in a bit of stock-rustling. Yet Pryderi raises his entire land, at maximum urgency, for just a few pigs.

The story continues to describe fierce battle – with phrases such as ‘great slaughter on either hand’ and the final single combat between Pryderi and Gwydion, in which, “by magic and enchantment Gwydion conquered and Pryderi was slain”.

The standard story is as loathsome as one could wish, since the only point of this war is apparently to get Math, lord of Gwynedd, into war mode, so as to facilitate the rape of Math’s “footholder”, the maiden Goewyn, by Gwydion’s brother Gilvaethwy. In my view, Goewyn is about the only character in the standard story to emerge with any credit. Far from being intimidated by these men (Gwydion is presumed to be the heir to the Gwynedd throne), at first opportunity she calls out the rapist(s) saying:

“Assault was made upon me, and that openly. Nor did I bear it in quiet…They wrought rape upon me and upon thee dishonour”

Note that she says ‘they’, implying Gwydion as rapist as well as panderer, and that it is Math who is dishonoured, not herself.

Rereading the story recently, I find a couple further suspicious sentences, ignored by commentators I believe. Before the final fight, Pryderi gives hostages against the truce. But this practice did not happen in such warfare, or at least not one-sidedly, unless an army were fully defeated. It is said that ‘Gwrgi Gwastra’ is one of the hostages. It is subsequently implied, when hostages are released, that Gwrgi is the ‘lord’. Presumably then, he was heir to Dyfed and now rightfully its king. Most writers therefore assume him to be Pryderi’s son. The problem is that ‘Gwrgi Gwastra’ is not plausible as a real name for a king’s son. ‘Gwrgi’ can mean something on the lines of ‘cannibal’, linked to an Irish word for ‘werewolf’. ‘Gwastra’ means ‘vain’. Other Gwrgi persons in literature include ‘Gwrgi Garwlwyd’ (man-dog rough-grey) – a mass-murdering warrior. The word is obviously the same as the modern ‘corgi’ dog, mostly thought somewhat laughable, even if royally appreciated. Originally though, a ‘cur’ dog was the lowest sort of ankle-biting cattle-driving beast – the word ‘ci’ just means ‘dog’ in general. (There are ‘name issues’ with the whole family, including those of Cigfa and Pryderi himself, but these must wait for another day.)

What on earth is to be made of all this? Whether the audience were peasants or gentry, they could in no way credit the ‘pigs’ as the creatures they knew by that name. If not ‘real pigs’ can they be ‘symbolic’ of something? If the Mabinogi were “Pilgrim’s Progress” we could guess that the pigs were ‘symbolic’ of ‘lust’ and ‘greed’. But there is no reason to interpret the rest of the stories in such a manner, not has it been seriously suggested. A plausible alternative to that sort of pious allegory, one consistent with what we know of Celtic culture, is that the stories as we know them actually constitute a sort of ‘satire’. Sadly, we have no trace whatsoever of earlier versions of the stories, but clearly my hypothesis requires prior versions to have existed and to have been well-known. Satire only works if the audience are familiar with what is being satirised, and also with the import of the mode of satire. To take a modern example, the ‘Donald Trump blimp’, depicting him as a baby in a nappy, would just not work if we were not well acquainted with his image, and did not think of him as an overweight infantile narcissist.

Satire is not an unreasonable interpretation. Pryderi is, quite simply, the son of a Goddess. His Mother, Rhiannon, is considered to be a ‘reflex’ of the Gaulish ‘Rigantona’ – Great Queen, and further more or less equivalent to the Irish ‘Mor Rigan’ (also ‘Great Queen’) and to the ‘Horse Goddess’ known to Roman soldiers as ‘Epona’. One might expect therefore that if the stories had any connection to Pagan spirituality, then Pryderi, appearing in all four branches of the Mabinogi, would get favourable report. But in the texts we have, and also as implied in most modern commentary, he is treated as something of an idiot. The first three branches are bad enough, whilst in the fourth he is so stupid as (a) to be seduced of his magic pigs (b) to start a serious war over them and finally (c) to get himself killed.

My personal feeling, reinforced by the insult to Pryderi’s son, described above, is that ‘satire’ is too kind a term by far. Rather, the Mabinogi (or at least, those parts referring to Pryderi) are actually a sustained insult, a blasphemy in fact, to the Pagan Deities. I don’t claim this view as original; for example, in his novel ‘Porius’, John Cowper Powys seems to feel likewise, at least as regards to Pryderi. But it seems to me that such a hypothesis requires some attempt at alternative explanation and reconstruction of ‘the real story’. Indeed, we really need at least two levels of prior story – one in which the characters are truly Goddesses and Gods (perhaps not so ‘dramatic’), and a second in which they are more humanised, but retain proper dignity. Given that we have no actual evidence whatsoever, few modern writers risk anything in this direction. But having no academic reputation at stake, I shall leap into this bog, hoping to land safely on a kindly rock just below water level.

To start with then, the ‘pigs’ are really women. Not just any women but actually the primary college of priestesses of Dyfed. As such, they undoubtedly constitute the Sovereignty of the Land, much described by Matthews and others. My own (hopelessly un-academic) reconstruction above of the hobeu / moch ‘joke’ hints at reference to women. As women, they are a sensible fit to the ‘double their number’ geis. This simply means that they were pledged to raise a daughter to succeed them before retiring from their role. Their being ‘from Annwn’ connects them to the ‘Old Religion’ (something more matriarchal at least) and / or to chthonic Earth spirituality. Actual women could be tied to horseback and moved at comparative speed from Lampeter to Bangor, and would leave rather less trail than pigs.

The abduction, and we may surely presume, the rape, of these women, would have constituted a fundamental spiritual and political assault upon the land of Dyfed. The Romans’ rape of Boudicca’s daughters may be seen in the same light, and was just as unforgiveable – once war was commenced, Boudicca did not stop until she and her army were defeated and slaughtered. It was thus entirely proper for Pryderi immediately to raise the maximum force of war in attempting the rescue and defence of the Holy Women. It is of course sad that Pryderi failed in that final battle against the rapist Gwydion, but we may reinstate Pryderi to proper honour. Not a pathetic idiot, but rather a true Son of the Goddess, dying in unflagging defence of Her honour, as manifested in Her Holy Women. Kenneth Morris suggests that after death Pryderi will have apotheosis, joining the Immortals. Quite rightly!

I have wondered whether the ‘pig’ theme is just the storytelling trick of the final redactor, or something more. If everyone knew the ‘true story’, but had no sympathy for it (being Christians) then perhaps it was enough just to tell the story in the form we have. But I am suspicious that the idea of referring to women (or especially, to priestesses) as ‘pigs’ was more than just the redactor’s personal misogyny. I have to go back a long way to get any connection here.

In our present-day culture, pigs do not have good PR. This is quite unfair. Left to themselves they are as clean as any creature – we humans would surely soon be quite pongy if forced to live in a sty with no washing or sanitation facilities. Pigs are actually quite intelligent – the writer Dick King-Smith (author of ‘The Sheep -Pig’, filmed as ‘Babe’) considered them at least as clever as dogs. Pigs are metabolically more like humans than most creatures, and it has been possible to transplant bits of pig into humans. Why should we despise them so intensely? (We are much kinder to other creatures that are eaten.) The reason has to be the dreadful combination of religion and politics. Rationalisation based on public health concerns is quite spurious.

My suggestion is that the piggist propaganda actually dates back quite a few thousand years, to the point when the Indo-European folk began to move from their Ukrainian homelands into Europe. My thoughts on this have been greatly stimulated by the work of Maria Kvilhaug, for example: http://freya.theladyofthelabyrinth.com/?page_id=761. There has been much controversy about all this, but my understanding is that modern DNA research has largely confirmed the earlier language-based migration theory, despite the continued opposition of many archaeologists. Seems to me that Marija Gimbutas’ work has been confirmed more than refuted, though I feel there is no need to accept all of her interpretations.

The Indo-Europeans did not keep pigs. Theirs was a culture based on the herding of horses and cattle. But their first major cultural encounter on migration westward was with the people of ‘Old Europe’, who were settled farmers, and certainly pig-keepers. So as the Indo-Europeans became dominant, I suggest simply that they used the sort of dehumanising language all too common with modern day warmongers and oppressors, so that the conquered became ‘pig-people’. or pigs, for short. I would postulate that something similar happened in the Levant, when the Semitic tribes (Hebrews and Arabs) moved into Canaan. The Semites were herders of sheep and goats, again encountering settled farmers with pigs. Most of our modern-day piggist prejudice derives from them and their ‘holy books’.

I think there may be something further. It is not unreasonable to suggest a ‘Pig Goddess’ in Old Europe. Kvilhaug suggests that the historical basis of the Vanir (as opposed to the Indo-European Aesir) is in fact the people, and/or deities, of Old Europe. In the extant Norse sources there are indeed ‘Pig deities’, namely the Vanir siblings Freyr and Freyja. (At the least, both ride on magical pigs.) So it seems to me that it becomes painfully easy to imagine that the priestesses and priests of these deities might be referred to, by Indo-European (or Semitic) misogynists, simply as ‘Pigs’. I suspect that this unpleasantness was as sticky as pig-poo, and that patriarchs and misogynists have had a long-standing ‘tradition’ of referring to spiritual women as pigs. This has barely disappeared – legends about pig-faced women were around as late as the 19^th century and a 2006 film, ‘Penelope’ starring Christina Ricci had this theme. The phrase ‘pig in a poke’ was in the past applied to women in bonnets – it is still in use.

The challenge remains to reconstruct some of the story, at one or both of the prior levels I suggest. I would have been as wary of doing this as better scholars seem to be. However, after speaking about the above ideas recently to a Pagan group I found a story flooding into my consciousness, and had to write it down in order to be able to think of anything else. Whether this constituted ‘authentic spiritual vision’, or otherwise, you may judge for yourselves.

I’ve put the story on a separate page linked below. Here are a few notes about it in advance. If you want to discuss it (politely) with me, I would appreciate your thoughts. My story does of course resolve the sundry issues in the standard form. I found little use for Gilvaethwy except as a liar. Didn’t seem any need for two rape scenes (especially if the story was originally transmitted pictorially) so Goewyn has relocated to Dyfed. ‘Gwrgi’ must surely bear the true name of ‘Gwri’ (his father’s child-name), though the best I can do for a pun-original for ‘Gwastra’ is the modern Welsh ‘gwastad’ which can mean ‘constant’ or ‘steadfast’ as well as ‘level’ etc; I give him that character. Because the standard text does not mention the pigs’ release, which for me is vital, I have perhaps fudged some locations a little closer together than they actually are on the ground. (You can find actual maps for sites mentioned here: http://www.nantlle.com/mabinogi-saesneg-places-mentioned-in-the-fourth-branch.htm) The end of my story has no literary source, but it was as insistent as the rest. It still leaves enough timeframe for the doings of Aranrhod / Lleu / Blodeu(w)edd, and indeed it explains why the standard fourth branch text tells of Lleu becoming lord of Gwynedd, but not Gwydion. You may spot the rest of my not-very-subtle allusions for yourselves.

I do have a worry about all this… If my hypothesis is correct – that the entire fourth branch of the Mabinogi (at the minimum) is actually an insult and a blasphemy – then it must be plausible that Gwydion is being traduced no less than Pryderi and his family are being insulted. The most obvious deity corresponding to Gwydion (via no more than the standard Welsh mutation) is the Germanic Woden (like Moccus, equated to Mercury by Romans). Tales of Woden / Odin certainly do have Him as a master of deceit and as a warmonger – rape only occurs once in a strange prophecy-fulfilling tale. But still, I feel Odin’s true nature to be something well beyond human nastiness. I can but await Gwydion telling his side of the tale!

My own telling of the tale of The Pigs of Pryderi is here:
https://pandorasjar.org/the-pigs-of-pryderi

Here in Wales we celebrate March 1^st as Dydd Gwyl Dewi. That translates as “Dewi’s Festival Day”. Note that the Welsh phrase doesn’t mention any ‘saint’ despite that being usual in English. So I can readily argue that despite our long oppression by the dank chapels, the true meaning of the day has never been lost.

We fly our flag too of course, the flag we call Y Ddraig (The Dragon) after what it depicts. It’s one of the few in the world that shows a Pagan spiritual symbol. Which is perhaps why it isn’t included in the composite ‘Union flag’ of the UK, comprised of the symbols of three other purported saints. . There is a recently-invented cross-style flag for ‘Saint David’, but I suspect the UK government is still ignorant of it. Y Ddraig for me anyway.

I doubt that many people really believe a word of the ‘Saint David’ hagiography, but it isn’t generally acknowledged that the whole thing was invented in the 11^th century, basically as propaganda in a dispute as to which Welsh bishopric would have precedence. As usual with these fables, the scribe just nicked a few cherries from Pagan tradition, recombining the places and the images into their own fantasy. One of the more amusing ‘borrowings’ from the real Dewi is the ancient title ‘Dewi Dyfyrwr’ – Waterman. The hagiography pretends that this is because their saint didn’t drink beer!

Mostly, we simply speak of Y Ddraig, but actually, His name is Dewi. This isn’t just a fancy – though it’s pleasant enough, as in the imitation dragons (Dewi and Dwynwen, complete with babies Cariad and Dylan) that have been constructed at Ccaerffili Castle.  Dewi is the male, the red chunky one. There is a tradition, not necessarily invented by the author John Wyndham, that female dragons are blue and slinkier.

In the case of Dewi, we can see that knowledge is liberation. If one has only ever heard of ‘Saint David’ then all historical mention of ‘Dewi’ would have to be of the ‘saint’,  but once one knows of the real Dewi, we realise that when people write of “Dewi”, it’s really Him! For example, the earliest known reference to Dewi is in the very anti-English 10th ce poem ‘Armes Prydain Fawr’ (‘Prophecy’ or ‘Calamity’ of Great Britain). The quote is “A Lluman glân Dewi – a ddyrchafant”; that is: “And they will raise the pure banner of Dewi”. Medieval Welsh poets often compared their leaders to dragons in poems praising their bravery, for example, Gruffydd ab yr Ynad Coch said of Llewelyn ap Gruffudd Pen dragon, pen draig oedd arnaw (‘A dragon’s head he had’).

By now, Dewi has become the best known Spirit of our Land. More properly, he is a God of the Rivers. Many of the rivers of our land bear his name in some form or other: these include the Taf, Taff, Teifi, Towy, Tawe, Tywi and Dyfi. It does rain a lot here, so the rivers flow strongly! It would be nice to think that the Daffodil, the national symbol of modern times, derived its name from him also, but sadly not it seems – apparently it’s a medieval mixup from the quite different flower named asphodel, which in ancient Greece was said to grow in the meadows of the otherworld. In Welsh, the names of the leek (the original national emblem) and daffodil are close – leek is Cenhinen, daffodil is Cenhinen Pedr.

Dewi’s banner definitely has a history. Apparently, it has been traced back to various auxiliary cavalry units in the second century ce Roman army. Some of these came from Sarmatia – an area at the edge of the Empire broadly corresponding to modern Ukraine. After defeating a people, the Roman army typically took in new soldiers from its former opposition, in effect as hostages against genocide. These were then sent as far as possible from home to subdue yet more barbarians. Divide and conquer. The Sarmatians flew their banners in the manner of a wind sock. The Greek military writer Arrian describes the draco – “during a cavalry charge they are inflated by the wind and even make a sort of hissing sound as the air is forced through them”. The Sarmatians brought their dragon banners to Britain, where they seem to have found near relationship with the tribes they met, including, we may guess, a close language similarity within the Celtic diaspora. (We tend to forget that Celtic culture actually began in central Europe, after a rather earlier Indo-European movement from the Ukraine area, then spreading in all directions, in our case until the Atlantic Ocean.) The Sarmatians were indeed Cymry – fellow countrymen, and their descendants apparently fought with Arthur against the Saxons.

It is claimed that the mother of ‘Saint David’ was another saint, “Non”, raped by a local prince. This silliness cunningly hides a further thread of the real story. Non is really the local Spirit of the sacred wells and springs, which surely are the Mothers of the Rivers. The purported birthplace of David is Non’s Well near the city of Tyddewi (again, no ‘saint’ in the Welsh name) and there are at least three other places in Wales named after Her – Llan-Non = ‘sacred enclosure of Non’s spring’, one is on the next hill east from here. She is honoured in Cornwall too, with a church of ‘St Nonna’ nearby a sacred well in the modern village of Altarnun. There isn’t much in the way of traceability for Non. We may guess that Her name, rather than being derived from the English word ‘nun’ (in Welsh, ‘lleian’) is actually related to that of the Well Goddess of England, herself remembered in the many sacred wells dedicated to ‘Saint’ Anne (or sometimes Antony, as at Llansteffan). Christian fables tell of Anne as being ‘of the house of David’ and as the mother of Mary (who is also the sea…) so all that would make sense of a sort.

Monica Sjoo, author of ‘The Great Cosmic Mother’, who lived in Sir Penfro for a number of years, wrote that “St. Non’s Well has trance-inducing powers, and its still waters can act as a scrying mirror. Many a time I have sat there by the well dreaming and meditating”. Monica further linked the Well to a physical power that would be helpful in childbirth. Her s account is at http://people.bath.ac.uk/liskmj/living-spring/sourcearchive/fs1/fs1ms1.htm

So how can we celebrate Dewi, Y Ddraig, in our modern Paganism (other than cheering the Wales Rugby team in the Six Nations tournament that’s underway each year at this time )?

Two thoughts: firstly, something practical and political – visit your local well or spring, or if you can locate it, the source for your domestic own water supply. Say your prayers and sing your songs, but make sure you take a carrier bag or two and first clean up any litter. Whether individually or in a group, you could well link this to an action against fracking, since that madness is likely to cause irremediable poisoning of the Waters in the Earth. (Join Druids Against Fracking:  https://www.facebook.com/groups/Druidsagainstfracking/)

Secondly, something more ritual / personal / family-related: when my children were young, I was first introduced to the idea of the Earth Dragon by poet Hilary Llewelyn Williams, who celebrated likewise with her young children. We made a stuffed cloth ‘dragon’ who, with a mortal accomplice, had to ‘hide’ out in the garden. She is Asleep, and has to be woken. Finding Her takes some time, but whilst searching one can find lots of small chocolate spheroids as evidence of where She’s been (children enjoy this bit of course). When She is eventually found, She takes a lot of waking (getting on a bit after all) so this takes a lot of noise. She often complains that it’s can’t quite be time to wake as people aren’t singing loudly enough. (Bang the drums some more!)

Or perhaps, combine these! Wake up the Dragon at your local watersource with drums, song, bagpipes and laughter! (You’re welcome to use my song below)

A couple of years back I was inspired to create a song to the Earth Dragon, awakening at this time. I set it to the tune of the Serbian dance Setnja, so that dance for me is now firmly associated with both Dydd Dewi and Spring Equinox. My words bear no relation to the Serbian song lyric that is sometimes used. It’s a pretty easy dance, basically a fancy walk, that any group could do if they liked the idea.

It’s danced in an ‘open circle’ (curving line) anticlockwise – left hand rests on hip, right arm through left of person in front (like teapots!)

• Step R first, around notional circle – slow, slow, quick quick slow (R L RLR)
• Then swivel slightly on the spot to face more centrally: take two slow steps L R back (so outwards) then three ‘change your mind’ steps – back,  close, forward (LRL)
• And repeat – traditional music tends to start slowly and speed up. You can see a small group dancing it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATDFVhMWPiU

Two great versions of the music, instrumental only, can be found and purchased at minimal cost from ‘Freedonia State Orchestra’ https://nicholasbreezewood.bandcamp.com/album/freedonia-state-orchestra.

Here’s my song and the basic melody line.:

Dragon Wake, Rouse Your Powers,
All Earth Greets You with Brightest Flowers

Dragon Rise, Dance and Sing
All Earth Calls You Spring-time Bring.

Dragon Wise, Oldest One,
All Earth Welcomes the Spring-time Sun

Dragon Fire, Lift in Flight
All Earth Leaps in Springs Delight

Dydd Gwyl Dewi Hapus!

Here in Wales there’s a phenomenon known as ‘Welcome to Wales’, ‘Croeso I Gymru’. This occurs especially when one crosses the Pont Hafren (Severn bridge) in a westerly direction. Whatever the weather elsewhere, at this liminal point in time and space the rain always splats across the windscreen. Seems to work also at Cardiff airport – returning at midnight after a brief quest for winter sunshine the icy rain didn’t so much precipitate as move horizontally through the air. At least it woke me up enough to do the drive home.

We joke about it, but after this trip I’ve decided I rather like our welcome home. I had been in the island of Lanzarote. The place is basically one giant volcano rising from one of the split lines in the spreading tectonic plates of the Atlantic Ocean. In some areas the rocks are still hot enough to cook one’s dinner. In wintertime Lanzarote is very arid. A good chunk of the island is a plain of black lava dating back to the last eruption of the 1730’s, so dry that in all those years just a few lichens have as yet made it their home. Away from the lava field every stream bed is dryer than bone, and you’re likely to be scoured by windblown dust and sand. There isn’t a single tree apart from the tourist resorts and close by to dwellings. Much of the land is brown, with a few scrabby dried-up bits of vegetation waiting for their chance to bloom again when rain does come. (To be fair, the northern part is a little bit greener!)

I was very impressed by the work of the folk cultivating the better bits of land. Immaculate little rectangles of finely-raked black ground-lava soil have little hollows for every plant to catch the occasional drop of rain. Lots of onions were coming up nicely. Whole hillsides are covered with vineyards, where each vine, with woody growth trimmed back almost to ground level, has its own hollow perhaps a metre in depth, with a little drystone wall of lava lumps to add to wind protection. There’s a great deal of the world desperate for water. But here in Cymru, though we do sometimes grumble as to the sogginess, the gift of water means that the land is green, and when the sun does shine, the trees provide a gentle shade.

Water is very much a theme for the imminent festival of Imbolc. In folklore Imbolc is sometimes called a ‘breaking of the ice’, but I suspect that idea is both from a more northern location (like Scotland) and from a time when winters were colder (such as the ‘little ice age’ which lasted until the mid 1800’s). Nowadays it seems that floods are rather more likely. In the 30+ years that I’ve lived on this mountain, there has been a noticeable shift in climate. Used to be one didn’t think about gardening much before Spring Equinox, but Imbolc is now the time to begin planting if one is to make the most of the season. A greenhouse is essential of course for starting the plants in comfort.

In a song by Pagan band Aeolian Songspell, Imbolc is “The Season of Rebirth, Feel the Infant Stirring in the Waters of the Earth.” A lovely gentle song for the festival, also invoking ‘Galantha, the Snowdrop Queen’  – you can listen to it here:

Years ago I was introduced to the idea of Imbolc as a time for ‘Washing the Face of the Earth’. This is very much in accordance with ancient Roman practice. For them, February was the last month of the year (which started March 1^st) – a time for purification, getting rid of the year’s detritus. In ancient Athens, their ‘spring-cleaning’ festivals of Kallynteria and Plynteria were held a bit later in the year. In Anglo-Saxon times February was ‘Solmonath’ (Mud month!) and also Kale-monath (cabbage – there wasn’t much else left to eat – though in Wales we have leeks also!) Here at Pandora the festival of Imbolc seems the perfect opportunity for a soapy slosh-around of the various statues that live outside in the garden, as well as an extra dusting of the altars.

For many of the Pagan community, whether or not they have other ‘Celtic’ or ‘Gaelic’ interests, the festival of Imbolc is focused on the Goddess Brighid. Her name seems to mean ‘Bright One’ and ‘Fiery Arrow’. Brighid was identified with Sulis Minerva of Bath, which makes her ‘Eye of the Sun’, as is the Egyptian Sekhmet. Brighid is usually thought of as a Triple Goddess, but this has no connection to the notion of maiden-mother-crone – sometimes there are three Brighids, sisters perhaps, but of the same ‘age’. Alternatively, you may easily associate Her with all the four elements of Earth, Air, Water and Fire – in short, She’s Goddess of just about everything. If you want to know more about her, and search the internet, you may well feel somewhat daunted – 927,000 results for ‘brighid goddess’! Brighid has become the focus for a true devotion, something felt in a deeply inter-personal way – She doesn’t fit into anyone’s allegorical boxes. In the 1960’s Vatican II ‘modernization’ it was declared that there was insufficient proof of the existence of any ‘Saint Brighid’ and she was thus ‘decanonised’. So She has been returned to us, and Her flame burns again at Kildare.

If you’re interested in knowing more of Brighid in the devotional sense you should look at Clann Bhride (Children of Brighid), a religious order devoted to this goddess – their website is at https://clannbhride.wordpress.com/   They publish a ‘Book of Hours’, on paper and also as free pdf. Some of the same folk have contributed to ‘The Cauldron Cill: Brighid Devotional’, available from www.lulu.com. This prayer is from the Clann Bhride introduction: ‘Who is Brighid’

Light me as Your lantern.
Play me as Your harp.
Keep me in Your mantle.
Guide me to Your hearth

Taking things beyond just three ‘aspects’ the Brigid-Along developed by Sassafras Grove of AD is a Novena, or potentially nine-day event. Starting at https://sassafrasgrove.org/tag/brighid-along/ (or search from brighid-along) – the nine rites celebrate Brighid as Midwife, Foster Mother, Initiatrix, Smith, Poet, Warrior, Guardian of Sacred Wells, Keeper of Hearth Fires, and as Healer.

For me, Brighid is Lady of the Mantle. Her mantle covers and protects the land and each person who asks for her protection. The threads of the mantle connect all things in the Web of Life. You may be interested in this 2010 article ‘Brigid of the Mantle: Brigid nam Bratta’ by Linda Iles, at https://mirrorofisis.freeyellow.com/id408.html. The visionary “Fiona Macleod” has Brigid saying:

“I put songs and music on the wind before ever the bells of the chapels
were rung …

“And I have been a breath in your heart.

“And the day has its feet to it that will see me coming
into the hearts of men and women like a flame upon dry grass,
like a flame of wind in a great wood…”

Our local Circle Dance group will be meeting towards the end of the ‘Imbolc season’. Dances will include the Romanian ‘Cradle Dance’ Joc de Leagane (traditionally in honour of the village midwife), the Bulgarian ‘Razvivaj Dobro’ (traditionally led by a nursing mother) and Zensko Oro (to the tune of ‘Come Bride, Enter In’. Shifting themes, the Corries’ “Peat Fire” seems just right for the Breton An Dro. My personal favourite music for Brighid is the song ‘Brighid Upon the Highland’, for which a circle waltz seems right. The tune is the traditional ‘Brigit O’Malley’, with words by Helen Farias and Craig Olsen. You can read a little more about the song here: https://www.gaiansoul.com/2012/01/30/a-song-of-devotion-to-brigid-on-the-highland/ and you can hear the song, even download it for free at: https://craigolsonband.bandcamp.com/track/brigid-upon-the-highland

To close, the simplest of all prayers for Her is in Gaelic, translating as “Walk with us, Brighid”, pronounced “Shoe lean ah Breejah”:

Siul Linn, a Bhrid

It’s a hard world for us Pagans to relate to. The most popular usage for the word ‘myth’ is ‘a widely held but false belief or idea ‘. We generally speak of the religious beliefs of ancient Pagans as being ‘myths’, but what does this really mean for us? How do we actually relate to myths, from our own culture or others?

There seems to have been a shift in language usage such that the word ‘mythology’, which ought to mean ‘study of myth’ or more literally, ‘talking about myth’ has become equivalent to ‘myth’ itself. Google certainly indicates this. A search for ‘myth image’ produces masses like these arrows, not a deity in sight. Whereas, a search for ‘mythology image’ gets you Zeus and other Olympians, Thor and his hammer, and lots more. As for ‘mythos’, that seems to be a brand of beer! Whether a source uses ‘myth’ or ‘mythology’ is itself an interesting point. I do find that the better writers tend to use the former term, whilst the potboilers and plagiarists use the latter. If one looks in a bookshop or library for ‘mythology’, it’s almost all to be found in the “children’s section”. Victorian academics had the notion that the people in traditional cultures have ‘primitive’ and ‘undeveloped’ minds, supposedly analogous to those of children. Hence myth was and is thought only suitable for children (once stripped of all sex and much of the violence), irrelevant to adults.

There is for me something a little strange about this ‘mythology’ word – although similar dual usage has happened also with some other ‘ologies’. To me ‘mythology’ also suggests a ‘subtext’ – specifically that what is being studied is only the ‘myths’ and not that to which they refer (the deities). In other words, it is fundamental to most presentations of ‘mythology’ that the deities do not actually exist – and so they cannot in themselves be a valid target of study. Only what people have said (and especially written) about them can then be of concern. Hence the title of this piece – it is ‘talking about’ those who ‘talk about myth’

Really though, that’s not my interest – since for us as Pagans, it seems to me that the point of mythology must be to know better the nature of God/dess/e/s themselves. Arguably better for us to drop the term ‘mythology’ and instead use ‘theology’ (study of the ‘theioi’ ) or the feminist term ‘thealogy’.

It’s certainly not an easy task to relate to Myth at all. For us as NeoPagans, embedded in the ‘western’ commodity-culture, our mythic heritage has been perverted and largely destroyed. We can speculate as to how patriarchal cults have rewritten older myths, typically rendering the results incomprehensible, but though we might try a ‘re-inversion’ it’s not easy to recapture the ‘originals’. Many scholars tell us that no such originals ever existed. They tend to prefer texts to oral tradition, even though writing is a fairly recent event in human experience.

Clearly we ‘moderns’ have a real problem between Myth and Science. Rationalists tell us that myth is just ‘bad science’, and so superseded. We can disagree, and say that myth is the expression of spiritual vision. But how many of us could seriously speak of our galaxy, the word itself derived from Greek for ‘milk’, still known as the Milky Way, as drops from the breasts of the Great Mother?

In ancient Greece, the term used for stories about the ‘Gods’ was “mythos”, which means little more than just ‘story’. This word was often used in association partly with ‘logos’, which has connotations of order and knowledge – logos being the logic behind an argument. Intriguingly, the writer Hesiod (not usually my favourite) makes a deeply-felt contrast between the two. For him, mythos was truth and logos was lies,’seductive falsehoods’. One might speculate that this rather grumpy character had had a bad experience with lawyers… I find his opposition amusing anyway, especially when I bear in mind the the Christian ‘message’ is – in the ‘Gospel of John’ anyway – specifically referred to as ‘Logos’ (usually translated as ‘the Word’ in English). I think Hesiod would be even more unhappy with the ‘logos’ of public discourse nowadays – faced with the barrage of advertising, political propaganda and fake news in general, he would rather talk to his sheep!

If you search for ‘definitions’ of ‘myth’ alongside ‘legend’ and related words, you will find a clearly-graded ranking. Myth is reserved for deities, especially stories of ‘creation’ (effectively, ‘bad science’) whilst ‘legend’ is considered to relate events concerning humans (effectively, ‘bad history’). The bottom ranks of the hierarchy are fable, folk tale and ‘fairy tale’ – all suitable only for the ‘common people’ and to fill the heads of children. But this is a construction of our culture’s intellectuals – people in traditional Pagan cultures, past and present, do not endorse any such separation.

Over the past decade or so I’ve visited family in Aotearoa / New Zealand several times. There’s plenty of opportunity to enjoy a ‘Maori Cultural Heritage Experience’ but very little chance for Pakeha tourists to talk with any Maori about real spirituality. Whilst their faith has certainly ‘survived’, it does seem that to an extent there is an active process of rediscovery underway. A pride in traditional culture and festivals links closely to spirituality. For example, the Maori festival of Matariki marks the heliacal rising of the Pleiades, a little before the winter solstice. Increasingly this is celebrated as a public holiday, but the connections to spirituality are taken seriously (unlike Xmas).

In Maori, ‘Mata-ariki’ means “the eyes of god”. According to myth, when Ranginui, the sky father, and Papatūānuku, the earth mother, were separated by their children, the god of the winds, Tāwhirimātea, became so angry that he tore out his eyes and threw them into the heavens. Others say Matariki is the mother surrounded by her six daughters, Tupu-ā-nuku, Tupu-ā-rangi, Waitī, Waitā, Waipuna-ā-rangi and Ururangi. Another account explains that Matariki and her daughters appear to assist the sun, Te Rā, whose winter journey from the north has left him weakened.

You may have read , in works by writers such as Eliade, how in traditional spirituality, myth is of fundamental importance. Every single act, the outwardly ordinary as well as those of magic and ritual, takes on a sacred character precisely as it re-enacts the primal events of the myth. Furthermore, each such re-enactment is understood as a re-creation of whatever the primal events brought into being. Now, it’s one thing for an academic to say this sort of thing, far removed from its actual substance – it’s quite another when a modern writer speaks of their own tradition in very similar language.

I was fortunate to purchase a copy of ‘Tohunga’ by Samuel Timoti Robinson (it’s often difficult to locate a source for this book). Whereas almost all accounts of indigenous myth have been collected by hostile redactors – missionaries or colonial administrators – this is by a modern practitioner initiated into the Maori shamanic / priestly tradition. The first quarter of Robinson’s book presents Maori myth from ‘before creation’ – the Ages of Void and Night – to the population of the world by our ancestors. Robinson’s account has great depth and complexity – far beyond the ‘just-so-story’ material one usually encounters. One feels then that other oral traditions have no less substance.

The second degree (of seven) in tohunga training is specifically focused on learning systematically the lore of the many deities and prayers. Speaking of ‘karakia’ (prayers of power) Robinson writes (my brackets):

The karakia …called upon the aid of atua (deities) …for hunting…gathering food…calling and quelling the winds and rain, chanting while weaving so as to hold the fibres together…every aspect of Maori daily life.”

The tohunga ascends the macrocosm by karakia and contacts the higher powers by naming the atua…then, when we apply this karakia to the physical level, such as when calling Rangi to bless a child, these heavenly powers are brought down to out level in Te Ao Marama.”

The names of the wairua (spirits) become the power bases by which rituals are empowered.

To join the karakia to Hawaiki (the mythical origin place) has the added mana of the source…instead of our individual power the Maori has the power of everyone before him in his whakapapa.

In the NeoPagan movement we don’t really have a lot of myth. The myth of Atlantis has been superseded, I think, by the science of plate tectonics and continental drift. (So Atlantis was ‘bad science’, though to credit Blavatsky et al, it was not until nearly a hundred years later that the modern theory was accepted.) The Wiccan second degree employs a much-questioned ‘Descent of the Goddess’ myth – usually considered to have written by Gardner himself.

Most popular, surely, is still the Wiccan ‘Wheel of the Year’ myth, in which their Goddess and God are directly embodied in the changing of the seasons. This is mostly derived from the ‘Golden Bough’ by James Frazer and the ‘White Goddess’ by Robert Graves. Various ideas of twin gods in conflict are mixed in, not always very consistently. I suspect though, that whilst most Pagans think it’s important to be in tune with the physical cycle of the year, as well as with its underlying spiritual currents (which of course differ greatly in different climates. and reverse in the southern hemisphere), nonetheless they don’t feel a need to mythify this especially. Nor can it have been so significant to the first generation of Wiccans, some of whom have suggested that ‘doing magic’ was of more importance than celebrating festivals. Starhawk’s ‘The Spiral Dance’ presents the creation myth from the Feri tradition, but as far as I am aware, that title is the only popular Wiccan book with its own ‘mythic’ narrative.

One of the major changes in the Pagan community during my 40+ years has been the shift away from duotheism to polytheism in general, and to specific polytheisms, such as Hellenismos or Kemeticism, as well as various Celtic and Norse reconstructions. Barely a handful of us will have born into polytheism, so these commitments are the result of explicit choice – however much we feel the Gods have directed us. I’m wondering how much this movement derived from a ‘need for myth’, unsatisfied by Wiccan or not-very-theist-Druid Paganism, and to how great an extent myth is the centre of the spiritual practice, rather than a background. (I would love to hear more from practitioners in these faiths.) Certainly I’m aware of a distinct divergence in the Heathen community, between those who treat the Eddas as ‘authoritative sacred texts’, not so unlike the Abrahamics, and those of more flexible views. (You might be interested to know that if you’re a prisoner in the UK, you can get a free copy of the Eddas, just like the Bible and the Koran, but these is the only Pagan text given such status.)

Looking at some of the Pagan faiths that have maintained continuity – the many Hindu traditions, say, or Shinto, it’s not always easy, when we are not fluent in the relevant language, for us to know whether myth is a fundamental part of daily spiritual practice, or more the excuse for a public festival. In Voudoun, the loa are considered immediately present at every event, so perhaps in that religion myth plays a lesser part.

Many of us are deeply unsatisfied by standard versions of myths – taking the view that what has come down to us is not much representative of ancient spirituality, having been heavily ‘patriarchalised’ and otherwise amended by those with political and economic power. You can find many writers describing this – a classic is ‘The Paradise Papers’ by Merlin Stone. But if we are to do more than grumble, and instead regain ‘true myth’ we will have to write it ourselves. If there ever were texts of these ‘tru myths’, all have gone to the fires. So rather than sneering at ‘Unverified Personal Gnosis’ (UPG) we have to ask the deities to tell us their stories directly. Better if we don’t expect all such gnosis to be consistent! We won’t all like everyone else’s visions.

The process is happening. One of my great favourites is Charlene Spretnak’s “Lost Goddesses of Early Greece”. Another good place to rummage is at Bibliotheca Alexandrina where the folks have produced a number of ‘devotional anthologies’, often including retellings as well as modern prayers.

Creation myths have not much featured as yet. It’s notable that the Abrahamic cults make a big deal of these. Victorian-era scholars, whose influence continues, tended to interpret Creation as making a Creator automatically ‘Top God’. Then writers like Eliade describe how these deities seem to move off the scene, using the term ‘deus otiosus’. I am inclined to think that this is a deep misunderstanding of Pagan Creation Myth. I would suggest that our myths are conceptually quite different from the Abrahamic stuff. More precisely, rather than their separation of Creator and Created, in the Pagan myths the Pagan Creator deities are the Creation Process. In Robinson’s book mentioned above, creation is termed ‘Te Wananaga o Te Ao Marama’ – the coming of our world of light. The language is deep and subtle – it’s not like making a cake, or anything else in which creator, source material and created result are identifiably separate.

For myself, I felt the ‘craving for true myth’ some years back. Writing for the readers of ‘The Pipes of PAN’ magazine, I initiated a ‘competition’ to encourage ‘new’ myths of creation. The prize was awarded to the poet Hilary Llewellyn-Williams for her story “Spinning Woman”. I didn’t write at that time, but more recently found ‘The Drummer’ was speaking to me. The story She gave combines a Creation myth with a very specific aetiology (origin story).

Just because they are deities, doesn’t mean they don’t have a sense of humour…

You can find the Drummer’s story here: https://pandorasjar.org/the-drummer-the-stones-and-the-bunnies

You’ve all heard of Pandora. You’ve all been told the story of the silly girl whose curiosity released all the ills of the world. She has the distinction of being the second-most-blasphemed Goddess in human history – after Eve,  Mother of All Living. Perhaps now that hardly anyone actually believes in ‘Eve’, Pandora is tops!

 I wrote rather more briefly about Pandora in the collection ‘Naming the Goddess’ ed. Trevor Greenfield, Moon Books 2014. Some new insights have arrived since then.

Pandora never had a ‘box’ – the 16th-century writer Erasmus mistranslated the Greek word ‘pithos’ (a large storage jar) as if it had been ‘pyxis’ (box). The story was somewhat confused with that of Psyche (the story within a story in Lucius Apuleius wonderful ‘The Golden Ass’). Just about every artist since then has reproduced the mistake – lovely pictures but not much help when it comes to understanding Her. Except maybe that the word ‘box’ is sometimes used as a euphemism for female organs…This has been a very sticky error – one even finds Goddess-worshiping Pagan writers caught up in it.

This painting by Dante Gabriel Rossetti is pretty much standard – tells us more about the artist’s relationship to the model (Jane Burden Morris) than about Pandora.

In my local ‘high street’ Pandora has been turned into a shop selling expensive bling – no doubt in costly ‘boxes’. Just as the name of our Goddess Isis has been hijacked of late, so a google for Pandora now prioritises shopping. And just about every hack journalist in search of a cliché will open up “Pandora’s Box” before long. Computer games pervert Her into a ‘goddess of calamity’ and deceit. There are countless novels using Her name – Amazon currently has no less than 6809 results for her – varying from bonkbuster and soft porn to a rather nice children’s book by Victoria Turnbull, in which Pandora is a fox in a dress.

A more appropriate recent tribute is that Her name is used for the ‘idyllic’ planet portrayed in the 2009 film ‘Avatar’. The beautiful inhabitants live in harmony with nature and worship a mother-goddess named Eywa. I feel very uncertain as to the ‘message’ of this film – can’t help feeling that a subtext is the impossibility of such life for we humans.

The usual tale derives from the 7th-century bce Hesiod whose works could be considered the ‘party line’ of ‘Greek mythology’. I don’t believe that we should think of these stories as ‘myths’ – at least if we equate the word ‘myth with ancient Pagan religion – but rather as ‘just-so stories’, that is, something ‘deliberately made-up’. Hesiod’s material is reproduced without question by most writers today, as if it were definitive. However, anyone attempting a serious study of ancient Greek religion must soon realise that things were vastly more complex. The Hesiod story of Pandora has a substantial presence in our culture, which one could even describe as obsessive, but ancient Greeks seem to have largely ignored it, as did most Roman mythographers. Other writers, Theognis for example (and also Aesop) told a quite different story in which a Jar of Blessings was given by Zeus to humankind (or ‘man’ – sic) but that a man (so not Pandora) opened it, and all but Hope skipped off back to heaven!

The similarity of the stories of Pandora and Eve is deeply suspicious. Both are ‘first women’, both are made of clay (Eve indirectly, after Adam), both are given responsibility for the presence of evil in the world. Early Christian writers saw this clearly and John Milton made the connection in his ‘Paradise Lost’ some 350 years ago, but all these would have thought the Eve story as written millennia before that of Pandora. The early feminist Mary Wolstonecraft recognised clearly how these stories have been used:

“We must get entirely clear of all the notions drawn from the wild traditions of original sin, the eating of the apple, the theft of Prometheus, the opening of Pandora’s box, and the other fables, too tedious to enumerate, on which priests have erected their tremendous structures of imposition, to persuade us, that we are naturally inclined to evil.”

— Mary Wollstonecraft (1792), A Vindication of the Rights of Women: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects (quoted from http://www.eoht.info/page/Pandora’s+box)

More recently, it has become generally accepted that the Israelite story dates to something nearer to 500 bce, around some two hundred years after that of Hesiod. Palestine at that time was something of a crossroads between Europe, Asia and Africa – far more ‘cosmopolitan’ than ‘sunday school history’ would suggest. It is therefore entirely plausible that the Pandora story is directly the precursor for that of Eve – both are still used remorselessly to this very day as misogynistic propaganda.

 Nearly all websites and books will just repeat the same nonsense of Pandora as ‘the first woman’ – apparently, prior to that point, humankind really was just ‘man’. For me, a reference source’s approach to Pandora is a good test of its reliability. Philosophers who accept the Hesiodic story can at best only waffle about the ‘riddle of femininity’ and the meaning of Hope remaining in the Jar. The majority seem to think Hope is delusory, rather than a comfort. A few might suggest that the difficulties of mortal life can be a worthwhile challenge to spiritual growth.

So how do we recover Pandora? What might her imagery and story be ‘really’? As it turns out, we don’t have words, but we do have pictorial evidence. The birth of Pandora was represented on the pedestal of the statue of Athena situated at the Parthenon on the Acropolis in Athens – hardly the location for a sadly moralistic fable. Long after Hesiod, vase painters continued to illustrate Her more properly.

The first modern scholar to break open the box seems to have been Jane Ellen Harrison, a Classics scholar at Newnham College, Cambridge in the early years of the 20^th century ce. She was a feminist and a pacifist, a fighter for women’s educational rights (herself denied degree and professorship), much abused by male scholars unable to challenge her scholarship. It would be nice to think of her as a proto-Pagan, but though her work is of great value to us, she remained an atheist-humanist, and did not truly celebrate the Goddesses she liberated. She generally sees the myths as ‘explanations’ of ancient rites, the real nature of which – differing from Olympian religion – had been forgotten.

Harrison’s article “Pandora’s Jar”, published in 1900, first lifts the ‘great lid’. She links the Pandora story to the festival of Anthesteria (timed around the January or February full moon. The three days of the feast were called Pithoigia, Choës, and Chytro – all words related to ‘pots’. She shows how the festival, rather than being an excuse to open new wine, was rather, or was formerly, a celebration of the spirits of the dead – sometimes known as Keres.

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This vase shows Hermes, in his role as psychopomp, alongside spirits emerging from the pithos, one of which is returning to it. (redrawn by Jane Harrison after original in a dissertation by Paul Schadow, 1897)

Pandora’s jar is specifically called a ‘pithos’ – this is basically the sort of ‘Grecian Urn’ one finds in garden centres nowadays for people to make into water features. A pithos is actually a very large jar, too heavy for anyone to just carry, typically situated on the ground, or partly within. A smaller jar would have been referred to as an ‘amphora’ or perhaps ‘urnula’. To use a pithos as water feature in this way is not inappropriate. The flowing, and ever-cycling waters are a good invocation of Pandora, for She is the One from Whom All Gifts Flow, and to whom all returns.

Harrison writes more of Pandora in her book “Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion”. She castigates Hesiod as ‘pessimistic’ and ‘bourgeois’ and as having ‘ugly malice’. The name ‘Pandora’ means “the All-Giving”. It’s neither an ‘Olympian jest’ nor a sarcastic euphemism. Hesiod tries to switch the meaning into passive mode, as ‘all-gifted’. Wordplay of this nature is typical of mythic inversion. Harrison argues convincingly, from the evidence inscribed on the ancient pottery, how ‘Pandora’ is a title of the Earth Mother, in Her ‘Anodos’ – as Koré, the Maiden Uprising. Another name inscribed by Her image is ‘Anesidora’ – ‘sender-forth of gifts’.

As well as for storing the physical gifts of the Earth, the pithos was also used for funerary purposes – a practice not so dissimilar to the ‘Canopic Jars’ of Egyptian rite. Pithoi were often partly sunk into the ground. So the pithos is also the grave. The belly of the Jar is the Womb of Pandora. Images on surviving Greek pottery show pithoi as containing the ‘Keres’ – not ‘demons’ but the souls of the dead that are in Pandora’s care. The Keres are depicted as little winged beings – She sets them free.

The hubris exhibited by Hesiod is quite breathtaking. He has transformed the Mother of the Gods into their created plaything, a foolish, disobedient girl. He has turned Her Gifts into things of fear and contempt. He has turned our Mother into a vengeful curse upon humankind – “a woe for men who live on bread.” And clearly Hesiod doesn’t approve of curiosity – of asking questions. All of this is a perfect example of what Robert Graves calls ‘iconotropy’ –the re-interpretation and perversion of ancient religious images in the service of a contrary dogma. Poor Eve has much the same problem with Her Tree, Her Snake and Her Apple of course! We might feel a little sorry for this pathetic woman-hater and his unhappy private life, were it not for the torrent of bile for which he is responsible.

A tantalising hint from an ancient writer remains. We are told that Sophocles wrote a play entitled ‘Pandora or the Hammerers’. Sadly, the text has been completely lost; all we have is this title. Sophocles’ creation was apparently a ‘satyr play’ – we might think of this as equivalent to a farce, so some incongruity is plausible. The few writers who mention the play seem to think that the hammers might be used in breaking the earth, to free Pandora. Clearly they have never actually used a sledgehammer (which is what is depicted on the pottery). Hitting the ground with one of these things either splatters oneself with mud, or serves to compact the soil (not good for fertility). They could be used to break rocks, but that doesn’t make sense either, except for the use of marl to ‘sweeten’ acidic soil. ‘Clods’ are just too soft for hammers, and would need more than bashing to get into fertile receptivity. No one has considered what seems to me to be an obvious answer – the Hammers are used to smash the pithos in a ritual enactment, either setting free the spirits therein, or in the metal-working context discussed next.

The Hammerers are Pandora’s immediate connection to Hephaestus – he is always depicted with hammer in hand. His involvement opens a different or complementary thread of inquiry. According to Hesiod, Hephaestus is Pandora’s creator – other stories tell of his creation of metal-working automatons (we might call them ‘robots’ ). He is also assigned ‘patron god’ status for pottery. Hephaestus is generally considered ‘pre-Greek’ (that is, worshiped by people in the area prior to the arrival of Indo-European Greeks), as also was his parthenogenetic mother, Hera, Queen of Heaven. If we apply a process of ‘mythic re-inversion’ – a questionable methodology maybe, but which at least gives us a different perspective – we could have Pandora ‘correctly’ as Hephaestus’ mother.

This makes more mythic sense than you might initially think. Pandora herself is usually considered mother of the first mortal woman, Pyrrha. Together with her husband Deucalion, Pyrrha survives a Greek flood. It has been suggested though that Pyrrha and Deucalion are something of a fire / water allegory rather than ‘real characters’. ‘Pyrrha’ means ‘fire’, as in our various ‘pyro-‘ words. But in some non-Hesiodic stories, Pyrrha is credited instead as Pandora’s mother. Pandora is also closely associated with Fire via the Prometheus story – basically as the ‘pay-back’ and equivalent for Prometheus’ stealing fire from the Olympians Gods. We might easily say that Fire was the First Gift – that which facilitated our own species’ transformation from ‘animal’ to ‘human’. It is surely the case that Fire is the Mother of Pottery. Further though, metal-working was developed thousands of years after pottery, and could not have done so without the high-temperature technology of the kiln. Molten metal requires a container – specifically a robust pot. In some techniques, the container needs to be smashed in order to obtain the metal. We call such metal-holding pots ‘crucibles’ and we continue to use this word as a metaphor for the context of spiritual change. Breaking the mould is usually unavoidable when the intended result is a casting, such as a statue. So, additionally, the Pot is the mother of the Bronze.

Pandora’s Fire is a mix of Ancient Greek choral storytelling with a modern twist, perhaps intended mainly for school audiences.  See https://www.theatrefolk.com/products/pandora-s-fire It’s somewhat off mythologically,  since starts from the Box, but shifts so to completely subvert the victim-blamming of Hesiod. I love the ending:

Burn, burn, Pandora’s bright fire,
Dazzle the world with your light.

The modern writer Daniel Ogden makes the fascinating suggestion that ancient Greeks understood the Jar (maybe smaller than the usual pithos) as a container for Pandora’s child – a ‘teras-baby’, that is, ‘deformed’, lame or just ugly. Strangely he does not name this child as Hephaestus, despite the precise match that God would make to these labels. If all this mixture of imagery is confusing, well, that is precisely the nature of most true myth – they are an attempt to set down a coalescence of spiritual visions.

Fascinatingly, the ancient Greek word for ‘pot’ relates not only to ceramics, but also to chasms and fissures in the Earth, just as in the English ‘pothole’. Springs, the waters of life, flow from such pots. Even the phrase “gone to pot”, meaning ruin and destruction, translates similarly. We know that Persephone the Koré descends through such a place and returns thereby in Her ascent, Her Anodos. So the Jar is not just the holder of Pandora’s Gifts – it is also Her embodiment and Her gateway into epiphany.

I had always thought of Pandora as primarily an ‘Earth Goddess’, Waters too, but on reflection She would seem at least tri-faceted – like Persephone she is involved in Death / Rebirth but also, uniquely in Greece I think, but maybe not unlike Irish Brighid, in Fire, pottery and metalwork. If we take the view that Goddesses do not always have quite the same uniqueness of identity that we believe of ourselves, then Pandora would be a title not only of Gaea / Rhea or Persephone, but also of Hera.

I first made my own dedication to Pandora many years ago. Back in the Typewriter Age I published a magazine, itself titled “Pandora’s Jar”. At the same point in time, I rededicated my Fellowship of Isis hearth or Iseum as the Centre of Pandora, and I made dedication to Pandora at my ordination in the FOI. In addition to the factual material presented by harrison, I was very much moved by Charlene Spretnak’s retelling of the Pandora myth. I wrote back then that the reclaiming of the truth of Pandora is a good metaphor for the task we face. It is even more urgent now. Instead of dominating, fearing and cursing the Earth (and women) our society needs once again to live in harmony with the gifts She so freely provides. We also need to understand that the creatures that we find inconvenient or which sometimes bring us sickness are Hers too, older than We. The great gift of life is matched by the gift of surcease, of death, that we may live again, renewed in vigour.

Recent reading makes me feel further that the Giving of Gifts is actually the basis of human culture, not some add-on twice a year. Pandora as All-Gifting becomes then more than metaphor, rather the origin of whence we have come, and the focus to which we need to return.

Pandora, Anesidora, Koré,
Crowned With Flowers, First of the Graces,
You that bestow all things necessary to life.

From your never-emptying Jar
Come all the Gifts of Earth in season.

When we are constrained in rigidity
May your Hammerers Strike,
Set us free to grow.

May Your Hope Uprise Within Us like Your First Gift of Fire.
Rise Up O Flame
May we be transformed in Your Crucible
As Gifts of Beauty, Wisdom and Joy.

References:

If you’re as fascinated by Pandora as I am, you might be interested in these sources – if you find others, of interest beyond the same old stuff, please let me know:

• All the original texts are online, for example at www.theoi.com/Heroine/Pandora
• Wikipedia will give you a good basic introduction:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandora
• Jane Harrison’s work is not easy reading … she expects you to be able to read Greek and Latin without translation, and the word ‘phallus’ stays in Greek! The original “Pandora’s Box” article seems only available via the Journal of Hellenic Studies,  just this purchasable at: https://kisslibrary.com/book/BB07C132C1F96EB0B4A6. Her “Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion” can be bought easily from Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Prolegomena-Study-Religion-Classic-Reprint/dp/0266343619/
  
• Daniel Ogden. “What was in Pandora’s Box?” is in “Archaic Greece: New Approaches and New Evidence” edited by Nick Fisher, Hans van Wees. I read it at https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=fARPDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA213&lpg=PA213#v=onepage&q&f=false
  
• Charlene Spretnak. “Lost Goddesses of Early Greece” is a wonderful collection revisioning the myths – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lost-Goddesses-Early-Greece-Pre-Hellenic/dp/B017QUZEVG/
• Dora and Erwin Panofsky produced a fascinating study of the changing imagery of Pandora – free pdf from: https://monoskop.org/images/4/40/Panofsky_Dora_and_Erwin_Pandoras_Box_The_Changing_Aspects_of_a_Mythical_Symbol.pdf
• An interesting account of Jane Harrison and her critics is ‘For love of an idea’ by Arlen Shelley:  http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/09612029600200114

Here in Wales our winters are becoming increasingly soggy. All too often they are grey and depressing. But today, after a light snowfall, skies are blue and the horizon is clear. Hearts sparkle again like the snow on each twig.

Feels like cue a song!

Winter calls a clear horizon
Like the sea calls to the port
Like the sky calls to the desert
Like a love calls too the heart.

(That’s “Clear Horizon” by Jan Harmon 1985.
Listen here: Clear Horizon by Libana, from Libana’s album ‘Fire Within’. Buy the track or cd here: Fire Within)

Imminent in the festival calendar, leading up to Solstice, are the various festivals of ‘Saint Lucy’ tomorrow on December 13th.  A northern version is that known as Lussi Long-Night. Read more here: Lussi Long-night in Maria Kvilhaug’s blog.  Maria’s page includes a further link to a recipe for luscious-looking Lussi-cat buns. We have lots of wood cut, and my cake is baked, so hopefully Lussi won’t find the household unready, and give her blessing to the baking.

Here in the UK the annual orgy of consumerism, debt, drunkenness and over-eating is well under way. I prefer to use the name ‘Xmas’, which though perfectly legitimate in origin, in modern usage has the connotations of secular tawdriness that I want to express. In addition, saves me having to use the C-word any more than necessary. The UK stands out from other ‘formerly Christian countries’ in the massive distortion of the festival calendar towards this single event.

Those of us who are Pagan, of whatever form, often hate this time of year. On the one hand we want to be enthusiastic about our festival of Yule (or whatever), and do our best to tell the noisy rabble of street revelers just how spiritual it all is really. For ourselves, we want to actually contact some of that spiritual meaning. If we are parents we want to try to share something of the ‘real magic of it all’ with our children – we are convinced this isn’t plastic and electronics. But on the other hand, we cannot avoid being swept along by the pressure of commercial advertising and media mania. We struggle not to be defined as ‘Scrooges’ (or Grinches maybe, as a more recent literary creation), or as boring party-poopers. We know that if we try to call out that the whole thing is ‘humbug’ (Dickens-speak for cant and hypocrisy) then the world just laughs at us.

All this tends to bring on (hopefully non-clinical) depression. Much about the season pushes us that way in any case. In Carmarthenshire, Wales, where I live, the weather has been very grey, most days filled with rain that has varied from penetrating drizzle to full-on horizontal. The ground is sodden. Work in the garden is largely impossible (even though my standing joke is of gardening as ‘playing in the mud’). A walk on the hill, where the weather would certainly blow or wash ‘the cobwebs away’, all just seems far too much effort. One might try a little Hypericum as remedy – derived from a beautiful golden-yellow flower traditionally linked to Midsummer – in the hope of recapturing a little of summer’s light. We hope for clear horizons on the day of Solstice Dawn, December 22nd . (here in the UK). We’ll be lighting a fire to greet the Sun.

For some further thoughts and inspiration, you might be interested in the next posts on the themes of

• Winter Solstice – believe it or not?  – what do we actually believe?
• Santa’s Sacked  – so we do we do then?
• Winter Solstice Meditation
• Mother Earth’s Winter Solstice Colouring Book