Creation

Holy Cow Mother, Cort! I'm totally titulated now! Thanks for the
thoughts!

>In the Pelasgian creation myth, Eurynome starts alone dancing on the
>waters. She creates Ophion ought of the North wind, and he coils
>around her, and couples with her. The now fertilized Eurynome changes
>into a dove and lays an egg. Ophion then coils about the egg seven
>times, from which everything emerges.

Sexual antagonism... intriguing. I guess I should think about that
for a while.

>What I get from this is the serpent coiled around Eurynome, analagous
>to the serpent coiled about the world tree.

This sentence sent shivers down my spine. This totally makes sense
but I hadn't thought of it that way before! I've already noticed the
similarities in shape between the World Tree and the goddess with
upraised arms (which also came to later mean the crescent moon). The
Goddess is also later abstractified as a World Pillar.

Clearly then, the Goddess must have been associated with and
equivalent to the World Tree at an early date. Hence, the coiling
of the snake around the egg, around the Goddess and around the
World Tree is just triplication of some original, less
obfuscated tale.

However, something is amiss about this account: "The now fertilized
Eurynome changes into a dove and lays an egg". I like to assume that
there is fundamental logic (even fuzzy logic, at the very least)
behind all myths. What would be the inspiration for such a
transformation due to fertilisation? Second of all, a "dove" is
too specific in terms of reconstructing the original tale.
The Goddess is definitely associated with a bird though (perhaps
just about any bird; note other associations like the raven,
blackbird or vulture).

If we look at Nyx, we see that the complete void of
primordial darkness can be symbolized nicely as a large outstretched
black bird hovering over primordial waters. If these tales originate
from the Mediterranean, we can expect people to believe "In the
Beginning, there was only the waters and darkness." They were sea
people afterall and the waters seem to stretch forever from the
coast. The bird might have been impregnated by the waters,
representing a masculine principle, as you suggest, causing a great
Cosmic Egg to be laid on the waters, from which the universe is
born. (Note too that the inspiration for a bird might be derived
from the fact that only birds had the power to move over the waters,
and fly so far away from land. In this respect, they had what
appeared to be a magical power.)

At the same time, however, it makes logical sense that early
peoples would think of all life as deriving from the womb (of a
woman) including the universe itself. The latter concept is not so
sea-specific. Continuing with the Great Goddess concept, there are
many later myths of self-fertilizing or self-generating woman (eg:
Athena, Mary of the bible, yadayada). Hence, we have a second
possibility for Creation: Goddess always existed... She impregnates
self... Universe oozes forth from womb.

Perhaps then, this latter Great Goddess myth could be the core
foundation of the later neolithic myths of Creation, having been
fused with the Great Bird myth. The Woman and the Bird become one
and the same. Hence either "the bird flies over the waters" or
"the Goddess dances upon the waters" or "the Goddess dances
upon a snake" to get the ball of creation rolling. The snake=waters
connection then becomes symbolic of the male principle... Oooooh,
that gives a whole new sexual meaning to the Cretan Snake Goddess!
My, how provocative.

>Or, alternately, she sends out a bee. Another Minoan goddess animal.
>I think the sun symbolism is interesting, as the sun often symbolizes
>justice and authority, aka the axe, and we do know of a sun goddess
>in the region.

Oh, yes, a bee. That's what I meant... But the connection is still
sound between the butterfly and the sun, I think, just a very
abstract connection.

Perhaps it was when the goddess became abstractified as the horns
(moon) and axe (sun) that the new association between the sun and
the axe caused an association between the sun and authority. This
connects with the idea of the sun-chief, another element of
religio-political life which may have existed in the E.Med. during
the neolithic... It's all so complex!

Oh, btw, I suppose this is a pointless revelation by now, but the
doubleaxe should be made of copper because it's nice and shiney
like the sun. Similarly, the horns should be nice and white like
the moon... just in case you want to make your own neolithic altar
in the comfort of your own home.

-------------------------------------------------
Glen Gordon
Webdeveloper

home: http://glen_gordon.tripod.com
email: glengordon01@...
ph: (604)904.0320
-------------------------------------------------

>
>Cort Williams
>

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