Category: The Goddesses

The Goddess Hecate

The Goddess Hecate

Hecate or Hekate (ancient Greek Ἑκάτη, Hekátē, pronounced /ˈhɛkətiː/, in Shakespeare /ˈhɛkət/) is a chthonic Greco-Roman goddess associated with magic, witchcraft, necromancy, and crossroads. She is attested in poetry as early as Hesiod’s Theogony. An inscription from late archaic Miletus naming her as a protector of entrances is also testimony to her presence in archaic Greek religion.

Regarding the nature of her cult, it has been remarked, “she is more at home on the fringes than in the center of Greek polytheism. Intrinsically ambivalent and polymorphous, she straddles conventional boundaries and eludes definition.” She has been associated with childbirth, nurturing the young, gates and walls, doorways, crossroads, magic, lunar lore, torches and dogs.

Hecate may have originated among the Carians of Anatolia, where children were often given variants of her name. William Berg observes, “Since children are not called after spooks, it is safe to assume that Carian theophoric names involving hekat- refer to a major deity free from the dark and unsavoury ties to the underworld and to witchcraft associated with the Hecate of classical Athens.” But he cautions, “The Laginetan goddess may have had a more infernal character than scholars have been willing to assume.”

In Ptolemaic Alexandria and elsewhere during the Hellenistic period, she appears as a three-faced goddess associated with magic, witchcraft, and curses. Today she is claimed as a goddess of witches and in the context of Hellenic Polytheistic Reconstructionism. Some neo-pagans refer to her as a “crone goddess”, though this characterization appears to conflict with her frequent characterization as a virgin in late antiquity. She closely parallels the Roman goddess Trivia.

Mythology

Hecate has been characterized as a pre-Olympian chthonic goddess. She appears in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter and in Hesiod’s Theogony, where she is promoted strongly as a great goddess. The place of origin of her following is uncertain, but it is thought that she had popular followings in Thrace. Her most important sanctuary was Lagina, a theocratic city-state in which the goddess was served by eunuchs. Lagina, where the famous temple of Hecate drew great festal assemblies every year, lay close to the originally Macedonian colony of Stratonikeia, where she was the city’s patroness. In Thrace she played a role similar to that of lesser-Hermes, namely a governess of liminal regions (particularly gates) and the wilderness, bearing little resemblance to the night-walking crone she became. Additionally, this led to her role of aiding women in childbirth and the raising of young men.

Hesiod records that she was esteemed as the offspring of Gaia and Uranus, the Earth and Sky. In Theogony he ascribed great powers to Hecate:

[…] Hecate whom Zeus the son of Cronos honored above all. He gave her splendid gifts, to have a share of the earth and the unfruitful sea. She received honor also in starry heaven, and is honored exceedingly by the deathless gods. For to this day, whenever any one of men on earth offers rich sacrifices and prays for favor according to custom, he calls upon Hecate. Great honor comes full easily to him whose prayers the goddess receives favorably, and she bestows wealth upon him; for the power surely is with her. For as many as were born of Earth and Ocean amongst all these she has her due portion. The son of Cronos did her no wrong nor took anything away of all that was her portion among the former Titan gods: but she holds, as the division was at the first from the beginning, privilege both in earth, and in heaven, and in sea.

According to Hesiod, she held sway over many things:

Whom she will she greatly aids and advances: she sits by worshipful kings in judgement, and in the assembly whom she will is distinguished among the people. And when men arm themselves for the battle that destroys men, then the goddess is at hand to give victory and grant glory readily to whom she will. Good is she also when men contend at the games, for there too the goddess is with them and profits them: and he who by might and strength gets the victory wins the rich prize easily with joy, and brings glory to his parents. And she is good to stand by horsemen, whom she will: and to those whose business is in the grey discomfortable sea, and who pray to Hecate and the loud-crashing Earth-Shaker, easily the glorious goddess gives great catch, and easily she takes it away as soon as seen, if so she will. She is good in the byre with Hermes to increase the stock. The droves of kine and wide herds of goats and flocks of fleecy sheep, if she will, she increases from a few, or makes many to be less. So, then, albeit her mother’s only child, she is honored amongst all the deathless gods. And the son of Cronos made her a nurse of the young who after that day saw with their eyes the light of all-seeing Dawn. So from the beginning she is a nurse of the young, and these are her honors.

Hesiod emphasizes that Hecate was an only child, the daughter of Perses and Asteria, a star-goddess who was the sister of Leto (the mother of Artemis and Apollo). Grandmother of the three cousins was Phoebe the ancient Titaness who personified the moon.

Hesiod’s inclusion and praise of Hecate in the Theogony has been troublesome for scholars, in that he seems to hold her in high regard, while the testimony of other writers, and surviving evidence, suggests that this was probably somewhat exceptional. It is theorized that Hesiod’s original village had a substantial Hecate following and that his inclusion of her in the Theogony was a way of adding to her prestige by spreading word of her among his readers.

Hecate possibly originated among the Carians of Anatolia, the region where most theophoric names invoking Hecate, such as Hecataeus or Hecatomnus, the father of Mausolus, are attested, and where Hecate remained a Great Goddess into historical times, at her unrivalled[30] cult site in Lagina. While many researchers favor the idea that she has Anatolian origins, it has been argued that “Hecate must have been a Greek goddess.” The monuments to Hecate in Phrygia and Caria are numerous but of late date.

If Hecate’s cult spread from Anatolia into Greece, it is possible it presented a conflict, as her role was already filled by other more prominent deities in the Greek pantheon, above all by Artemis and Selene. This line of reasoning lies behind the widely accepted hypothesis that she was a foreign deity who was incorporated into the Greek pantheon. Other than in the Theogony, the Greek sources do not offer a consistent story of her parentage, or of her relations in the Greek pantheon: sometimes Hecate is related as a Titaness, and a mighty helper and protector of humans. Her continued presence was explained by asserting that, because she was the only Titan who aided Zeus in the battle of gods and Titans, she was not banished into the underworld realms after their defeat by the Olympians.

One surviving group of stories suggests how Hecate might have come to be incorporated into the Greek pantheon without affecting the privileged position of Artemis. Here, Hecate is a mortal priestess often associated with Iphigeneia. She scorns and insults Artemis, who in retribution eventually brings about the mortal’s suicide. There was an area sacred to Hecate in the precincts of the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, where the priests, megabyzi, officiated.

Hecate also came to be associated with ghosts, infernal spirits, the dead and sorcery. Like the totems of Hermes—herms placed at borders as a ward against danger—images of Hecate (like Artemis and Diana, often referred to as a “liminal” goddess) were also placed at the gates of cities, and eventually domestic doorways. Over time, the association with keeping out evil spirits could have led to the belief that if offended, Hecate could also allow the evil spirits in. According to one view, this accounts for invocations to Hecate as the supreme governess of the borders between the normal world and the spirit world, and hence as one with mastery over spirits of the dead. Whatever the reasons, Hecate’s power certainly came to be closely associated with sorcery. One interesting passage exists suggesting that the word “jinx” might have originated in a cult object associated with Hecate. “The Byzantine polymath Michael Psellus […] speaks of a bullroarer, consisting of a golden sphere, decorated throughout with symbols and whirled on an oxhide thong. He adds that such an instrument is called a iunx (hence “jinx”), but as for the significance says only that it is ineffable and that the ritual is sacred to Hecate.”

Hecate is one of the most important figures in the so-called Chaldaean Oracles (2nd-3rd century CE), where she is associated in fragment 194 with a strophalos (usually translated as a spinning top, or wheel, used in magic) “Labour thou around the Strophalos of Hecate.” This appears to refer to a variant of the device mentioned by Psellus.

Variations in interpretations of Hecate’s role or roles can be traced in 5th-century Athens. In two fragments of Aeschylus she appears as a great goddess. In Sophocles and Euripides she is characterized as the mistress of witchcraft and the Keres.

In the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Hecate is called the “tender-hearted”, a euphemism perhaps intended to emphasize her concern with the disappearance of Persephone, when she addressed Demeter with sweet words at a time when the goddess was distressed. She later became Persephone’s minister and close companion in the Underworld. But Hecate was never fully incorporated among the Olympian deities.

The modern understanding of Hecate has been strongly influenced by syncretic Hellenistic interpretations. Many of the attributes she was assigned in this period appear to have an older basis. For example, in the magical papyri of Ptolemaic Egypt, she is called the ‘she-dog’ or ‘bitch’, and her presence is signified by the barking of dogs. In late imagery she also has two ghostly dogs as servants by her side. However, her association with dogs predates the conquests of Alexander the Great and the emergence of the Hellenistic world. When Philip II laid siege to Byzantium she had already been associated with dogs for some time; the light in the sky and the barking of dogs that warned the citizens of a night time attack, saving the city, were attributed to Hecate Lampadephoros (the tale is preserved in the Suda). In gratitude the Byzantines erected a statue in her honor.

As a virgin goddess, she remained unmarried and had no regular consort, though some traditions named her as the mother of Scylla.

Although associated with other moon goddesses such as Selene, she ruled over three kingdoms; the earth, the sea, and the sky. She had the power to create or hold back storms, which influenced her patronage of shepherds and sailors.

Goddess of the crossroads

Cult images and altars of Hecate in her triplicate or trimorphic form were placed at crossroads (though they also appeared before private homes and in front of city gates). In this form she came to be known as the goddess Trivia “the three ways” in Roman mythology. In what appears to be a 7th century indication of the survival of cult practices of this general sort, Saint Eligius, in his Sermo warns the sick among his recently converted flock in Flanders against putting “devilish charms at springs or trees or crossroads”, and, according to Saint Ouen would urge them “No Christian should make or render any devotion to the deities of the trivium, where three roads meet…”.[

Animals Associated With Hecate

Dogs were closely associated with Hecate in the Classical world. “In art and in literature Hecate is constantly represented as dog-shaped or as accompanied by a dog. Her approach was heralded by the howling of a dog. The dog was Hecate’s regular sacrificial animal, and was often eaten in solemn sacrament.” The sacrifice of dogs to Hecate is attested for Thrace, Samothrace, Colophon, and Athens.

It has been claimed that her association with dogs is “suggestive of her connection with birth, for the dog was sacred to Eileithyia, Genetyllis, and other birth goddesses. Although in later times Hecate’s dog came to be thought of as a manifestation of restless souls or demons who accompanied her, its docile appearance and its accompaniment of a Hecate who looks completely friendly in many pieces of ancient art suggests that its original signification was positive and thus likelier to have arisen from the dog’s connection with birth than the dog’s demonic associations.”

Athenaeus (writing in the 1st or 2nd century BCE, and drawing on the etymological speculation of Apollodorus) notes that the red mullet is sacred to Hecate, “on account of the resemblance of their names; for that the goddess is trimorphos, of a triple form”. The Greek word for mullet was trigle and later trigla. He goes on to quote a fragment of verse “O mistress Hecate, Trioditis / With three forms and three faces / Propitiated with mullets”. In relation to Greek concepts of pollution, Parker observes, “The fish that was most commonly banned was the red mullet (trigle), which fits neatly into the pattern. It ‘delighted in polluted things,’ and ‘would eat the corpse of a fish or a man’. Blood-coloured itself, it was sacred to the blood-eating goddess Hecate. It seems a symbolic summation of all the negative characteristics of the creatures of the deep.” At Athens, it is said there stood a statue of Hecate Triglathena, to whom the red mullet was offered in sacrifice. After mentioning that this fish was sacred to Hecate, Alan Davidson writes, “Cicero, Horace, Juvenal, Martial, Pliny, Seneca and Suetonius have left abundant and interesting testimony to the red mullet fever which began to affect wealthy Romans during the last years of the Republic and really gripped them in the early Empire. The main symptoms were a preoccupation with size, the consequent rise to absurd heights of the prices of large specimens, a habit of keeping red mullet in captivity, and the enjoyment of the highly specialized aesthetic experience induced by watching the color of the dying fish change.”

The frog, significantly a creature that can cross between two elements, also is sacred to Hecate.

In her three-headed representations, discussed above, Hecate often has one or more animal heads, including cow, dog, boar, serpent and horse.

The Goddess Diana

 

Research on the Goddess Diana

Part 1

“Goddess Of The Hunt”

Diana (lt. “heavenly” or “divine”) was the goddess of the hunt, being associated with wild animals and woodland, and also of the moon in Roman mythology. In literature she was the equal of the Greek goddess Artemis, though in cult beliefs she was Italic, not Greek, in origin. Diana was worshiped in ancient Roman religion and is currently revered in Roman Neopaganism and Stregheria. Dianic Wicca, a largely feminist form of the practice, is named for her. Diana was known to be the virgin goddess and looked after virgins and women. She was one of the three maiden goddesses, Diana, Minerva and Vesta, who swore never to marry.

Along with her main attributes, Diana was an emblem of chastity. Oak groves were especially sacred to her. According to mythology, Diana was born with her twin brother Apollo on the island of Delos, daughter of Jupiter and Latona. Diana made up a triad with two other Roman deities: Egeria the water nymph, her servant and assistant midwife; and Virbius, the woodland god.

Diana (pronounced with long ‘i’ and a’) is an adjectival form developed from an ancient *divios, corresponding to later ‘divus’, ‘dius’, as in Dius Fidius, Dea Dia and in the neuter form dium meaning the sky. It is rooted in Indoeuropean *d(e)y(e)w meaning bright sky or daylight, from which also derived the name of Vedic god Dyaus and the Latin deus (god), dies (day, daylight).

The Greek αδει(αν)ός (adei(an)os) means empty, because Aeneas’s mother, Venus, in the form of a hunting woman was very similar to the goddess Diana and because the Aeneid describes that since Paris (mythology) the temples hallow an empty name and she went down the empty sky when Eurytion held the arrow ready on his bended bow.

Theology

The persona of Diana is complex and contains a number of archaic features. According to Dumezil it falls into a particular subset of celestial gods, referred to in histories of religion as ‘frame gods’. Such gods, while keeping the original features of celestial divinities, i.e. transcendent heavenly power and abstention from direct rule in worldly matters, did not share the fate of other celestial gods in Indoeuropean religions – that of becoming dei otiosi, since they did retain a particular sort of influence over the world and mankind.

The celestial character of Diana is reflected in her connexion with light, inaccessibility, virginity, and her preference for dwelling on high mountains and in sacred woods. Diana therefore reflects the heavenly world (dium) in its sovereignty, supremacy, impassibility, and indifference towards such secular matters as the fates of men and states. At the same time, however, she is seen as active in ensuring the succession of kings and in the preservation of mankind through the protection of childbirth.

These functions are apparent in the traditional institutions and cults related to the goddess. 1) The institution of the rex Nemorensis, Diana’s sacredos in the Arician wood, who held its position til somebody else challenged and killed him in a duel, after breaking a branch from a certain tree of the wood. This ever totally open succession reveals the character and mission of the goddess as a guarantee of the continuity of the kingly status through successive generations.The same meaning implying her function of bestower of regality is testified by the story related by Livy of the prediction of empire to the land of origin of the person who would offer her a particularly beautiful cow. 2) Diana was also worshipped by women who sought pregnancy or asked for an easy delivery. This kind of worship is testified by archeological finds of votive statuettes in her sanctuary in the nemus Aricinum as well as by ancient sources, e.g. Ovid.

According to Dumezil the forerunner of all frame gods is an Indian epic hero who was the image (avatar) of the Vedic god Dyaus. Having renounced the world, in his roles of father and king, he attained the status of an immortal being while retaining the duty of ensuring that his dynasty is preserved and that there is always a new king for each generation. The Scandinavian god Heimdallr performs an analogous function: he is born first and will die last. He too gives origin to kingship and the first king, bestowing on him regal prerogatives. Diana, although a female deity, has exactly the same functions, preserving mankind through childbirth and royal succession.

Dumezil’s interpretation appears deliberately to ignore that of James G. Frazer, who links Diana with the male god Janus as a divine couple. Frazer identifies the two with the supreme heavenly couple Jupiter-Juno and additionally ties in these figures to the overarching Indoeuropean religious complex. This regality is also linked to the cult of trees, particularly oaks. In this interpretative schema, the institution of the Rex Nemorensis and related ritual should be seen as related to the theme of the dying god and the kings of May.

Physical Description

Diana often appeared as a young woman, age around 12 to 19. It was believed that she had a fair face like Aphrodite with a tall body, slim, small hips, and a high forehead. As a goddess of hunting, she wore a very short tunic so she could hunt and run easily and is often portrayed holding a bow, and carrying a quiver on her shoulder, accompanied by a deer or hunting dog. Sometimes the hunted creature would also be shown. As goddess of the moon, however, Diana wore a long robe, sometimes with a veil covering her head. Both as goddess of hunting and goddess of the moon she is frequently portrayed wearing a moon crown.

Worship

Diana was initially just the hunting goddess, associated with wild animals and woodlands. She also later became a moon goddess, supplanting Titan goddess Luna. She also became the goddess of childbirth and ruled over the countryside.

Diana was worshipped at a festival on August 13, when King Servius Tullius, himself born a slave, dedicated her temple on the Aventine Hill in the mid-sixth century BC. Being placed on the Aventine, and thus outside the pomerium, meant that Diana’s cult essentially remained a ‘foreign’ one, like that of Bacchus; she was never officially ‘transferred’ to Rome as Juno was after the sack of Veii. It seems that her cult originated in Aricia, where her priest, the Rex Nemorensis remained. There the simple open-air fane was held in common by the Latin tribes, which Rome aspired to weld into a league and direct. Diana of the wood was soon thoroughly Hellenized, “a process which culminated with the appearance of Diana beside Apollo in the first lectisternium at Rome”. Diana was regarded with great reverence by lower-class citizens and slaves; slaves could receive asylum in her temples. This fact is of difficult interpretation. Wissowa proposed the explanation that it might be because the first slaves of the Romans must have been Latins of the neighbouring tribes.

Though some Roman patrons ordered marble replicas of the specifically Anatolian “Diana” of Ephesus, where the Temple of Artemis stood, Diana was usually depicted for educated Romans in her Greek guise. If she is accompanied by a deer, as in the Diana of Versailles this is because Diana was the patroness of hunting. The deer may also offer a covert reference to the myth of Acteon (or Actaeon), who saw her bathing naked. Diana transformed Acteon into a stag and set his own hunting dogs to kill him.

Worship of Diana is mentioned in the Bible. In Acts of the Apostles, Ephesian metal smiths who felt threatened by Saint Paul’s preaching of Christianity, jealously rioted in her defense, shouting “Great is Diana of the Ephesians!” (Acts 19:28, New English Bible). After the city secretary (γραμματεύς) quieted the crowd, he said, “Men of Ephesus, what person is there who does not know that the city of the Ephesians is the keeper (guardian) of the temple of the great Diana and of her image that fell from heaven ?” (Acts 19:36)

Sanctuaries

Diana was an ancient goddess common to all Latin tribes. Therefore many sanctuaries were dedicated to her in the lands inhabited by Latins. The first one is supposed to have been near Alba before the town was destroyed by the Romans.

The Arician wood sanctuary near the lake of Nemi was Latin confederal as testified by the dedicatory epigraph quoted by Cato.

She had a shrine in Rome on the Aventine hill, according to tradition dedicated by king Servius Tullius. Its location is remarkable as the Aventine is situated outside the pomerium, i.e. original territory of the city, in order to comply with the tradition that Diana was a goddess common to all Latins and not exclusively of the Romans.

Other sanctuaries we know about are listed here below:

Temple of Diana, in Evora, Portugal.

Colle di Corne near Tusculum where she is referred to with the archaic Latin name of deva Cornisca and where existed a collegium of worshippers.

The Algidus Mount, also near Tusculum

At Lavinium

At Tivoli, where she is referred to as Diana Opifera Nemorensis

A sacred wood mentioned by Livyad computum Anagninum(near Anagni).

On Mount Tifata, near Capua in Campania.

In Ephesus, where she was worshiped as Diana of Ephesus and the temple used to be one of world’s seven wonders.

Legacy

In religion

Diana’s cult has been related in Early Modern Europe to the cult of Nicevenn (aka Dame Habond, Perchta, Herodiana, etc.). She was related to myths of a female Wild Hunt.

Wicca

Today there is a branch of Wicca named for her, which is characterized by an exclusive focus on the feminine aspect of the Divine. In some Wiccan texts Lucifer is a name used interchangeably for Diana’s brother Apollo.

Stregheria

In Italy the old religion of Stregheria embraced goddess Diana as Queen of the Witches; witches being the wise women healers of the time. Goddess Diana created the world of her own being having in herself the seeds of all creation yet to come. It is said that out of herself she divided into the darkness and the light, keeping for herself the darkness of creation and creating her brother Apollo, the light. Goddess Diana loved and ruled with her brother Apollo, the god of the Sun. (Charles G. Leland, Aradia: The Gospel of Witches)

Since the Renaissance the mythic Diana has often been expressed in the visual and dramatic arts, including the opera L’arbore di Diana. In the sixteenth century, Diana’s image figured prominently at the Château de Fontainebleau, in deference to Diane de Poitiers, mistress of two French kings. At Versailles she was incorporated into the Olympian iconography with which Louis XIV, the Apollo-like “Sun King” liked to surround himself.

There are also references to her in common literature. In Shakespeare’s play, Romeo and Juliet, many references are made to Diana. Rosaline, a beautiful woman who has sworn to chastity, is said to have “Dian’s wit”. Later on in the play, Romeo says, “It is the East, and Juliet is the sun. Arise fair sun, and kill the envious moon.” He is saying that Juliet is better than Diana and Rosaline for not swearing chastity. Diana is also a character in the 1876 Leo Delibe ballet ‘Sylvia’. The plot deals with Sylvia, one of Diana’s nymphs and sworn to chastity and Diana’s assault on Sylvia’s affections for the shepherd Amyntas.

In Jean Cocteau’s 1946 film La Belle et la Bête it is Diana’s power which has transformed and imprisoned the beast.

In literature

In Shakespeare’s Pericles, Prince of Tyre Diana appears to Pericles in a vision, telling him to go to her temple and tell his story to her followers.

Diana is also used by Shakespeare in the famous play As You Like It to describe how Rosaline feels about marriage.

Diana is used by Shakespeare in Twelfth Night when Orsino compares Viola (in the guise of Cesario) to Diana. “Diana’s lip is not more smooth and rubious”

Speaking of his wife, Desdemona, Shakespeare’s Othello the Moor says, “Her name that was as fresh/As Dian[a]’s visage, is now begrim’d and black/As mine own face.”

There is also a reference to Diana in Shakespeare’s play Much Ado About Nothing where Hero is said to seem like ‘Dian in her orb’, in terms of her chastity.

In All’s Well That Ends Well Diana is seen again, not only as a figure in the play, but also where Helena makes multiple allusions such as, “Now, Dian, from thy altar do I fly…” and “…wish chastely and love dearly, that your Dian/was both herself and love…” The Steward also says, “…; Dian no queen of virgins,/ that would suffer her poor knight surprised, without/ rescue in the first assault or ransom afterward.” It can be assumed that ‘Dian’ simply a shortening of ‘Diana’ since later in the play when Parolles’ letter to Diana is read aloud it reads ‘Dian’.

The Goddess is also referenced indirectly in Shakespeare’s player A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The character Hippolyta states “And then the moon, like to a silver bow new bent in Heaven”. She refers to Diana, Goddesse of the moon, who is often depicted with a silver hunting bow. In the same play the character Hermia is told by the Duke Theseus that she must either wed the character Demetrius “Or on Diana’s alter to protest for aye austerity and sinle life”. He refers to her becoming a nun, with the Goddesse Diana having connotations of chastity.

In The Merchant of Venice Portia states “I will die as chaste as Diana, unless I be obtained by the manner of my father’s will”. (I.ii)

In Romeo & Juliet, Romeo describes Rosaline, saying that “She hath Dian’s wit”.

Carlos Fuentes’s novel entitled, Diana o la cazadora solitaria (Diana or the lone huntress), was based on The Goddess. Diana Soren was also a character that being described as having the same personality as the goddess.

In “The Knight’s Tale” in The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer, Emily prays to Diana to be spared from marriage to either of her admirers Arcite or Palomon.

In “To Science”, the sonnet by Edgar Allan Poe, science “dragged Driana from her car” (9).

In language

Pomona (left, symbolizing agriculture), and Diana (symbolizing commerce) as building decoration

Both the Romanian word for “fairy”, Zână and the Leonese word for “water nymph”, xana, seem to come from the name of Diana.

In Arts

Diana had become one of the most popular theme of arts. Painters like Titian, Peter Paul Rubens, François Boucher, Nicholas Poussin had made her as a major theme. Most of stories that being exposed are the stories of Diana with Actaeon, story of Callisto, and when she rested after hunting. Some famous work of arts with Diana theme are :

  • Diana and Actaeon, Diana and Callisto, and Death of Actaeon by Titian.
  • Diana and Callisto, Diana Resting After Bath, and Diana Getting Out of Bath by François Boucher.
  • Diana Bathing With Her Nymphs by Rembrandt.
  • Diana and Endymion by Poussin.
  • Diana and Callisto, Diana and Her Nymph Departing From Hunt, Diana and Her Nymphs Surprised By A Faun by Rubens.
  • Diana and Endymion by Johann Micheal Rottmayr.
  • The famous fountain at Palace of Caserta, Italy, created by Paolo Persico, Brunelli, Pietro Solari told a story about when Diana being surprised by Acteon.
  • A sculpture by Christophe-Gabriel Allegrain could be seen at the Musée du Louvre.
  • A sculptural mascot on the Diana car manufactured by the Diana Motors Company.

In Beaux Arts

Beaux Arts architecture and garden design (late 19th and early 20th centuries) used classic references in a modernized form. Two of the most popular of the period were of Pomona (goddess of orchards) as a metaphor for Agriculture, and Diana, representing Commerce, which is a perpetual hunt for advantage and profits.

In Parma at the convent of San Paolo, Antonio Allegri da Correggio painted the camera of the Abbess Giovanna Piacenza’s apartment. He was commissioned in 1519 to paint the ceiling and mantel of the fireplace. On the mantel he painted an image of Diana riding in a chariot pulled possibly by a stag.

In Film

Diana/Artemis appears at the end of the ‘Pastoral Symphony’ segment of ‘Fantasia’.

In his 1968 film La Mariée était en noir François Truffaut plays on this mythological symbol. Julie Kohler, played by Jeanne Moreau, poses as Diana/Artemis for the artist Fergus. This choice seems fitting for Julie, a character beset by revenge, of which Fergus becomes the fourth victim. She poses with a bow and arrow, wearing white.

Other

  • In the funeral oration of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997, her brother drew an analogy between the ancient goddess of hunting and his sister – ‘the most hunted person of the modern age’.
  • William Moulton Marston used the Diana myth as a basis for Wonder Woman.
  • For the album art of Progressive metal band Protest the Hero’s second studio album Fortress, Diana is depicted, protected by rams and other animals. The theme of Diana is carried throughout the album.

 

“Hail Diana”

Hail Artemis Diana
Blessed Lady of the Beasts
I dedicate myself to You

May my path honor Thee
May my spirit celebrate Thee
May my life force magnify Thee

These things I pray
Be fulfilled this day
Goddess Mother help me
To know what is right.”
– Goddess Prayers and Invocations

Research on the Goddess Diana

Part 2

Diana . . . The Roman Goddess was known by many names including Queen of Heaven; the Great Goddess; Lunar Virgin; Mother of Animals; Lady of Wild Creatures; and the Huntress. Diana as the Roman Moon-Goddess was originally worshipped on the mountain Tifata near Capua and in sacred forests. Later she was given a temple in the working-class area on the Aventine Hill where she was mainly worshipped by the lower class (plebeians) and the slaves, of whom she was the patroness. She is often depicted carrying a bow and arrow and wearing animal skins or accompanied by animals.

When the Greek city of Ephesus fell to Roman rule, Goddess Diana was merged with the Greek Goddess Artemis. This is most likely due to the fact that around the time of the Roman empire, Romans would allow the places they over took to continue worshipping their own Gods and Goddesses, incorporating those Goddesses into the Roman Pantheon. Artemis and Diana were worshipped at the same times historically and when the Great Greek Temple of Artemis was destroyed the Romans rebuilt it in honor of Diana and the myth of Goddess Diana of Ephesus began.

Stories of Goddess Diana are told form the beginning of Troy to the Christian Bible of King James in the scriptures of Acts and the gospels of Paul.

Ephesians.”

The multi-breasted statue of Diana at Her Temple in Ephesus displayed her capability to nourish all creatures and provide for them. Worshippers adored Goddess Diana so much that the only way the Christians could rid the people of their Goddess was by assimilating her into their new religion. Thus Ephesus became a place of Mary, Mother of God. The church even invented stories of Mary living at Ephesus and being entombed there.

In Babylonia, and in the nation of Assyria, she was known as “ISHTAR” The Phoenicians called her “ASTARTE”. The Israelites knew her as “ASHTORETH”.

Diana was also the goddess of the Latin commonwealth where She rule with Her brother Lucifer. Lucifer being a Latin word for “Light Bringer”.

In Italy the old religion of Stergheria embraced goddess Diana as Queen of the Witches. Witches being the wise women healers of the time. Goddess Diana created the world of her own being having in herself the seeds of all creation yet to come. It is said that out of herself she divided into the darkness and the light, keeping for herself the darkness of creation and creating her brother Lucifer, the light. Goddess Diana loved and ruled with her brother Lucifer, the god of the Sun and Moon.
As time went on, the Earth was created and Diana descended to Earth, as did her brother Lucifer. Diana taught magick and witches were born. One night using witchcraft in the form of a cat, His most beloved animal, Diana tricked Lucifer. She gained entrance to His chamber where She seduced Him. From this union a daughter was born. Goddess Aradia.
In other versions of this myth we find the similarities the Christain tales take as their own in attempts to dispel the Goddess.
The first being, Lucifer who is so proud of his beauty, and who for his pride is driven from the Paradise of Goddess as is the tale of Lucifer falling from Gods grace.
The second being Goddess Diana also sends Her daughter Aradia to live as a mortal and save the misfortunate people of Earth as does God send His son Jesus to live as a mortal and save the people.

As pagans my sisters, Goddess Diana is the eternal Mother of all creation, the first that is and the last that will be. She is the Huntress of the forest seeking means of survival. She is the call of the wild, the beating heart of the forests, the animal spirit within, urging us to remember our origins. She awakens nature within us that we remember to feel the rustling wind through our hair, to hear the howling of a wolf or the echo of a voice in the forest. Goddess Diana calls to us to let our animal essence out and hone our inherent sensibilities. Dance and sing to the moon, run until our heart pounds to the top of a hill, to take a swim in a creek, roll around in the grass as we once did as a children, or just gaze upon the stars in wonderment; knowing all the while that Goddess Diana is within us, sharing sharing our journey.

As with the Christian invasion into the old religion , we too are told as women what is right and wrong. We are told what is the correct thinking to blend into a society that denies us our truth. Not tonight my sisters, tonight we pray to the Goddess Diana that you never forget the wonders of creation, the joy of being alive, and the importance of being a woman. Tonight we pray to Goddess Diana to be filled with Her strength to survive the challenges that would steal our dreams. under Her Full Moon we are alive in Her reflection. As a Circle of women we pray to Goddess Diana to grants us development and change within ourselves. As we embrace Her energy that is the vibrations of the universe that lives within us let the hunt begin. Let us seek out and tame the resources that is the beast and the forest of our lives. As goddess Diana let us be the huntress of our path. Tonight as women we say “Great is the Goddess Diana and Great is the Goddess in Me”.

Research on the Goddess Diana

Part 3

Ode to Diana

I am Diana

Know me

I have many names, many faces

You know me as the Queen of Heaven, The Huntress, Lady of the Wild Creatures, Lunar Virgin, Daughter of the Moon,

My name has been Ishtar, Astarte, Artemis, Ashtoreth.

I am mother to Aradia. Sister to Lucifer. Daughter of Zeus, most high.

You will find me in Tifata, nearCapua.

My temple is atEphesus, before the time of others that stole.

My temple is in your heart.

My name is your name.

My life is your life, our hearts beat as one.

I am Diana

Celebrate me

When I am a maiden on Ostara, call me by name…

Diana, Aphrodite, Arianrhod, Venus, Cybele, Freya, and Rhiannon.

When I am the mother on Litha, call me by name…

Amaterasu, Hestia, Juno, and Sunna

When I am the Crone on Samhain, call me by name…

Hecate, Inanna, Machi, Mari, Ishtar and Lilith.

Call me down when the moon shines full.

Embrace me when the moon is dark.

Caress me when the moon waxes and wanes.

I am Diana

Honor me

In the night sky as the Great She Bear.

In the phases of the moon,

In nature, the beauty of a sunrise

The mystery of the moon rise.

Speak to me at dawn, at noon when the sun’s heat warms your face

Whisper to me at dusk when purple fingers of nights stain the sky

Sing to me at midnight as you dance beneath my silvery luminescence.

Light a white candle and I am there

Use jasmine and breathe in my spirit.

Place a moonstone in your pocket and I walk with you.

Carry me within your heart and we shall be together

Always.

Written by Ladyhawke. Copyright 2008

Diana in prayer, magic and divination.

Hail Diana

Hail Artemis Diana
Blessed Lady of the Beasts
I dedicate myself to You

May my path honor Thee
May my spirit celebrate Thee
May my life force magnify Thee

These things I pray
Be fulfilled this day
Goddess Mother help me
to know what is right

~ Abby Willowroot © 1999

 

The Goddess Bastet

The Goddess Bastet

 

Bastet is the name commonly used by scholars today to refer to a feline goddess of Ancient Egyptian religion who was worshipped at least since the Second Dynasty. Her name is also spelled Bast, Baast, Ubasti and Baset.

Name in hieroglyphs
W1 t B1
Major cult center Bubastis
Symbol the cat, the lioness, the sistrum
Parents Ra, Atum

Bastet, the form of the name which is most commonly adopted by Egyptologists today, is only a modern convention, which offers one possible reconstruction. In early Egyptian, her name appears to have been bȝstt, where ȝ represents an aleph. In Egyptian writing, the second t marks a feminine ending, but was not usually pronounced, and the aleph ȝ may have moved to a position before the accented syllable, as witnessed by the Aramaic spelling ȝbst.By the first millennium, then, bȝstt would have been something like ‘obest’ or ‘ubesti’ in Egyptian speech.

The town of Bastet’s cult (see below) was known in Greek as Boubastis (Βούβαστις). The Hebrew rendering of the name for this town is Pî-beset (“House of Bastet”), spelled without Vortonsilbe.

What the name of the goddess means remains uncertain. One recent suggestion by Stephen Quirke (Ancient Egyptian Religion) explains it as meaning “She of the ointment jar”. This ties in with the observation that her name was written with the hieroglyph “ointment jar” (bȝs) and that she was associated with protective ointments, among other things.

From the third millennium BC, when Bastet begins to appear in our record, she is depicted as either a fierce lioness or a

Originally she was viewed as the protector goddess of Lower Egypt. As protector, she was seen as defender of the pharaoh, and consequently of the later chief male deity, Ra, who was also a solar deity, gaining her the titles Lady of Flame and Eye of Ra.

Her role in the pantheon became diminished as Sekhmet, a similar lioness war deity, became more dominant in the unified culture of Lower and Upper Egypt

In the first millennium BC, when domesticated cats were popularly kept as pets, Bastet began to be represented as a woman with the head of a cat and ultimately emerged as the Egyptian cat-goddess par excellence. In the Middle Kingdom, the domestic cat appeared as Bastet’s sacred animal and after the New Kingdom she was depicted as a woman with the head of a cat or a lioness, carrying a sacred rattle and a box or basket.

History and Connection To Other Gods

Cats in ancient Egypt were revered highly, partly due to their ability to combat vermin such as mice, rats – which threatened key food supplies – and snakes, especially cobras. Cats of royalty were, in some instances, known to be dressed in golden jewelry and were allowed to eat from their owners’ plates. Turner and Bateson estimate that during the Twenty-second dynasty c.945-715 BC, Bastet worship changed to being a major cat deity (as opposed to a lioness deity). With the unification of the two Egypts, many similar deities were merged into one or the other, the significance of Bast and Sekhmet, to the regional cultures that merged, resulted in a retention of both, necessitating a change to one or the other. During later dynasties, Bast was assigned a lesser role in the pantheon, but retained.

In the temple at Per-Bast some cats were found to have been mummified and buried, many next to their owners. More than 300,000 mummified cats were discovered when Bast’s temple at Per-Bast was excavated. The main source of information about the Bast cult comes from Herodotus who visited Bubastis around 450 BC during the heyday of the cult. He equated Bastet with the Greek Goddess Artemis. He wrote extensively about the cult. Turner and Bateson suggest that the status of the cat was roughly equivalent to that of the cow in modern India. The death of a cat might leave a family in great mourning and those who could would have them embalmed or buried in cat cemeteries – pointing to the great prevalence of the cult of Bastet. Extensive burials of cat remains were found not only at Bubastis, but also at Beni Hasan and Saqqara. In 1888, a farmer uncovered a plot of many hundreds of thousands of cats in Beni Hasan.

The lioness represented the war goddess and protector of both lands. As the fierce lion god Maahes of Nubia later became part of Egyptian mythology, during the time of the New Kingdom, Bastet was held to be the daughter of Amun Ra, a newly ascending deity in the Egyptian pantheon during that late dynasty. Bastet became identified as his mother in the Lower Egypt, near the delta. Similarly the fierce lioness war goddess Sekhmet, became identified as the mother of Maashes in the Upper Egypt.

As divine mother, and more especially as protector, for Lower Egypt, Bastet became strongly associated with Wadjet, the patron goddess of Lower Egypt. She eventually became Wadjet-Bast, paralleling the similar pair of patron (Nekhbet) and lioness protector (Sekhmet) for Upper Egypt.

Later perception

Later scribes sometimes renamed her Bastet, a variation on Bast consisting of an additional feminine suffix to the one already present, thought to have been added to emphasize pronunciation; perhaps it is a diminutive name applied as she receded in the ascendancy of Sekhmet in the Egyptian pantheon. Since Bastet literally meant, (female) of the ointment jar, Her name was related with the lavish jars in which Egyptians stored their perfume. Bast thus gradually became regarded as the goddess of perfumes, earning the title, perfumed protector. In connection with this, when Anubis became the god of embalming, Bast, as goddess of ointment, came to be regarded as his wife. The association of Bastet as mother of Anubis, was broken years later when Anubis became identified as the son of Nephthys.

Lower Egypt’s loss in the wars between Upper and Lower Egypt led to a decrease in the ferocity of Bast. Thus, by the Middle Kingdom she came to be regarded as a domestic cat rather than a lioness. Occasionally, however, she was depicted holding a lioness mask, hinting at her potential ferocity.

Because domestic cats tend to be tender and protective of their offspring, Bast also was regarded as a good mother, and she was sometimes depicted with numerous kittens. Consequently, a woman who wanted children sometimes wore an amulet showing the goddess with kittens, the number of which indicated her own desired number of children.

Eventually, her position as patron and protector of Lower Egypt led to her being identified with the more substantial goddess Mut, whose cult had risen to power with that of Amun, and eventually being syncretized with her as Mut-Wadjet-Bast. Shortly after, in the constantly evolving pantheon, Mut also absorbed the identities of the Sekhmet-Nekhbet pairing as well.

This merging of identities of similar goddesses has led to considerable confusion, leading to some attributing to Bastet the title Mistress of the Sistrum (more properly belonging to Hathor, who had become thought of as an aspect of the later emerging Isis, as had Mut), and the Greek idea of her as a lunar goddess (more properly an attribute of Mut) rather than the solar deity she was. The native Egyptian rulers were replaced by Greeks during an occupation of Egypt that lasted almost five hundred years. These new rulers adopted many Egyptian beliefs and customs, but always “interpreted” them in relation to their Greek culture. These associations sought to link the antiquity of Egyptian culture to the newer Greek culture, thereby lending parallel roots and a sense of continuity. Indeed, much confusion occurred with subsequent generations; the identity of Bast slowly merged among the Greeks during their occupation of Egypt, who sometimes named her Ailuros (Greek for cat), thinking of Bast as a version of Artemis, their own moon goddess. Thus, to fit their own cosmology, to the Greeks Bast is thought of as the sister of Horus, whom they identified as Apollo (Artemis’ brother), and consequently, the daughter of the later emerging deities, Isis and Ra. Roman occupation of Egypt followed in 30 BC, and their pantheon of deities also was identified with the Greek interpretations of the Ancient Egyptians. The introduction of Christianity and Muslim beliefs followed as well, and by the sixth century AD only a few vestiges of Ancient Egyptian religious beliefs remained, although the cult of Isis had spread to the ends of the Roman Empire.

Dear Lady Bast
Shining, bright one
Goddess of Egypt
Deity of the moon
And Patroness of cats and women.
Guide me,
Bless me,
Light up my life with your divine intervention.
So mote it be.

The ritual of Bast

Begin the ritual with a breathing exercise to relax the participants and enliven their energy. Now light the anointed candles which stand before the goddess. Next, construct a cone of power. The cone is a travelling one, and the participants must visualize it leaving this world, travelling through space back in time to ancient Egypt, and alighting in the desert.

The visualizer now takes over, and says:

Step out of the cone and into the desert. Feel the warmth of the sun on your skin and the burning heat of the sand beneath your feet. In the distance you can see a vast temple rearing up to meet the sky. Begin to walk towards the temple, noting anything that you see on the way. As you draw closer you pass by an oasis pool surrounded by tall palm trees. Lionesses doze in the shade of the trees and as you pass by they lift their heads as if to grant you passage into the temple.

Walk on, past the lionesses, towards the temple. As you get closer you begin to realize what a massive structure it is. It is constructed of vast columns, which are intricately carved with symbols and hieroglyphs. Ahead of you there is a wide sandstone path leading up to the main entrance, which is flanked by two huge obelisks. These are constructed of rough golden sandstone and are so tall that they seem to reach up to the sky. Walk up the path and amongst the columns. Once you are in their shade the air feels cool and refreshing. It seems like a haven from the relentless heat of the desert. You can smell a strong fragrance of cut blooms on the air and the subtler scent of exotic musky incense.

You find that you are standing in the outer courtyard of the temple. There are trees cultivated here and in the centre you can see a large circular pool. This pool reflects the burning gold of the sun in the daytime and the silver light of the moon by night for these are both aspects of the Goddess. There are temple staff around you, all going about their duties. Many of them smile at you in greeting but none approach you. It is as if you are expected here.

At the back of the courtyard you can see a huge doorway which leads to the outer shrine. Walk towards it. Either side of this great doorway you can see that the walls are carved with pictures of cat headed people and seated cats. You can reach out and run your hand over the warm stone. Feel the contours of the carvings beneath your fingers.

Step inside the shrine now. The room is dimly lit, let your eyes adjust after the bright sunlight outside. After a moment you can see that before you stand a statue of a great cat carved from smooth, black stone. It wears thick gold earrings and an ornately crafted collar of faience. At its feet lie offerings left by visitors to the temple. You can see many flowers and perfume jars, as well as statues and figurines. Priests and priestesses are in the shrine, tending a multi­tude of cats. The air around you is full of the music of the cats; their purrs and cries. Pause to pay your respect to the sacred cat of Bast, and then walk on down a corridor to your right.

You are making your way towards the inner sanctum of Bast down a short corridor lit with flickering lamps and candles. At the far end the corridor opens out into a vast room lined by pillars. At the other end of the room, so huge that it fills your vision, is a flight of golden steps that leads up to an immense golden statue of the goddess. She is depicted as a beautiful cat-headed woman. She wears heavy jewellery at her ears and throat and is swathed in a robe carved from gold. In her hand she carries a golden sistrum, her sacred rattle, and at her feet are tiny golden kittens. The steps below her are covered in cats, sleeping, grooming, playing. The room is full of soft but lively music, played by priestesses on flutes and drums and rattles. Other priests and priestesses dance sinuously to the music, like cats themselves. The floor is covered in petals and as you walk upon them, they release their heady fragrance. Approach the foot of the stairs and raise your arms.

The visualizer shakes a sistrum three times. The charge-reader says:

Oh, Bast, lady of Asheru,

ruler of Sekhet-Neter,

Ruler of the divine field, lady of Ankhtawy, Life of the two lands,

We, your priestesses call to you.

Hear our prayers.

We come before you in love.

We come before you in peace.

We come before you in joy.

And ask that we might speak with you.

May your essence enter into the statue before us.

And become your living body in this world.

Dwell here in gentleness, Bast,

And let your blessings be upon us.

The whole group shake their sistra, conjuring the Heka ofBast to enter the statue, both in the visualization and in the statue at home.

Concentrate on this happening. When you feel a change in the energy of the room let the shaking die away. (A group may need a few attempts before they sense energy in unison but it will happen with practice.)

The visualizer resumes:

Now visualize that the statue before you begins to comealive. The eyes become the living eyes of a cat, and gradually the gold turns to furry skin. The kittens at her feet begin to play and the folds of her dress flow softly. The goddess begins to descend the stairs towards you, her eyes full of benevolence and peace.

While this is happening, you must cast your inner eye back to the room where your statue of the goddess stands before the anointed candles. Imagine that the light of these candles shines into the statue, which is like an extension of the senses of Bast in the temple. Through the light of these candles, Bast can see your soul, and recognizes you.

The visualizer shakes the rattles. The charge-reader says:

Oh, Bast, queen of all cats, Daughter of Ra,

We bring offerings to you

As symbols of our love and respect.

We offer food to the great goddess in the temple of Bast.

We offer drink to the cat of the heavens.

We offer incense to the gentle cat.

We offer love to the daughter of Ra.

Now burn some incense and eat the feast, but leave a small portion of each item you eat for Bast. These morsels should be pIaced in a separate dish. The feast can be shared with any cats that are present. Pass round a goblet of wine (which can be refilled as often as you like), each person present splashing a little of it over the other offerings in the dish. Try to imagine that you are still in the temple rather than at home; the visualization has not ended. After this has been done, place the dish of offerings on the altar before the statue. Now close your eyes and make yourself comfort able to return to the visualization.

The visualizer shakes the sistrum three times, and says:

See the temple clearly once more around you.

Bast is standing before us, enjoying the offerings we have given her.

The visualizer shakes the sistrum three times again. The charge-reader says:

Oh Bast. daughter of Ra. Divine cat, lady of all magic,

Accept our offerings for they are given in love.

Grant to us our desires and come to our aid.

Reach out to us with gentle hands,

And let your blessing be upon your priestesses.

So it is spoken, so it is done.

Each member of the group now visualizes clearly in pictures exactly what he or she wants from Bast. Imagine yourself as happy, carefree, loved and loving, but show it in pictures rather than words. After an appropriate time, the visualizer shakes the sistrum and the charge-reader says:

Oh Bast, queen of cats, Lady of laue and pleasure,

We offer you our humble thanks for all that you have granted to us.

Continue to share with us your strength and your fire.

Lend us your understanding, show us your wisdom.

Give us the courage to be all that we may be

And the ability to know ourselves as you know us.

May we take with us from this temple a feeling of peace that will be with us in the days and weeks to come.

May we feel enlivened and liberated from all care.

May you strengthen this sisterhood,

With love, unity and grace.

We ask this in your name, Bast, Lady of Ankhtawy, lady of Asheru,

Ruler of the divine field,

Ruler of Sekhet-Neter.

Continue the visualization for a few moments. It is time for all present to commune privately with the goddess. She may have. knowledge to bestow or gifts to impart. She may take you to other parts of the temple, or elsewhere in her realm. You may meet other people or gods. After an appropriate time, the visualizer shakes the rattles, and the charge-reader says:

Oh, Bast, we thank you for this audience.

We go from your temple with your presence in ourhearts.

We are your priestesses and will do all in our power

To protect your children on this earth.

When we make love, we will do so as an offering to you.

When we partake of delicious food and drink, we will do so as an offering to you.

When we dance, we will do so as an offering to you.

When we sing, we will do so as an offering to you.

We give you our love and our gratitude,

Be forever in our hearts, Bast, even when we here present are apart.

The visualizer resumes:

Now bow to the goddess, and see her begin to retreat up the stairs. When she reaches the top she assumes her normal position and turns back into a sleeping statue of gold. When you are ready, bid farewell to the priests and priestesses, and to all the cats. Walk back down the corridor again. In the outer shrine it is time to have a few thoughts for your own cats. Perhaps you may like to ask for Bast’s protection for them. You can also ask for her blessing for any other loved ones. When you have finished bow your head to the statue to show your thanks and continue on out of the temple. Make your way back through the outer courtyard and out of the huge entrance again. You can see the cone of power shining in the distance. Walk towards it, past the oasis pool and the lionesses. Once you reach it step inside and sit back down.

The person designated to construct the cone now brings it back to present space and time, and dismantles it. When this is done, he or she says, ‘When you are ready, open your eyes.’

After the ritual

Once everyone has opened their eyes, it is a good idea for them to talk about their experiences. Some people might feel that their visu alizations are too personal to discuss at that time, and this must be respected. In our group, we always tape the results of a working, and type it up afterwards as a permanent record. You may like to make a note of your experiences in your magical diary.

After the discussion, we always enter party mode. The first thing we do is dance for Bast. We play our favourite songs and usually sing to them – badly, it has to be said, but we are sure Bast does not mind that! On many ritual nights we have sat up drinking wine and talking until dawn. These are special nights, and everyone should enjoy them as they see fit.

The remains of the feast should be cast out over a garden or some other appropriate spot. During the following days, many of us also like to make some kind of donation to a charity associated with cats, whether in cash or simply a can of cat food in one of the many charity dump bins in pet stores.

This rite can be adapted for use as a simple ‘thanks’ ritual. Instead of asking Bast for her help, the time in the ritual apportioned for requesting boons can be spent simply thanking the goddess for past help and for her presence in our lives. We think it is as important to do this as any potent ritual to improve a situationor create opportunities. The aid of the gods should never be taken for granted.

 

 

Now visualize that the statue before you begins to comealive. The eyes become the living eyes of a cat, and gradually the gold turns to furry skin. The kittens at her feet begin to play and the folds of her dress flow softly. The goddess begins to descend the stairs towards you, her eyes full of benevolence and peace.

While this is happening, you must cast your inner eye back to the room where your statue of the goddess stands before the anointed candles. Imagine that the light of these candles shines into the statue, which is like an extension of the senses of Bast in the temple. Through the light of these candles, Bast can see your soul, and recognizes you.

The visualizer shakes the rattles. The charge-reader says:

Oh, Bast, queen of all cats, Daughter of Ra,

We bring offerings to you

As symbols of our love and respect.

We offer food to the great goddess in the temple of Bast.

We offer drink to the cat of the heavens.

We offer incense to the gentle cat.

We offer love to the daughter of Ra.

Now burn some incense and eat the feast, but leave a small portion of each item you eat for Bast. These morsels should be pIaced in a separate dish. The feast can be shared with any cats that are present. Pass round a goblet of wine (which can be refilled as often as you like), each person present splashing a little of it over the other offerings in the dish. Try to imagine that you are still in the temple rather than at home; the visualization has not ended. After this has been done, place the dish of offerings on the altar before the statue. Now close your eyes and make yourself comfort able to return to the visualization.

The visualizer shakes the sistrum three times, and says:

See the temple clearly once more around you.

Bast is standing before us, enjoying the offerings we have given her.

The visualizer shakes the sistrum three times again. The charge-reader says:

Oh Bast. daughter of Ra. Divine cat, lady of all magic,

Accept our offerings for they are given in love.

Grant to us our desires and come to our aid.

Reach out to us with gentle hands,

And let your blessing be upon your priestesses.

So it is spoken, so it is done.

Each member of the group now visualizes clearly in pictures exactly what he or she wants from Bast. Imagine yourself as happy, carefree, loved and loving, but show it in pictures rather than words. After an appropriate time, the visualizer shakes the sistrum and the charge-reader says:

Oh Bast, queen of cats, Lady of laue and pleasure,

We offer you our humble thanks for all that you have granted to us.

Continue to share with us your strength and your fire.

Lend us your understanding, show us your wisdom.

Give us the courage to be all that we may be

And the ability to know ourselves as you know us.

May we take with us from this temple a feeling of peace that will be with us in the days and weeks to come.

May we feel enlivened and liberated from all care.

May you strengthen this sisterhood,

With love, unity and grace.

We ask this in your name, Bast, Lady of Ankhtawy, lady of Asheru,

Ruler of the divine field,

Ruler of Sekhet-Neter.

Continue the visualization for a few moments. It is time for all present to commune privately with the goddess. She may have. knowledge to bestow or gifts to impart. She may take you to other parts of the temple, or elsewhere in her realm. You may meet other people or gods. After an appropriate time, the visualizer shakes the rattles, and the charge-reader says:

Oh, Bast, we thank you for this audience.

We go from your temple with your presence in ourhearts.

We are your priestesses and will do all in our power

To protect your children on this earth.

When we make love, we will do so as an offering to you.

When we partake of delicious food and drink, we will do so as an offering to you.

When we dance, we will do so as an offering to you.

When we sing, we will do so as an offering to you.

We give you our love and our gratitude,

Be forever in our hearts, Bast, even when we here present are apart.

The visualizer resumes:

Now bow to the goddess, and see her begin to retreat up the stairs. When she reaches the top she assumes her normal position and turns back into a sleeping statue of gold. When you are ready, bid farewell to the priests and priestesses, and to all the cats. Walk back down the corridor again. In the outer shrine it is time to have a few thoughts for your own cats. Perhaps you may like to ask for Bast’s protection for them. You can also ask for her blessing for any other loved ones. When you have finished bow your head to the statue to show your thanks and continue on out of the temple. Make your way back through the outer courtyard and out of the huge entrance again. You can see the cone of power shining in the distance. Walk towards it, past the oasis pool and the lionesses. Once you reach it step inside and sit back down.

The person designated to construct the cone now brings it back to present space and time, and dismantles it. When this is done, he or she says, ‘When you are ready, open your eyes.’

After the ritual

Once everyone has opened their eyes, it is a good idea for them to talk about their experiences. Some people might feel that their visu alizations are too personal to discuss at that time, and this must be respected. In our group, we always tape the results of a working, and type it up afterwards as a permanent record. You may like to make a note of your experiences in your magical diary.

After the discussion, we always enter party mode. The first thing we do is dance for Bast. We play our favourite songs and usually sing to them – badly, it has to be said, but we are sure Bast does not mind that! On many ritual nights we have sat up drinking wine and talking until dawn. These are special nights, and everyone should enjoy them as they see fit.

The remains of the feast should be cast out over a garden or some other appropriate spot. During the following days, many of us also like to make some kind of donation to a charity associated with cats, whether in cash or simply a can of cat food in one of the many charity dump bins in pet stores.

This rite can be adapted for use as a simple ‘thanks’ ritual. Instead of asking Bast for her help, the time in the ritual apportioned for requesting boons can be spent simply thanking the goddess for past help and for her presence in our lives. We think it is as important to do this as any potent ritual to improve a situation or create opportunities. The aid of the gods should never be taken for granted.

 

Homage to Bast

 

Oh Bast, Lady of Aheru, ruler of Sekhet-neter

 

Lady of Ankhtawy, ruler of the Divine Field

 

Life of the Two lands

 

We call to you.

 

Hear us and awaken to our presence.

 

Bast, you are beauty, health and gentleness.

 

You comfort those who are made mad by the moon,

 

When you walk at their side in the shadow lands.

 

You, oh lady, are of the gods who protect this world.

 

Thunder and lightning strike the skies,

 

But you return in glory with your father, the sun.

 

You can blast and you can forgive

 

You can punish and you can reward

 

You can grant sunshine unto children

 

You can grant moonshine unto lovers

 

You have died and yet you live.

 

It is whispered that if one man or woman should believe in your power

 

You can hearken to the prayers of all the world. Hear us, oh Bast,

 

You can twist the skein and weave the thread of destiny.

 

You are sacred and beautiful, a lady of music.

 

You are lustrous and all-powerful,

 

And the world rides upon the arch of your back.

 

You are venerated and called the Lady of the East.

 

Bast the divine, ruler of the night, goddess of love, Infinite, all-wise and all-knowing.

 

Grant blessings unto us who follows in your ways.

 

Great cat, who is the cat of the heavens,

 

Grant to us our desires.

 

Be favourable unto us.

 

From Sekhem Heka written by Storm Constantine

 

The Goddess Artemis – Goddess Of The Hunt

The Goddess Artemis – Goddess Of The Hunt

Artemis was one of the most widely venerated of the Ancient Greek deities. Some scholars believe that the name, and indeed the goddess herself, was originally pre-Greek. Homer refers to her as Artemis Agrotera, Potnia Theron “Artemis of the wildland, Mistress of Animals”. In the classical period of Greek mythology, Artemis (Greek: (nominative) Ἄρτεμις, (genitive) Ἀρτέμιδος) was often described as the daughter of Zeus and Leto, and the twin sister of Apollo. She was the Hellenic goddess of the hunt, wild animals, wilderness, childbirth, virginity and young girls, bringing and relieving disease in women; she often was depicted as a huntress carrying a bow and arrows. The deer and the cypress were sacred to her. In later Hellenistic times, she even assumed the ancient role of Eileithyia in aiding childbirth.

Artemis later became identified with Selene, a Titaness who was a Greek moon goddess, sometimes depicted with a crescent moon above her head. She was also identified with the Roman goddess Diana, with the Etruscan goddess Artume, and with the Greek or Carian goddess Hecate.

Artemis in mythology

Birth

Various conflicting accounts are given in Classical Greek mythology of the birth of Artemis and her twin brother, Apollo. All accounts agree, however, that she was the daughter of Zeus and Leto and that she was the twin sister of Apollo.

An account by Callimachus has it that Hera forbade Leto to give birth on either terra firma (the mainland) or on an island. Hera was angry with Zeus, her husband, because he had impregnated Leto. But the island of Delos (or Ortygia in the Homeric Hymn to Artemis) disobeyed Hera, and Leto gave birth there.

In ancient Cretan history Leto was worshipped at Phaistos and in Cretan mythology Leto gave birth to Apollo and Artemis at the islands known today as the Paximadia.

A scholium of Servius on Aeneid iii. 72 accounts for the island’s archaic name Ortygia by asserting that Zeus transformed Leto into a quail (ortux) in order to prevent Hera from finding out his infidelity, and Kenneth McLeish suggested further that in quail form Leto would have given birth with as few birth-pains as a mother quail suffers when it lays an egg.

The myths also differ as to whether Artemis was born first, or Apollo. Most stories depict Artemis as born first, becoming her mother’s mid-wife upon the birth of her brother Apollo.

Childhood

 

Roman marble Bust of Artemis after Kephisodotos (Musei Capitolini), Rome

The childhood of Artemis is not fully related in any surviving myth. The Iliad reduced the figure of the dread goddess to that of a girl, who, having been thrashed by Hera, climbs weeping into the lap of Zeus. A poem of Callimachus to the goddess “who amuses herself on mountains with archery” imagines some charming vignettes: according to Callimachus, at three years old, Artemis, while sitting on the knee of her father, Zeus, asked him to grant her six wishes: to remain always a virgin; to have many names to set her apart from her brother Apollo; to be the Phaesporia or Light Bringer; to have a bow and arrow and a knee-length tunic so that she could hunt; to have sixty “daughters of Okeanos”, all nine years of age, to be her choir; and for twenty Amnisides Nymphs as handmaidens to watch her dogs and bow while she rested. She wished for no city dedicated to her, but to rule the mountains, and for the ability to help women in the pains of childbirth.

Artemis believed that she had been chosen by the Fates to be a midwife, particularly since she had assisted her mother in the delivery of her twin brother, Apollo. All of her companions remained virgins and Artemis guarded her own chastity closely. Her symbols included the golden bow and arrow, the hunting dog, the stag, and the moon. Callimachus tells how Artemis spent her girlhood seeking out the things that she would need to be a huntress, how she obtained her bow and arrows from the isle of Lipara, where Hephaestus and the Cyclops worked. Okeanus’ daughters were filled with fear, but the young Artemis bravely approached and asked for bow and arrows. Callimachus then tells how Artemis visited Pan, the god of forest and he gave her seven bitches and six dogs. She then captured six golden-horned deer to pull her chariot. Artemis practiced with her bow first by shooting at trees and then at wild beasts.

Wooing the Goddess

As a young virgin, Artemis had interested many gods and men, but none of them successfully won her heart, except her hunting companion Orion, who was then accidentally killed either by the goddess herself or by Gaia.

Alpheus, a river god, was in love with Artemis, but he realized that nothing he could do would win her heart. So he decided to capture her. Artemis who was with her companions at Letrenoi, went to Alpheus, but suspicious of his motives, she covered her face with mud so the river god would not recognize her. Another story involving the god is the story where he tried to rape Artemis’ attendant Arethusa. The goddess felt pity for her and saved her by transforming Arethusa into a spring in Artemis’ temple, Artemis Alphaea in Letrini, where the goddess and her attendant drink.

Bouphagos, the son of the Titan Iapetos, saw Artemis and had a thought of raping her. Detecting his sinful thoughts Artemis struck him at Mount Pholoe.

Sipriotes was a boy who, either because he accidentally saw Artemis bathing or attempted to rape her, was turned into a girl by the goddess.

Actaeon

Artemis was once bathing in a vale on Mount Cithaeron, when the Theban hunter Actaeon stumbled across her. Enraged, Artemis turned him into a stag and, not knowing their own owner, Actaeon’s own dogs killed him.

Adonis

In some versions of the story of Adonis, who was a late addition to Greek mythology during the Hellenistic period, Artemis sent a wild boar to kill Adonis as punishment for his hubristic boast that he was a better hunter than she.

In other versions, Artemis killed Adonis for revenge. In later myths, Adonis had been related as a favorite of Aphrodite, and Aphrodite was responsible for the death of Hippolytus, who had been a favorite of Artemis. Therefore, Artemis killed Adonis to avenge Hippolytus’s death.

In yet another version, Adonis was not killed by Artemis, but by Ares, as punishment for being with Aphrodite.

Orion

Orion was a hunting companion of the goddess Artemis. In some versions of his story he was killed by Artemis, while in others he was killed by a scorpion sent by Gaia. In some versions, Orion tried to seduce Opis, one of her followers, and she killed him. In a version by Aratus, Orion took hold of Artemis’ robe and she killed him in self-defense. In yet another version, Apollo sent the scorpion. According to Hyginus Artemis once loved Orion (in spite of the late source, this version appears to be a rare remnant of her as the pre-Olympian goddess, who took consorts, as Eos did), but was tricked into killing him by her brother Apollo, who was “protective” of his sister’s maidenhood.

The Aloadae

These twin sons of Iphidemia and Poseidon, Otos and Ephialtes, grew enormously at a young age. They were aggressive, great hunters, and could not be killed unless they killed each other. The growth of the Aloadae never stopped, and they boasted that as soon as they could reach heaven, they would kidnap Artemis and Hera and take them as wives. The gods were afraid of them, except for Artemis who captured a fine deer (or in another version of the story, she changed herself into a doe) and jumped out between them. The Aloadae threw their spears and so mistakenly killed each other.

Callisto

Callisto was the daughter of Lycaon, King of Arcadia and also was one of Artemis’s hunting attendants. As a companion of Artemis, she took a vow of chastity. Zeus appeared to her disguised as Artemis, or in some stories Apollo, gained her confidence, then took advantage of her (or raped her, according to Ovid). As a result of this encounter she conceived a son, Arcas. Enraged, Hera or Artemis (some accounts say both) changed her into a bear. Arcas almost killed the bear, but Zeus stopped him just in time. Out of pity, Zeus placed Callisto the bear into the heavens, thus the origin of Callisto the Bear as a constellation. Some stories say that he placed both Arcas and Callisto into the heavens as bears, forming the Ursa Minor and Ursa Major constellations.

Iphigenia and the Taurian Artemis

Artemis punished Agamemnon after he killed a sacred stag in a sacred grove and boasted that he was a better hunter than the goddess. When the Greek fleet was preparing at Aulis to depart for Troy to begin the Trojan War, Artemis becalmed the winds. The seer Calchas advised Agamemnon that the only way to appease Artemis was to sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia. Artemis then snatched Iphigenia from the altar and substituted a deer. Various myths have been told around what happened after Artemis took her. Either she was brought to Tauros and led the priests there, or became Artemis’ immortal companion.

Niobe

A Queen of Thebes and wife of Amphion, Niobe boasted of her superiority to Leto because while she had fourteen children (Niobids), seven boys and seven girls, Leto had only one of each. When Artemis and Apollo heard this impiety, Apollo killed her sons as they practiced athletics, and Artemis shot her daughters, who died instantly without a sound. Apollo and Artemis used poisoned arrows to kill them, though according to some versions two of the Niobids were spared, one boy and one girl. Amphion, at the sight of his dead sons, killed himself. A devastated Niobe and her remaining children were turned to stone by Artemis as they wept. The gods themselves entombed them.

Chione

Chione was a princess of Pokis. She was beloved by two gods, Hermes and Apollo, and boasted that she was prettier than Artemis because she made two gods fall in love with her at once. Artemis was furious and killed Chione with her arrow or struck her dumb by shooting off her tongue. However, some versions of this myth say Apollo and Hermes protected her from Artemis’ wrath.

Atalanta, Oeneus and the Meleagrids

Artemis saved the infant Atalanta from dying of exposure after her father abandoned her. She sent a female bear to suckle the baby, who was then raised by hunters. But she later sent a bear to hurt Atalanta because people said Atalanta was a better hunter. This is in some stories.

Among other adventures, Atalanta participated in the hunt for the Calydonian Boar, which Artemis had sent to destroy Calydon because King Oeneus had forgotten her at the harvest sacrifices. In the hunt, Atalanta drew the first blood, and was awarded the prize of the skin. She hung it in a sacred grove at Tegea as a dedication to Artemis.

Meleager was a hero of Aetolia. King Oeneus had him gather heroes from all over Greece to hunt the Calydonian Boar. After the death of Meleager, Artemis turned his grieving sisters, the Meleagrids into guineafowl that Artemis loved very much.

Aura

In Nonnus’ Dionysiaca, Aura was Greek goddess of breezes and cool air, daughter of Lelantos and Periboia. She was a virgin huntress, just like Artemis, and proud of her maidenhood. One day, she claimed that Artemis’ body was too womanly and she doubted her virginity. Artemis asked for Nemesis’ help to avenge her dignity and caused the rape of Aura by Dionysus. Aura became a mad and dangerous killer. When she bore twin sons, she ate one of them while the other one, Iakhos, was saved by Artemis. Iakhos later became an attendant of Demeter and the leader of Eleusinian Mysteries.

Trojan War

Artemis may have been represented as a supporter of Troy because her brother Apollo was the patron god of the city and she herself was widely worshipped in western Anatolia in historical times. In the Iliad she came to blows with Hera, when the divine allies of the Greeks and Trojans engaged each other in conflict. Hera struck Artemis on the ears with her own quiver, causing the arrows to fall out. As Artemis fled crying to Zeus, Leto gathered up the bow and arrows.

Artemis played quite a large part in this war. Like her mother and brother, who was widely worshiped at Troy, Artemis took the side of the Trojans. At the Greek’s journey to Troy, Artemis becalmed the sea and stopped the journey until an oracle came and said they could win the goddess’ heart by sacrificing Iphigenia, Agamemnon’s daughter. Agamemnon once promised the goddess he would sacrifice the dearest thing to him, which was Iphigenia, but broke the promise. Other sources said he boasted about his hunting ability and provoked the goddess’ anger. Artemis saved Iphigenia because of her bravery. In some versions of the myth, Artemis made Iphigenia her attendant or turned her into Hecate, goddess of night, witchcraft, and the underworld.

Aeneas was helped by Artemis, Leto, and Apollo. Apollo found him wounded by Diomedes and lifted him to heaven. There, the three of them secretly healed him in a great chamber.

Worship of Artemis

Artemis, the goddess of forests and hills, was worshipped throughout ancient Greece. Her best known cults were on the island of Delos (her birthplace); in Attica at Brauron and Mounikhia (near Piraeus); in Sparta. She was often depicted in paintings and statues in a forest setting, carrying a bow and arrows, and accompanied by a deer.

The ancient Spartans used to sacrifice to her as one of their patron goddesses before starting a new military campaign.

Athenian festivals in honor of Artemis included Elaphebolia, Mounikhia, Kharisteria, and Brauronia. The festival of Artemis Orthia was observed in Sparta.

Pre-pubescent Athenian girls and young Athenian girls approaching marriageable age were sent to the sanctuary of Artemis at Brauron to serve the Goddess for one year. During this time the girls were known as arktoi, or little she-bears. A myth explaining this servitude relates that a bear had formed the habit of regularly visiting the town of Brauron, and the people there fed it, so that over time the bear became tame. A young girl teased the bear, and, in some versions of the myth it killed her, while in other versions it clawed her eyes out. Either way, the girl’s brothers killed the bear, and Artemis was enraged. She demanded that young girls “act the bear” at her sanctuary in atonement for the bear’s death.

Virginal Artemis was worshipped as a fertility/childbirth goddess in some places, assimilating Ilithyia, since, according to some myths, she assisted her mother in the delivery of her twin. During the Classical period in Athens, she was identified with Hecate. Artemis also assimilated Caryatis (Carya).

Epithets

As Aeginaea, she was worshiped in Sparta; the name means either huntress of chamois, or the wielder of the javelin (αιγανέα). She was worshipped at Naupactus as Aetole; in her temple in that town there was a statue of white marble representing her throwing a javelin. This “Aetolian Artemis” would not have been introduced at Naupactus, anciently a place of Ozolian Locris, until it was awarded to the Aetolians by Philip II of Macedon. Strabo records another precinct of “Aetolian Artemos” at the head of the Adriatic. As Agoraea she was the protector of the agora. As Agrotera, she was especially associated as the patron goddess of hunters. In Elis she was worshiped as Alphaea. In Athens Artemis was often associated with the local Aeginian goddess, Aphaea. As Potnia Theron, she was the patron of wild animals; Homer used this title. As Kourotrophos, she was the nurse of youths. As Locheia, she was the goddess of childbirth and midwives. She was sometimes known as Cynthia, from her birthplace on Mount Cynthus on Delos, or Amarynthia from a festival in her honor originally held at Amarynthus in Euboea. She was sometimes identified by the name Phoebe, the feminine form of her brother Apollo’s solar epithet Phoebus.

Festivals

Artemis was born at the sixth day, the reason why it was sacred for her.
  • Festival of Artemis in Brauron, where girls aged not more than 10 and not less than 5 dressed in saffron robes played the bear to appease the goddess after the plagued she sent when her bear was killed.
  • Festival of Amarysia is a celebration to worship Artemis Amarysia in Attica. In 2007, a team of Swiss and Greek archaeologists found the ruin of Artemis Amarysia Temple, at Euboea, Greece.
  • Festival of Artemis Saronia, a festival to celebrate Artemis in Trozeinos, a town in Argolis. A king named Saron built a sanctuary for the goddess after the goddess saved his life when he went on hunting and swept by the wave and held a festival for her.
  • At the 16 of Metageitnio (second month on Athenian calendar), people sacrifice to Artemis and Hecate at deme of Erchia.
  • Kharisteria Festival on 6 of Boidromion (third month) to celebrate the victory of Marathon and also known as the Athenian “Thanksgiving”.
  • Day six of Elaphobolia (ninth month) festival of Artemis the Deer Huntress where she was offered cakes shaped like stags, made from dough, honey and sesame-seeds.
  • Day 6 of 16 of Mounikhion (tenth month) a celebration of her as the goddess of nature and animal. A goat was being sacrificed to her.
  • Day 6 of Thargelion (eleventh month) the ‘birthday’ of the goddess, while the seventh was Apollo’s.
  • A festival for Artemis Diktynna (of the net) in Hypsous.
  • Laphria, a festival for Artemis in Patrai. The procession started by setting the logs of wood around the altar, each of them sixteen cubits long. On the altar, within the circle, is placed the driest of their wood. Just before the time of the festival, they construct a smooth ascent to the altar, piling earth upon the altar steps. The festival begins with a most splendid procession in honor of Artemis, and the maiden officiating as priestess rides last in the procession upon a car yoked to deer. It is, however, not until the next day that the sacrifice is offered.
  • In Orchomenus, a sanctuary was built for Artemis Hymnia where her festival was celebrated every year.

Attributes

  • Bow and arrow
According to the Homeric Hymn to Artemis, she had golden bow and arrows, as her epithet was Khryselakatos, “of the Golden Shaft”, and Iokheira (Showered by Arrows). The arrows of Artemis could also to bring sudden death and disease to girls and women. Artemis got her bow and arrow for the first time from The Kyklopes, as the one she asked from her father. The bow of Artemis also became the witness of Callisto’s oath of her virginity. In later cult, the bow became the symbol of waxing moon.[42]
  • Chariots

Artemis’ chariot was made of gold and was pulled by four golden horned deer (Elaphoi Khrysokeroi). The bridles of her chariot were also made of gold.

  • Spears, nets, and lyre

Although quite seldom, Artemis is sometimes portrayed with a hunting spear. Her cult in Aetolia, the Artemis Aetolian, showed her with a hunting spear. The description about Artemis’ spear can be found in Ovid’s Metamorphosis, while Artemis with a fishing connected with her cult as a patron goddess of fishing.

As a goddess of maiden dances and songs, Artemis is often portrayed with a lyre.

Fauna

  • Deer

Deer were the only animals held sacred to Artemis herself. On seeing a deer larger than a bull with horns shining, she fell in love with these creatures and held them sacred. Deer were also the first animals she captured. She caught five golden horned deer called Elaphoi Khrysokeroi and harnessed them to her chariot. The third labour of Heracles, commanded by Eurystheus, consisted in catching the Cerynitian Hind alive. Heracles begged Artemis for forgiveness and promised to return it alive. Artemis forgave him but targeted Eurystheus for her wrath.

  • Hunting dog

Artemis got her hunting dogs from Pan in the forest of Arcadia. Pan gave Artemis two black-and-white dogs, three reddish ones, and one spotted one – these dogs were able to hunt even lions. Pan also gave Atemis seven bitches of the finest Arcadian race. However, Artemis only ever brought seven dogs hunting with her at any one time.

  • Boar

The boar is one of the favorite animals of the hunters, and also hard to tame. In honor of Artemis’ skill, they sacrificed it to her. Oineus and Adonis were both killed by Artemis’ boar.

  • Bear

The sacrifice of a bear for Artemis started from the Brauron cult. Every year, a little girl age not more than ten and less than five sent to Artemis’ temple at Brauron. Arktos e Brauroniois, a text by, Suidas, a Byzantine writer, told a legend about a bear that was tamed by Artemis, and introduced to people of Athens. They touched it and played with it, until one day a group of young girls poked the bear which became furious and attacked the girls. One of the girls’ brother found out what had happened and killed the bear so Artemis sent a plague in revenge. The Athenians consulted an oracle to understand how to end the plague. The oracle suggested that, in payment for the bear’s blood, every young Athenian virgin should not be allowed to marry until she had served Artemis in her temple (‘played the bear for the goddess’).

  • Guinea fowl

Artemis felt pity for the Meleagrids as they mourned for their lost brother, Meleagor, so she transformed them into Guinea Fowl to be her favorite animals.

  • Buzzard hawk

Hawks were the favored birds of many of the gods, Artemis included.

Flora

Palm and Cypress were issued to be her birth place. Other plants sacred to Artemis are Amaranth and Asphodel.

Artemis as the Lady of Ephesus

 
At Ephesus in Ionia, Turkey, her temple became one of the Seven Wonders of the World. It was probably the best known center of her worship except for Delos. There the Lady whom the Ionians associated with Artemis through interpretatio graeca was worshiped primarily as a mother goddess, akin to the Phrygian goddess Cybele, in an ancient sanctuary where her cult image depicted the “Lady of Ephesus” adorned with multiple rounded breast like protuberances on her chest. They had been traditionally interpreted as multiple accessory breasts, or as sacrificed bull testes, as some newer scholars claimed, until excavation at the site of the Artemision in 1987-88 identified the multitude of tear-shaped amber beads that had adorned her ancient wooden xoanon. In Acts of the Apostles, Ephesian metalsmiths who felt threatened by Saint Paul’s preaching of Christianity, jealously rioted in her defense, shouting “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” Only one of 121 columns still stand in Ephesus. The rest were used for making churches, roads, and forts.

Artemis, light-footed maiden, child of great Zeus
and blessed Leto, sharp-eyed one whose aim never fails.
Luminous Artemis, sure-stepping huntress,
graceful one who takes joy in dance and in contests,
ruthless protector of children and young women,
kind one to whom mothers turn in their travail.
Artemis, deer-slayer, guardian of untamed life,
I pray to you. Dark-eyed mistress of animals,
in thick-grown woods and sun-soaked fields we know you,
in the maddening chase, in the fire in our lungs,
in skill and precision, in the body’s memory;
grant me understanding of such chaste passion.

 
 
 

The Goddess Is Alive

Goddess Comments & Graphics
THE GODDESS IS ALIVE
              
Moon shines down upon a sea of Light,
Shifting sands lay singing in the Heart of the Night.
I looked upon a scene that gripped me to the core,
White-clad maidens below were dancing on the shore.
  
Sweet sounds slipped from moon-lit throats,
Wind whipped hair abound,
Lit by the light within and without,
The Women circled ’round.
  
As I stood, water engulfed my feet,
My body swayed to your Heavenly Heart beat.
Wind and wave and fire light,
Paled in my mind Earthly delight.
  
Time slipped by me as you held your embrace,
And windblown spray covered my face.
Protected deep within your Womb,
I could feel the tender pain of Life’s bloom.
 
Candles flared high as the Dance progressed,
Deep inside with a healing touch you blessed.
All around, wind, wave and fire shouted of your life,
Your light speared deep within, soothing my strife.
 
Divine Mother, Goddess of Light,
To you I come seeking protection from the night.
Come home to shelter within your arm,
Surrounded by Love, hidden from harm.

Holy Mother, Queen of Heaven and Earth,
From you we all trace our Birth.
Heavenly Goddess, light from above,
Shine down upon us, we pray for your Love.   ~Magickal Graphics~

Charge of the Dark Goddess

Goddess Comments & Graphics

The Dark Goddess speaks to us, through the mouths of Lilith, Kali, Tiamat, Hecate, the Black Maddonna, Nemesis, and Morgaine.

I am the Darkness behind and beneath the shadows. I am the absence of air that awaits at the bottom of every breath. I am the ending before life begins again, the decay that fertilizes the living. I am the Bottomless Pit, the never-ending struggle to reclaim that which is denied. I am the Key that unlocks every door. I am the Glory of Discovery, for I am that which is hidden, secluded, and forbidden.

Come to me at the Dark Moon and see that which can not be seen, face terror that is yours alone. Swim in the blackest ocean to the center of your greatest fears–the Dark God and I will keep you safe. Scream to us in terror and yours will be the Power of Forebear. Think of me when you feel pleasure, and I will intensify it, until the time I can have the greatest pleasure of meeting you at the crossroads between the roads.

~Magickal Graphics~

The Crone

 The Crone

Posted byPatrick McCleary
 
In my third and final installment covering the aspects of the Goddess, we turn to the Crone. Ancient Hag of the boundless wisdom. I hope that you enjoyed the last two sections.
Charge of the Crone

Come closer my grandchildren sit at my feet and hear my words. Let me tell you the story of my life and the lessons I have learned. Know that I am the Darksome terrible Goddess, but I only bring terror to those who do not understand.

I am Hecate, the Crossroads. I am Morganna, Raven of Battles. I am the widow descending to the Underworld to find my lost husband and my future son. And I am the womb that they are born from.

Know that at lifes end I will be waiting for you; to guide you through death and into rebirth. And that I will be there at birth to guide you through birth into life.

To truly taste life is to worship me. For Magick and art are my domains and my greatest lesson is love itself. So let there be compassion in your anger, power in your humbleness and mirth balanced against discipline.

Yet remember that if you seek to remove my veil and see my true face you have only to look within for I am always with you from the beginning to the end.

AspectsWho is the Crone? She is the one who, wrapped in mystery, brings the wisdom that is key to unlock the ancient mysteries. She is blunt and sometimes harsh but that is only because she has learned the value of unfettered honesty. The end of her life draws near and she has no time to indulge people in their illusions. She can be turned to when the world has baffled you, because she has lived a long life and more likely then not she has already solved the puzzle that faces you.See her face in the dark of the Moon and the cool night shadows and look within to know that she has always been with you from birth through death. She is the tomb that is the womb that leads from death into the rebirth and new life.

The Crone goddess of the Welsh was Cerridwen. A shape-shifting goddess of divination and enchantment. Her cauldron is a symbol of death and of life. It represents the womb and the tomb through which we have all passed and will pass again.

Her cauldron can contain the elixir of immortality that allows us to pass through death and into rebirth to live again. It may also contain the waters of Knowledge. Which would make it the Grail that Arthur seeked so long for. For a king of the Celts ruled by the will of the Goddess.

The ancient race of the Slavs worshipped a Goddess called Baba Yaga. She is the old crone that guards the Water of Life and Death. She is oftentimes represented as the wild untamed forces of nature but as we know the storm brings the water of life allowing for rebirth.

Her symbols are the birch tree, the tree of beginnings and endings. She was also known as the White Lady as she is stiff and white and carved of bone

 
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The Mother

The Mother 

Posted byPatrick McCleary

In my continuing series on teaching the different aspects of the Gods to kids, here is the section on the Mother aspect.
 
Rede of the Mother

Listen close and hearken to my words:

I who am Demeter, giver of fruitfulness and abundance; I who am Arianrhod, the Turner of the Heavenly Wheel; I who am Selene, Queen of the Starlit Heavens and Goddess of the Moon; I who am Hera, Goddess of the Hearth.

As I am the Goddess of the Moon. I am the bringer of change in your life. And although you may not see the wisdom, all I do is done for the betterment of each and every one of my children. But fear not for I am also Hera, Goddess of the Unchanging Hearth and I bring that growing power to each of your ventures, if they follow the Rede.

But also remember that for each of these gifts that I offer you, you must in turn spread your gifts to the people around you. Be a light in the world to show the way of love and the way of peace and passivity. But do not think that I counsel you to let yourself be trodden upon. Stand firm in your beliefs and for your rights. Yet do this while remaining calm and loving. And I assure you that if enough of you do this then it will spread like all wondrous things will and the world will be united in peace and love.

Let each person lead their own lives. yet counsel in love if you see them doing harm to themselves or others. Also lead by example. Live these words and others will follow. For do not actions speak louder than words?

I give you all my blessings and shower you in my Love. Blessed Be!

AspectsThe Mother is an aspect of the Goddess that at first glance seems self-explanatory. The Mother is the mother right? While she is that nurturing force, she is also self-sacrifice personified. But not self-sacrifice for its sake, rather she will sacrifice her needs and desires and even herself for her children and those she loves.As the Maiden was the Virgin, so has the Mother commited herself to her lover and to her children. Now that she is grown older she can no longer worry only about today and how she is affected, for she has brought new life into the world and she carries that responsibility.

She is the gateway to life and the womb that grows the seed. She is the Moon and the Earth and the controller of tides. She is universal love and the path to peace.

Demeter as the Goddess of grain and fertility was an important deity to the ancient Greeks. She was the mother of Persephone who was also called Kore. And in that story we see the dedication found in this aspect. She never stopped seeking for her lost daughter and when she found her she braved all things, even death, to rescue her.

Before her marriage to Zeus, Hera was called the Queen of Heaven because she ruled over the heavens and the earth and was responsible for every aspect of existence, including the seasons and the weather. She was also known as Juno in the Roman pantheon, the Goddess of weddings. Her sacred animals were the peacock and the cow. The cow symbolizing Hera’s watchfulness over her children and the peacock symbolizes her beauty and immortality. She has been called upon in olden days to bless and protect a woman’s marriage. Bringing fertility and protection for her children

 
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The Maiden

The Maiden 

Posted byPatrick McCleary

One of the most often questions from my youngest is about the Goddess and God. So I sat down and wrote up some poems and guidelines to help explain the different aspects of Them. Today I figured I would share with you the work I did on the Maiden. Hope that you enjoy.

Song of the Maiden

Hear the words of the Maiden:

I who am La Primavera, The Springtime. I who am the promise of Life and the hope for immortality. The one who from beneath my dancing feet spring flowers. I who am the Virgin, untameable. Robed in white, pure and untouched by the world’s strife.

I bid you to be merry in all you do. When you make love be sure to think of me for your little deaths are a chance for the beginnings of a little life. And at every birth think of me. For whether boy or girl I am also born there.

Every drop of rain is a blessing falling from my lips, so rejoice in the falling rain. I represent life unbridled, untamed. So I bid thee remember to be unashamed to sing or dance when the mood takes thee.

For every dance and every song is but an expression of the Song of Creation and the Dance of the Creatrix.

Count thy blessings every day and let not sadness take thee for every ending and misfortune leads to a new beginning and greater fortune. There is no room for sadness in the worship of Me.

Also remember not to fear the night for after every night there comes a new dawn. And I promise tht if ye look careful you can see me arrayed in clours wondrous on every morn at the rise of the Sun.

Specific Goddesses

This is the aspect of the Goddess pertaining to Youth and Innocence. She is the Eternal Virgin but not in the patriacharchal sense of a woman before sex or marriage but in the older sense of the word, a woman that belongs only to herself.

The Maiden aspect has many lessons for us. To love without bounds, to view the world through the eyes of innocence and to live in the moment. Through her we learn mercy and compassion. She is also a goddess of passion and gracefulness.

But as much as the Maiden lives in the now, she does not forget her duties. Nor does she let her innocence allow her to be taken advantage of. She is the Huntress, the Warrior Queen as much as she is the Midwife and the Gardener.

There are many Goddesses that fall into this aspect. One example is Artemis who was born after a short and painless labor. After her birth she then turned around and became midwife and nurturer to her Mother, Leto, and helped her mother to give birth to her own twin brother Apollo. Because of this Artemis became the Goddess of childbirth, the protector of children, and the goddess who listened most closely to the appeals of women. This Goddess’ association with the wilderness around us, symbolized her own untamed nature. Because of her independence she became the best huntress of the Gods. She was also often depicted carrying a torch to light the way for others, leading them through territories yet uncharted.

There is also the Goddess Kuan Yin who’s story best tells us about her. In her youth she was Miao Shan a maiden that wanted to become a Buddhist nun but was forbidden to do so by her Father. He tried to have her married off and when she refused he sent soldiers to kill her. She was saved by a tiger but then descended into the Land of the Dead and freed the souls in bondage there. Rose again and was greeted by Buddha himself who sent her into hiding on the isle of P’u T’o Shan where she reached enlightenment. Yet her suffering had taught her mercy and compassion so that she stopped short and turned back with the pledge to save mankind. That she would not reach enlightenment until everyone else before her reached there.

 
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Hecate: Goddess of the Witches, Our Dark Mother

Hecate: Goddess of the Witches, Our Dark Mother
By: Granny Moon, HPS, Order of the White Moon
 
Kindly old Grandmother, The Crone, a woman of wisdom, Our Dark Mother, she of many names and guises. Goddess of the Crossroads, Queen of the Witches, the Dark Goddess, The TripleGoddess. The protectress of the flocks and the sailors, she is invoked as the bestower of wealth and favor. These are but a few of the names by which she is known. She has been with us from the beginning.
 
Hecate is the oldest Greek tri-form Goddess. She is at the same time the three-phased Moon, and, in particular, it’s dark phase. She is the Dark Mother, or Crone aspect and a major deity of the Dianic tradition. In the Greek pantheon, Hecate Tri-form is known as Artemis, Persephone and Hecate. Hecate is sometimes seen as the third aspect of the Trinity Persephone/Demeter/ Hecate for it is Hecate who leads Demeter to her daughter. She is a “dark” Goddess, associated with magic and the night. She is often portrayed with 3 heads or with a 3 headed dog. She was worshipped mostly at crossroads where offerings were left for her – these offerings were known sometimes as “Hecate’s Suppers” – and were left there late at night on the eve of the Full Moon. The person leaving the food walked away without looking back, for fear of confronting the Goddess face to face. This was a way of honoring the threefold Goddess where one could look three ways at once. Other offerings included honey, dogs, black ewes and sometimes even humans. Some say she is not originally Greek, she has been classified as Thracian or as a Titan. She may also be linked to the Egyptian Goddess Heket.
 
She is a Goddess of the Moon, of the Underworld, and of Magick. She is also considered the protectress of flocks, sailors and of course, witches. Hecate is the protectress of far-away places, roads, and byways. She is considered the Goddess of The Crossroads. Statues of her stood at crossroads where travelers were faced with three choices. In latter-day paganism, Hecterions (a form of pillar) depict the Goddess with six arms, three torches and three sacred symbols: A Key, A Rope and A Dagger. With the Key to the underworld, Hecate unlocks the secrets of the occult mysteries and knowledge of afterlife. The Rope symbolizes the umbilical cord of rebirth and renewal and the Dagger or Athame is a symbol of ritual power.
 
Hecate belongs to the class of torch bearing deities, and carries a burning torch in accordance with the belief that she is the nocturnal Goddess of The Moon. A huntress, she knows her way into the realm of spirits. She is depicted wearing a gleaming headdress of stars. All the secret powers of nature are at her command. She has control over birth, life, and death. Her work includes the world of the dead (just a resting place of the dead), of the night and of the darkness. She is the Mistress of all the Witchcraft and Black Arts.
On her walks at night, Hecate has many accomplices. Her two black, ghostly dogs who have been sacrificed to her, (her priestesses Circe and Medea) are sometimes referred to as being her daughters. At night during the Dark Moon, the Goddess can be seen walking the roads ofGreece with her howling dogs and torches. The black howling dogs at night mean that Hecate is approaching. She and her dogs journey over the graves of the dead to search for souls of the departed and then carry them to refuge in the Underworld. She also haunts scenes of crimes as a Goddess of Expiation and Purification. She can be called on during the Dark of the Moon to banish or render justice.
 
The women who worshipped her often stained their palms and soles of their feet with henna. An adaptation of this ritual is held on Halloween or Hallowmas held on October 31, to honor Hecate at a time when the veil between the Worlds is the thinnest. In private worship her followers prepare and partake of Hecate’s suppers and the leftovers are to be placed outdoors as offerings to her and her hounds.
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Wishing you health, wealth and the magick of the Season!
 
About The Author: GrannyMoon is a High Priestess and Charter Council Member of The Order of the White Moon. Former staff member and student of the Esoteric Theological Seminary, attended LDS Seminary and is an ordained Metaphysical Interfaith minister with doctoral degrees in Theology and Divinity. Doula, Reiki Master and Lifetime Member of Herbal Healer Academy, Inc. Founder of Sisters of the Burning Branch, dedicated to the Feminine Divine and is currently taking students.

Atalanta

Atalanta

by Mia Gibson
Atalanta is the female athlete in Greek myth. It is unclear exactly where Atalanta comes from, some sources say that she came from Arcadia and was the daughter of Iasus and Clymene, but Hesiod and other sources attributes Atalanta’s origin to Boeotia where her father is Schoeneus. The contradiction over Atalanta’s birth contributes to the assumption that there were two maythic women that were merged into one person. 

Whoever Atalanta’s father was, he wanted a boy so bad that when Atalanta was born, he exposed her on a hill were she was suckled by a she bear, sent by Artemis, until a group of hunters found her and raised her to womanhood. Atalanta, like Artemis, loved to hunt.

Atalanta is best known for participation in male activities while at the same time having an aura of sexuality surrounding her. For example, some sources say that Atalanta was one of the Argonauts. Atalanta was even wounded in a battle with the Colchians and was healed by Medea, who was also on the voyage. But at the same time, other sources say that Jason refused to let Atalanta go on the voyage because she was a woman.

One male activity Atalanta definitely participated in was the Calydonian Boar Hunt. Other male members of the hunt objected to her presence, but consumed with lust, Meleagerinsisted that Atalanta be allowed to join. During the hunt, centaurs Hylaeus and Rhaecus tried to rape Atalanta. Atalanta killed both of them, thus the first bloodshed of the Calydonian Boar Hunt was human.

Atalanta shot the first arrow to pierce the boar. Because of this, Meleager gave Atalanta the boar’s pelt. This resulted in even more human bloodshed, Meleager’s two uncles protested to Atalanta receiving the pelt, so Meleager killed them. When Meleager’s mother heard that Meleager had killed her brothers, she threw an enchanted log on the fire, once the log finished burning Meleager would die.

After Atalanta’s success at the boar hunt, Atalanta’s father, Iasus or Schoeneus, was proud and claimed her as his daughter. Atalanta was reconciled with her father. Since Atalanta was now a princess, Iasus wanted Atalanta to marry. Atalanta had been warned not to marry by the Oracle. Atalanta came up with a witty plan that would stop her from having to marry. She would race the suitors, the one who beat her in the foot race would be the lucky man to marry her, but if she won, she could kill the man. Atalanta made the bargain knowing that no one could beat her. One day a racer, Melanion or to some sources Hippomenes, fell in love with Atalanta and wanted to marry her, but he knew he could not beat her so he called on Aphrodite, the love goddess, for assistance. Aphroditeprovided Melanion with three golden apples to entice Atalanta. During the race, whenever Atalanta would get ahead of Melanion, he would roll one of the golden apples forward, forcing a curious Atalanta to stop and pick the apple up. Atalanta’s frequent stops gave Melanion the advantage he needed and he won the race and Atalanta’s hand in marriage.

Once married, it seems that Atalanta could not contain her inhibitions any longer, for one day she allowed Melanion to seduce her in the temple of Zeus. Zeus was so angered that he turned them into lions. This was a fitting punishment because lions can not mate with each other.

Atalanta has a son named Parthenopaeus (son of a pierced maidenhead). Once again, there is a dispute as to who the father is. Some sources say that Atalanta had an affair with Meleagar, other sources attribute Parthenopaues to Ares or Melanion. Parthenpaoues was active in the war known as the Seven Against Thebes.

The Threefold Goddess

  The Threefold Goddess

 

     To understand the concept of Goddess requires more than the
ability to visualize God as a woman.  The Goddess concept is built
around the myth and mystery of the relationship between God and
Goddess, and beneath that, and part of it, Her Threefold Aspect …
Maiden, Mother and Crone.

     One of the oldest recognized Goddess forms is the first Greek
Goddess – Gaia, the Earth Mother; the Universal Womb; Mother of All.
The most ancient Goddesses were most often Earth and Mother Goddesses.
The were worshipped and revered as bearers of life … fat, healthy,
pregnant and fruitful. As the Goddess concept developed, then came the
Harvest Goddesses, who were also Earth Goddesses.  Understand that
this was a time when people did not even understand the basic
mechanics of procreation.  Life was very sacred and mystical indeed!

     Gradually, myth and mystery developed and revealed themselves,
creating the legend which we honor in the modern Wiccan Craft.

     We recognize the Goddess as the mother of all, including her
Mighty Consort, the God.  To Her he is Lover and Son, and together
they form the Ultimate, the Omniverse, the Dragon, the Mystery.

     Now that is a pretty tough concept all things considered.
Especially in our society as it sounds rather incestuous.  From a
mundane perspective, it gets worse as the Wheel of the Year Turns, and
the Oak and Holly Kings battle … eternal rivals and
sacrificial mates.

     In the pages that follow, we will explore the Goddess foundation
concepts and try to reach an understanding of the basis of the
Mystery.

     I don’t want to get off into all the names of all the Goddesses
in all the mythology in all of history.  While that is certainly a
noble endeavor, it is not the objective here.  What I do want to do is
look at the Goddess, in whole and in part, and see just who and what
she is.

     First and foremost, the Goddess is the symbol of the Cycle of
Everlasting.  She is constant, ever present, ever changing, and yet
always the same.  She could be compared in that respect to the oceans.

     As a part of that, she is that from which we have come, and to
which we will return.  She is the Universal Mother, the Cosmic Womb.
While those are largely symbolic images, as opposed to literal ones,
they are important to bear in mind about any aspect of the Goddess.
She never harms, she is Mother.

     One of the most difficult throwback mentalities to dispell in a
student is the difference between “dark and light” and “bad and good”.
Societally, and often religiously, we are trained to see bad and dark
and evil as being the same.  Hence, we are also taught to hate and
fear our own mortality.  All too often I see practicing Wiccans, who
ought to *know* better, fall back on these concepts when trying to
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explain or understand a concept.

     The Goddess is dark, she is light, she is birth, she is death,
and she rejoices in all things.  With death comes joy, for with death
comes renewal.  With life comes joy, for with life comes promise.
With growth comes joy for with growth comes wisdom.  Sorrow and fear
are not a part of her, not the way we feel those emotions.  She is
incapable of sorrow without joy, she fears nothing, because fear is
not real.  It is a creation of the mind.

     Whether you see the Goddess as a Warrior Queen, or like the Good
Witch of the North in the Wizard of Oz, she is the Goddess.  And she
has many parts and facets which defy comprehension as “One”.  She
simply IS, and in that, can be whatever you need her to be in order to
establish a relationship with her.  But none of that changes what she
IS.

     “I greet thee in the many names of the Threefold Goddess and her
Mighty Consort.  Athe, malkuth, ve-guburah, ve-gedulah, le-olam, Amen.
Blessed Be.”

      So here, at the Circle Door, greeted by the High Priest or
Priestess we first see mentioned the Threefold Goddess.  Full-sized
covens have three priestesses who take the specific roles of Maiden,
Mother and Crone, the High Priestess being Mother.

      The Threefold Goddess however is NOT three entities, she is one.
Her aspects represent Enchantment, Ripeness and Wisdom.

      Taking first things first is usually best, so we shall start
with a look at one side of the Maiden.

      Quoting “The Myth of the Goddess” as found in Gardenarian Wicca
(Gerald B. Gardner, The Meaning of Witchcraft, Aquarian Press, London,
1959.):

      Now Aradia had never loved, but she would solve all the
Mysteries, even the Mystery of Death; and so she journeyed to the
Nether Lands.

      The Guardians of the Portals challenged her, “Strip off thy
garments, lay aside thy jewels; for naught may ye bring with ye into
this our land.”

      So she laid down her garments and her jewels and was bound, as
were all who enter the Realms of Death the Mighty One.  Such was her
beauty that Death himself knelt and kissed her feet, saying, “Blessed by
thy feet that have brought thee in these ways.  Abide with me, let me
place my cold hand on thy heart.”  She replied “I love thee not.
Why dost thou cause all things that I love and take delight in to fade
and die?”

      “Lady,” replied Death, “it is Age and Fate, against which I am
helpless.  Age causes all things to wither, but when men die at the
end of time I give them rest and peace, and strength so that they may
return.  But thou, thou art lovely.  Return not; abide with me.”

      But she answered, “I love thee not.”
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      Then said Death, “An’ thou receive not my hand on thy heart
thou must receive Death’s scourge.”

      “It is Fate; better so”, she said, and she knelt, and Death
scourged her and she cried “I feel the pangs of love.”

      And Death said, “Blessed be” and gave her the Fivefold Kiss,
saying “Thus only may ye attain joy and knowledge.”

      And he taught her all the Mysteries.  And they loved and were
one, and he taught her all the Magicks.

      For there are three great events in the life of Man:  Love,
Death and Resurrection in a new body, and Magick controls them all.
For to fulfill love you must return again at the same time and place
as the loved one, and you must remember and love them again.  But to
be reborn you must die, and be ready for a new body; and to die you
must be born; and without love you may not be born.  And these be all
the Magicks.

     So there in the Gardnerian Myth of the Goddess we have her
Maiden aspect, seeking, searching and opening herself to the
mysteries.  But it is well to remember that the Goddess herself is a
mystery, and the primary gift of the Goddess is intuitive Wisdom.

     Beltaine (Bealtain) is the only Sabbat where the Goddess is
entirely devoted to the Maiden.  Here, she revels in the enchantment,
in the joy of coming into fullness and mating with the God.  Here, she
is maiden bride and we can most easily understand that facet of the
Maiden aspect.  I should probably note here that some see this
festival as maiden turning into mother, with the maiden being in full at
Candlemas, but I do not agree with that.

     Youth, newness, innocence and beauty are fundamental facets of
the Maiden aspect.  But beneath those are seeking, and love, and love of
seeking.  There is more to understand of the Maiden though.
Enchantment does not end with maidenhood, it is simply the beginning
of the Mystery of Life, for that, above all, is what the Goddess
stands for.

     In Circle, in the Balanced Universe, the Maiden takes her place
in the East.  In examining this most comfortable quarter, you learn
more about the Maiden Aspect.  East (Air) rules the free mind and
intellect.  It is the place to seek the ability to learn and to open
spiritually, to open your mind and find answers.  It is a masculine
quarter, ruled by intellect, and analytical logic, but she brings to
it an intuition which is required to use these to best advantage.

     “The river is flowing, flowing and growing, the river is flowing
back to the sea.  Mother carry me, a child I will always be.  Mother
carry me, back to the sea.”

     This Circle chant, sung in joy, sung in sorrow, is a cry to the
Mother Aspect for comfort and warmth, a power chant calling upon the
steady power and fullness of the Mother and a plea for guidance.
While the Earth Mother, and the fully aspected Goddess are placed
North in the Earth quarter, the Mother aspect alone belongs in the
west.
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     Comfort and love rule here.  Emotions, sorrow, joy, tears, these
belong to the ripeness of the Mother.  Caring and loving for all her
children, watching in pain and pride as they struggle to gain their
own, knowing full well she could reach out and do it for them, but
being both bound and desirous to let them do it for themselves.

     There is a considerable difference, as you might have interpreted
from the above, between the Earth Mother and the Mother Aspect of the
Goddess.  That is why we’ve started with her quarter, because it
reveals the limitations of the Aspect.

     The Mother aspect is ripeness, the ancient bearing of fruit,
child and grain.  She represents emotion and sexuality.  The Goddess
in that aspect is most of the altar (as discussed in the Great Rite
lesson.)  It is interesting to note the practice in numerous ancient
cultures of lovemaking or outright sex magick in cornfields to help
make the corn grow.

     The Dark Mother should also be placed here, although culturally, I
have a tendancy to think of the Dark Mother as more in keeping the
Crone Aspect.  It is a bit of work to see the Dark Mother in the West,
to separate Dark Mother from Crone, but it is worthwile.  If you have
any background with the tarot I would suggest you take it in that
context, it is beyond the scope of this text.

    Our exploration of the Goddess and her Aspects brings us now to
the Crone.  For me, the Crone is the most fascinating of the Aspects
of the Goddess.  Partly I suppose because she is the most mysterious
and paradoxical.

    “Blessed Goddess, old and wise, open mine, thy child’s, eyes.
Speak to me in whispered tones that I may know the rune of Crones.”

    With life and growth comes age and wisdom, and the Crone is this
in part.  She holds fire and power, which wisely used can be of great
benefit, but hold great danger for the unaware.  Hers are the secrets of
death and of life, and the mystery beyond the mystery.

    Part of the pleasure in knowing the Crone aspect is that while,
unlike the fully aspected Goddess, she is not also Maiden and Mother,
she does retain the experiences of both those Aspects in order to be
Crone.  The Crone, wizened though she is, must still be able to reach
into herself and recall the innocent joys and high passions of the
Maiden and the love and warmth of the Mother.  To be Crone and to not
have forgotten, to still be able to experience Maiden and Mother is,
to me, very appealing.  More importantly, to be comfortable in that
Aspect, where you have truth and knowledge but have left youth and
physical beauty behind, and to still _feel_ youth and beauty without
being desirous of them is an admirable quality.

    Crone is the least paralleled Aspect of the Goddess to our human
society.  We discard our old and wise, not understanding their value
as teachers and models, and fearing their appearance as a reminder of
our own mortality.

    Knowing Crone is a door we much each open for ourselves for to know
and love her is to cast aside a great many of our cultural and societal
malteachings.
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     While the individual Aspects of Threefold Goddess are certainly
valid concepts and paths to knowing Goddess, I should caution that most
mythological Goddess figures are composite Goddesses.  Earth Mother
Goddess figures are fully aspected Goddess by definition because they
represent the full cycle of the Wheel.  Most other Goddess figures can
be classified as having a dominant (or operative) aspect and recessive
(promised, or in some cases past) aspect.  Future and past should not be
taken literally, mythological Goddess figures are always whatever they
are eternally, they do not tend to change (ie age).

     Maiden Goddesses possessing their operative in the Huntress or
Warrior aspects most often have a promise of Crone. Maiden Goddesses
expressing their dominance in beauty and/or love usually have their
recessive aspect as Mother.  For example, Athena is a Maiden Goddess
with Crone attributes (the combination produces many Mother-type
qualities, and this results in the Crone aspected Maiden being the
most complete of the Mythological Goddesses, with the exception of
Earth Mother Goddesses.) Aphrodite is of course a Maiden Goddess with
Mother attributes.

     Similarly, Dark Mother Goddess figures mostly find their promise in
Crone and Light Mother figures their recessive in Maiden.   Crone
recessives work the same way, although sometimes it takes a bit of
close examination to find the “hidden” aspect.

     One should note that this is not a formula, rather a tool to
assist in examining and understanding Goddess figures and creating
one’s own personal spiritual link with Goddess.  It is also a useful
consideration when invoking a specific Goddess with purpose in ritual.
     The purpose of this course has been to open avenues of approach
in discovering and developing a relationship with Goddess.  For me
personally, I do not “believe” in the reality of mythological Goddess
figures as they were presented, but I do believe they are a valid way to
establish communication with Goddess.  I also believe Goddess will
appear in whatever form we are most ready to accept.  The real
Goddess, by my belief (and this is personal, not trad) is an entity
beyond my comprehension, perhaps composed of light (could 5000 sci-fi
films be wrong?), most assuredly unlike anything I could ever imagine in
true form.  However, I do find mythological Goddess figures highly
useful for ritual, and of some help in my personal relationship with
Goddess. I hope you will too.

What are Gods?

 
Many a hotly debated discussions have taken place over the years about what Gods are and whether it is important to believe in them as actual beings or if it is only necessary to understand that they represent psychopomps in our psyche that describe a part of ourselves or the world around us. There may never be a definitive answer found to this question, since each and every witch approaches the idea of the divine from a different point. To make one grand decision for everyone would be the height of hubris. Be that as it may, the Gods do hold power over and around us through both of these paths.
 
They can unlock the power that we hold within ourselves so that we can use it readily and easily by letting that aspect of ourselves be free. Additionally, they can exist in nature and the world around us to add more power to our own. What matters is that we ally ourselves wisely with those deities or archetypes that work best for us. If you are uncomfortable with a particular deity, trying to work with that one will most likely thwart what you are trying to accomplish.
 
Sometimes it is necessary to work through that discomfort, however. For example, many pagans and witches have difficulty working with the Christian God. There is great power, though, in being able to do so. When you learn how to deal with this discomfort, you have learned to stop letting it control you.
 
In the Craft, the state of mind that you do something in can have a large impact on the results of what you are attempting to do. A spell can be given a completely opposite direction to take if you do not focus on exactly what it is that you want and let yourself become distracted by other random thoughts. This is why clarity of mind and purpose is so necessary to witchcraft.

In a nutshell, Gods are whatever you believe them to be. Before you scream in frustration, take a deep breath and read on. Looking across the world’s religions, there are a whole host of beliefs about what Gods are. Christianity believes that there is one God, and only one God, all others being false idols, and that God is removed from the world, existing on high and watching us all.

Buddhism does not believe in Gods. Instead, they believe that a person can achieve enlightenment and cease their earthly existence and move on to something better. Many tribal religions revere more than one God, choosing instead to put the divine into the natural world and unexplained things and naming them Gods.

In my studies, I have found that there are five main beliefs that religions, or most of them, fall into; Atheism, Monotheism, Duothesim, Polythiesm, and Pantheism. Starting with the easiest, atheism is the belief that there is no God or that man himself is God. Some branches of Satanism fall into this category, as well as many pagans of varied “religious” beliefs, including some types of Wicca, that see the human as the pinnacle of existence, and most people who believe that there is no God, including man.

Monotheism, then, is the belief that there is one God, or the worship of one God despite recognizing the existence of others. Christianity, Judaism, and Islam all fall into this category, as do people who follow one particular God such as Gaia or Set. Closely related to Monotheism is the belief of Duotheism. A person who practices duothesim is a follower of two deities, most often a male-female pairing. Most Wiccans fall into this category or blend this with polytheism or pantheism.

Polytheism, as one might expect, is the worship of many Gods, each individual and separate. Tribal religions from around the world fall into this category as well as many pagans that are followers of the Norse paths. Finally, pantheism is the belief that all Gods are one God who has many faces so that man might understand the divine. Pantheism can also be expressed duotheistically by the belief that all Gods are one God and all Goddesses are one Goddess, both of whom wear many faces.

We still do not know, however, what Gods are. Within all of these categories, there are further subdivisions, most with no clear cut name, that allow a closer look at what gods are. The first group to look at is the people that believe that gods are literal entities. With this belief, worship is much more likely to be of an offertory nature, invoking the gods and asking them to intercede and help on the petitioner’s behalf. Most of the world’s dominant religions follow this belief, though they are scattered throughout the five types of theistic belief.

The second group believes that Gods may be literal entities, but they really aren’t sure and so they are not really going to worry about it, besides, who wants to offend a God if they’re wrong? For these people, worship is a little less offertory, though there are still offerings made. They tend to be more geared towards nature and the earth than any of the others, with the belief that the divine is in everything around them.

The second group believes that Gods may be literal entities, but they really aren’t sure and so they are not really going to worry about it, besides, who wants to offend a God if they’re wrong? For these people, worship is a little less offertory, though there are still offerings made. They tend to be more geared towards nature and the earth than any of the others, with the belief that the divine is in everything around them.

There are many other types of beliefs that are not covered here, as to what the Gods are or are not, but this give you, as a student, a place to start and discover for yourself what they mean to you and how you will interact with them. You may find, as you study and learn more, that your ideas of what the Gods are changes from time to time. This happens to almost everyone at one time or another, and is nothing to become distraught about. It is all a part of the riddle of the Gods, and they expect it.

 

Rhiannon

by Karen Davis

Rhiannon (her name is either “Maid of Annwn” or a variant of Rigatona, “Great Queen”), a version of the horse-goddess Epona and of sovereignity. She was mistress of the Singing Birds. She appeared to Pwyll, lord of Dyfed, as a beautiful woman in dazzling gold on a white horse. Pwyll sent his fastest horsmen after her, but could not catch her. On the third day, he spoke and she told him she wanted to marry instead of her espoused husband Gwawl. Pywll was to meet her in a year and a day.

He won her at the court of her father, Hefeydd the Old, by her aid. She bore Pwyll a son, who vanished. Her women killed a puppy and smeared its blood on her, to avoid blame at the child’s loss. As punishment, Rhiannon spent seven years telling her story to all comers and bearing them, like a horse, to the court.

The child, meanwhile, turned up at the court of Teyrnon, whose mares foaled on May eve and lost the foals mysteriously. When Teirnon kept watch, he saved a foal from a mysterious beast and also discovered, outside the stable, a child, whom he and his wife adopted. Then child grew to young manhood in seven years, and was given the foal rescued on the night he was found. Teirnon recognised the child as the son of Pwyll and returned him to his family, where he was named Pryderi(“worry”) by his mother.

Later, after Pwyll’s death, Rhiannon married Manawydan, brother of Bran and Branwen and son of Llyr, a great magician. One day, all of Dyfed turned into a wasteland, and only Rhiannon, Manawydan, Pryderi, and his wife Cigfa, were spared. Manawydan and Pryderi out hunting followed an enormous white boar into a caer, where Pryderi saw a golden bowl; when he touched it, he was enspelled. Rhiannon went after him and fell under the same spell the caer then vanished, taking them with it. She was rescued when Manawydan captured the wife of their enemy, Llwyd, who was taking revenge for the illtreatment of Gwawl.

Arianrhod

by Karen Davis

Arianrhod (“silver wheel”, thus, the moon), is one of the descendants of Don. She had two brothers, Gilfaethwy and Gwydion the sister of Math ap Mathonwy, whose quality was that he required a virgin’s lap to place his feet in, unless he was at war. When this virgin was raped, Math asked for a replacement, and Arianrhod volunteered. But when she stepped over his rod, she immediately gave birth to two children: a young boy and a blob. (This is likely because the word morwynmay mean either ‘virgin’ or ‘free young woman’, but it also indicates her divine status.)

Arianrhod

The boychild was named Dylan; he was a sea-being who returned to the waves. The blob was snatched up by Arianrhod’s brother Gwydion, who hid it in a chest until it grew into a baby. Arainrhod imposed three geases upon this boy: he would have no name unless she named him, he would bear no arms unless she armed him, and he would have no human woman to wife. Thus, Arianrhod denied him the three essential passages to manhood. Nevertheless, Gwydion raised the nameless boy, and one day Arianrhod spied a young boy killing a wren with a single flung stone. She called out that he was a bright lion with a sure hand, and thus he took that name: Llew Llaw Gyffes. Later, Gwydion faked an alarm, and tricked her into arming the boy.

Branwen

by Karen Davis

Branwen (“white raven”) a daughter of Llyr and Penarddun, and sister of Bran, and Manawydan, and half-sister of Nisien and Efnisien. Matholwch of Ireland sued for her hand, and gave horses to Bran. Efnisien mutilated the horses, nearly precipitating warfare, but Matholwch was appeased by the gift of a cauldron that could resurrect the dead. Branwen wed him, and went to Ireland, where she bore him a son, Gwern. But the Irish began to complain about their foreign queen, and she was banished to the kitchen, where she was a slave and boxed on the ears by the butcher daily. This lasted three years, during which Branwen trained a starling to speak and sent it to Wales, where it told Bran of her plight, and he sailed to rescue her.

Matholwch was terrified at the sight of a forest approaching Ireland across the sea: no one could make it out, until he called for Branwen, who explained it as Bran’s navy, and Bran himself wading through the water. He sued for peace, they built a house big enough for Bran, and Matholwch agreed to settle the kingdom on Gwern. Some Irish lords objected, and hid themselves in flour bags to attack the Welsh. But Efnisien, scenting Irish treachery, cast them into the fire, and then cast Gwern himself in (avoiding the geas against shedding kinsmen’s blood thereby). A war broke out, and the Irish replenished themselves through the cauldron. Efnisien, repenting, sacrificed himself by feigning death and being thrown into the cauldron, which he then broke, dying in the process. Only seven Welshmen survived, and Bran was fatally wounded. His head, which remained alive and talking, was returned to Wales and buried, and soon afterwards Branwen sailed to Aber Alaw and died. She is one of the three “matriarchs of Britain”, along with (probably) Rhiannon and Arianrhod.

Charge of the Star Goddess

Traditional, based partly on the “Charge of the Goddess”
by Charles Leland, Gerald Gardner, and Doreen Valiente.
 

Here ye the words of the Star Goddess; she in the dust of whose feet are the hosts of heaven, and whose body encircles the universe.

I who am the beauty of the green earth, the white moon among the stars, and the mystery of the waters call unto thy soul; arise and come unto me.

I am the soul of nature who gives life to the universe. From me all things proceed, and unto me all things must return. Before my face, beloved of gods and of me, let thine innermost divine self be enfolded in the rapture of the infinite.

Let my worship be within the heart that rejoices, for behold! All acts of love and pleasure are my rituals. Therefore, let there be beauty and strength, power and compassion, honor and humility, mirth and reverence within you.

To thou who thinkest to seek me, know that thy seeking and yearning shall avail thee not unless thou knowest the mystery. If that which thou seekest thou findest not within three, thou wilt never find it without.

For behold! I have been with thee from the beginning; and I am that which is attained at the end of desire.

Charge of the Dark God

Listen to the words of the Dark God, Who was of old called Dis, Hades, Osiris, Hunter, and Lord of Shadows.

I am the shadow that is cast by the sun in the brightest of days. I am the reminder of sudden mortality in the midst of joyous life. I am the black velvet night where dances the stars and the planets, time everlasting, unperturbed dancer of fiery endings and new beginnings. I am the Horned Hunter, bow drawn in my hand, gathering the living with my arrows and leading the Wild Hunt. By ny hand are ye lead from this life, that life may continue, for behold! My mystery lies in the movement of life energy from life unto life, for the reminder that all life feeds on life and that only through death is life found anew.

I am the strength that protects, comforts, gives solace and renewal. I am the one who stands by the Crone of Transformation, then enters her Tomb for birth through her womb. Follow my lead and find thy immortality. Together we shall laugh at the threshold of death passage as awareness awakens, and I shall embrace thee in thy last moments of life.

Remember me on dark moonless nights; look for my Rade in rolling storm clouds and the clash of bright lightning. I carry thee to the one who transforms. Dark Mother of all, releaser of strife. Sing to us thy songs in the tongues of ecstasy, for we understand the music of the soul. Blow me a kiss from the palm of thy hand when the moon is dark, and I shall smile upon three, but no kiss shall I return, for my kiss is the final one for all mortal flesh, nepenthe  to drink at the end of thy days.

Song of the Goddess

I am the Great Mother, adored by all creation which I have brought forth from my fertile womb. I am the Primal Mother, life-bringing force of the Divine Female, boundless and eternal.

My faces are many, for I am Transformation and I bring change to all. I am the Goddess of the Moon, Lady of all Magick, passing through phases of Maiden, Mother, and Crone. I am the Maiden whose name is carried upon the tides and the winds. I wear the Moon upon my brow as Crescent, Full, and Horned the stars rest beneath my feet, and the Serpent of Regeneration gazes up as me in adoration. I am Mysteries yet I reveal these to any who seek such of me. I open the New Path for the spiritual questor, comfort the weary traveler upon the old, and receive into my arms and soul in passage.

I am the Blessed Mother, the Bountiful Lady of the Harvest. I am clothed in the cool depths of the waters and draped in the gold of fields laden with grain. My tabard is the myriad forms of life in woodland, field, valley, river, sky and sea. My hair cascades across my shoulders as soft shadows stirring in the forests. By me are all seasons of the earth ruled that all things come to fruition through me, for lo, I am the Life-Giving Mother, fertile and joyous in my abundance.

I am the Crone, Grandmother, and Dead Mother, wise and tender. Through me pass all in the spiral dance of life, death and rebirth. I am the Wheel, the shadowed Moon, giving release and renewal to weary souls. The God ushers the Spirits unto me, for I am the Tomb through whom all must pass to be born of my Womb.

I am the Eternal Maiden, Mother of All, and Crone of Transformation. I stir the cauldron of Wisdom, Abundance, and Renewal, and I pour forth my Limitless Love upon all my peoples of the Earth.

Achlys

Achlys
She was the personification of Eternal Night, what was believed to have presaged Chaos. There was another who personified Misery, and Hesiod described her in the Shield of Heracles: “And beside them [the Keres and the Moirai] was standing Akhlys, dismal and dejected, green and pale, dirty-dry, fallen in on herself with hunger, knee-swollen, and the nails were grown long on her hands, and from her nostrils the drip kept running, and off her cheeks the blood dribbled to the ground, and she stood there, grinning forever, and the dust that had gathered and lay in heaps on her shoulders was muddy with tears.” How pleasant.