Okay, it started when I was staring too long at a double-axe/horn motif. I
told you gals about the typological relationship between the figure of the
Goddess with this newer composite emblem. The raised arms of the Goddess
became stylized into the horns of a bull while the body was abstractified as
a double-axe pattern. These two objects later became seperated as important
symbols on their own relating to the Goddess but with slightly different
connotations. At the same time as the symbolism was changing from the period
of 7000 BCE to 4000 BCE, there appear to have been extensive changes
involving the local mythologies of the Eastern Mediterranean and surrounding
areas.
Basically, in the Eastern Mediterranean from 7000 BCE, I'm sure that it all
started with a world concept whereupon a female goddess figure was seen to
live in everything (cf. Navajo Changing Woman). She would be polymorphic,
constantly changing, male and female.
There would already have been some sea trade going in the area and women may
have been left to the property and local affairs for the first time as the
men boated around the region doing their trade thing (Just a thought). By
6000 BCE, agriculture had come to Europe from Anatolia, changing and
augmenting the success, complexity and extent of the local sea trade. This
change in economy would also fuel the change of local societies as they
embraced agriculture and pastoralism.
The economy changes, society changes, and so mythology changes to reflect
newer times. Therefore, the Goddess got more complex and the concept of
symbolic tripartition was developed at this point whereupon the deity was
divided into sky, earth and waters. Each realm (overworld, middleworld,
underworld) gained connections with specific colours (red, black, white - in
that order), animals (bird, mammal, fish/serpent), seasons (winter,
spring-summer, autumn) and societal functions (priest, commoner, warrior).
Another important connection was with life cycle (girl, mother, crone) and
with basic cosmology (sun, Venus, moon). The new importance placed on
looking to the heavens for divine inspiration was influenced by the new use
of agriculture. Finally, the sun and the moon came to be seen as
antagonistic, explaining the changing of the seasons where either the
sun/day or the moon/night dominates depending on the time of the year.
Venus, the mother, was the intermediary, the balance between both extremes,
between both realms.
At this point, the symbolisms of the goddess began to vary greatly. The
goddess figure slowly developed into a double-axe/horn motif. Now
originally, the Goddess, being the universe itself, was the sun and the moon
combined (both the young maiden and the old crone). Therefore, the
seperation of the goddess figure into a double-axe and horn gave new,
seperate symbols to the sun (double-axe) and the moon (horns). The
double-axe made in copper would eventually mimick the shininess and colour
of the sun while the white horns mimicked the crescent moon. The double-axe
and the white horns together, however, symbolized the whole of creation,
Venus, the mother. Now, I have explained the "trinity" interpretation of the
double-axe/horn motif.
As agriculture gained dominance around the Eastern Mediterranean, there was
a gaining prevalency of patriarchy and higher densities of population. The
European female trinity of mother-girl-crone came to reflect local patterns
of family. The sun and moon could be seen in some traditions as twin
children (either sex) of the mother (Venus). This is why we find a whole
bunch of art in the region at this time aimed at pregnancy, birth,
motherhood, twin egg motifs, and the like. This is the ultimate origin of
the Divine Twins in IE mythology, btw. The female-female-female triad,
despite what Gimbutas has claimed, was already being altered according to
more patriarchal lines (female-male-male) well before the IE peoples came
over for a permanent visit in Europe. So we find by the time of writing, in
the Akkadian version of the trinity, two male gods (sun and moon) hanging
around the female Venus.
In typical European tripartitive fashion, the now male characters
subordinate to the mother Venus, who continued to fight each other like the
earlier female sun and moon figures, could be seen in three ways: As two
rivaling young wooers of a beautiful maiden, twin rivaling sons of a mother
or two rivaling husbands of a goddess. This is why we see two main male
figures associated with the goddess. Sometimes they flank her, sometimes one
is bearded, the other a young man. The male representations of the sun and
moon followed along the same vein as the female ones. Although they might be
any age (from twin babies to grown men in arms), the sun was generally a
young man; the male moon was a bearded old man.
It would appear that this was the foundation for a new "tanist"
interpretation of the same double-axe/horn motif. The younger male married
the beautiful young maiden (like Sumerian Dumuzi-Inanna), representing the
underworld together. The older man was married to the older woman (like
Greek Zeus-Hera), representing the sky together. In the middle was humanity,
the man and woman. Both couples of either the underworld or overworld were
in constant struggle for dominance (again, symbolizing seasonal changes).
The double-axe and horns thus represent dualing twins with one being the
slaughtered and the other being the victor. One being priest, the other
warrior. One being the worshipper with double-axe, the other the sacrificial
animal with horns. One being *Manus, the other *Yemos. *Dye:us and
*PerkWnos. Cain and Abel. Yada, yada.
At this point, I realized something rather self-evident but I'm not too
bright so I have to think harder than most people. I realized that the
double-axe/horn motif must have _simultaneously_ had, at some prehistoric
point in time, a "tanist" and "trinity" interpretation and this related to
the religious signifance of the numeral seven in these cultures by 5500 BCE.
You see, the trinity involves the little numeral three (three gods) while
this tanism thing involves the numeral four (two couples but four entities
in all). Three plus four is seven. Seven is coincidently the number of
astral bodies that later shows up in Sumerian mythology and which is welded
into the widely dispersed neolithic Creation story where there are seven
generations of gods born.
You're probably wondering at this point what I'm rambling on about... Here's
the basic trinity-tanist scheme of things:
trinity:
Venus/Sirius (mother)
sun (girl -> son)
moon (crone -> father)
tanism:
Jupiter (old man)
Saturn (old woman)
Mars (young boy)
Venus (young girl)
You can now see, as found in many mythologies, there is reduplication and
layering of various traditions occuring here that eventually combined to
form a new contorted mythology by 5500 BCE. It would then spread quickly
into the Egyptian, Syria/Palestine and Anatolia/Fertile Crescent regions.
There's probably more that I forgot to mention but there you have it so far.
- gLeN
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