Happy Birthday, Estelanui!

[whiteling]

*dashes in just in time to wish Estelanui a happy birthday*

Happy Birthday, dear Francesca! :-)

I hope you are having an enjoyable day full of pleasant happenings. *hugs*

And look - those lovely ladies have come, bearing gifts for you:

Comments

[mechtild]

What a lovely and apt birthday tribute for Estelanui! But who are the scowling faces (three) behind them?

[whiteling]

I don't know it for certain, but the three figures behind the goddesses are most probably the founders of the altar. It was common to found an altar for the Matronae in order to "help in time of need, to protect, to watch over a family or clan, to help in fertility and childbirth, to heal, and possibly to give protection in battle." (quote from a site on celtic culture) - only 50 km drive way from my home there are some ancient Matronae places of worship. Those sites have been excarvated and researched, but afterwards have been reconstructed (with copies of the original votiv altars and marks on the ground to make clear where the cult buildings once were situated) and they still are magical, strong places, filled with an old numinous spirit. :-)

[mechtild]

Those sites have been excarvated and researched, but afterwards have been reconstructed (with copies of the original votiv altars and marks on the ground to make clear where the cult buildings once were situated) and they still are magical, strong places, filled with an old numinous spirit. :-)

Have you visited these in person, these sites? I'm wondering if you felt a sense of divine presence there.

I think it's fascinating and encouraging that this votive altar for the three goddesses was not destroyed but built over, instead. I wonder if some powerful person managed that? It would be so interesting to know.

Looking at the three founders in back, I think perhaps their "scowls" are really the results of the disfigurement. The broken, worn away places in the stone have created the expressions I'm seeing. They probably originally looked solemn, but not scowling.

[whiteling]

Yes, I have been to some of those sites. :-) One of them lies in a beautiful wood, the other one on a windswept high plateau which conjures up images of ancient greece with all that dry heathland around. The places have been always known by the local people and when archeologists in the 18th and 19th century started to research remains of history, many of those sites were listed and investigated by and by.
Nowadays, you can find still little oblations there, like flowers, candles and ribbons... signs of the veneration of the Female. I did sense a sort of a divine presence there, hidden and a bit overgrown, but definitely still there.

[estelanui]

Thank you dear whiteling for your wishes and for your incredible gift. The pic is beautiful , the art is intriguing, but you choice opened me a new window about the triple goddess

[whiteling]

I'm very glad you liked the BD photo so much. :-)
Yes, this votive altar is especailly beautiful; it is placed in a huge room at the Landesmuseum and the three goddesses literally seem to bless the entire room. There are other Matrons altars too, which look more rural and simple. But they all exude a very powerful energy.

I didn't know of the Matrons cult either, before I lived in the Rhineland region. It's a very special thing of this area, I mean, in that high concentration of remaining altars. Cologne and Bonn have been the centres of Matrons worship. Under the Minster of Bonn the archaeologists found many votive altars and oblations, all dedicated to the Matrons.
Thanks for the Epona link. I loved the depiction with the two horses by her side very much.

The worship of Matres and Matrones seems different from the Madonna one, but the needs of the worshippers are not different at all.
You are so right. We will never know how the old rites and worship looked like, but the things worshippers prayed for haven't changed much.

I wish

Pt. 1 (sorry, it got really long...)

[mechtild]

Estelanui, happy birthday, if well after the fact. I loved that your birthday inspired this post by Whiteling. (This is for you to read, too, Whiteling

Pt. 2 (this is the end of it.)

[mechtild]

The reason your post, Whiteling, and your comments, Estelanui--in combination with the thoughts of Riane Eisler--so brought the St. Anne-Virgin-Child art works to mind after seeing the Matronae is that here is all this devotion and art work for St. Anne and the Virgin and the Virgin's child ), yet in the scriptural texts there are no references to St. Anne, or Mary's mother at all

[mechtild]

Oh, I forgot about Mary and Elizabeth - two women who for different reasons weren't expected to be pregnant. The three are lovely, but the bottom link, the Carrucci, is amazing. The forms and the colours make the women's bodies, in their lime and strawberry and citron and peach coloured clothes look like a bevy of summer desserts or fruit.

[whiteling]

Oh you two! Please continue with your fascinating discussion and adorn this thread with more exceedingly beautiful images!! :-)

Mechtild and Estelanui, I digged up an interesting and apt article in which the author makes connections between the three "Bethen" (those are a threeness of 'christianised' pagan goddesses, mostly known in Bavaria and Austria), the Matronae, the female saints St. Margaret, St. Barbara and St. Catherine, St Anne (Mechtild, you were absolutely spot-on!!) and "The Three Marys". It's well worth reading and explains a lot.

http://www.druidry.org/obod/deities/bavarian_triple_goddess.html

I found that article a while ago when I was searching for the "Saligen", another threesome female group (also mentioned in said article); but they seem to be more fairies than goddess figures.

[mechtild]

Whiteling, what a great article, and so thorough considering it wasn't that long. I forgot about the three virgins entirely, concentrating on mothers or the three ages. I just love to see the resilience of these symbols, perhaps giving hope that what they stand for or mediate might be just as resilient.

I thought the writer made an important point here, all the more after reading Eisler's book about her reconstructed Neolithic Europe:

There are efforts especially by feministic groups to revive the cult of the Bethen. Representative for those groups is the author Erni Kutter (see bibliography). These groups claim that the Bethen carry features of the Great Mother goddess who was venerated in the originally matriarchal societies across Europe. The female mysteries were then suppressed with the upcoming of male dominated societies and totally eradicated with the arrival of Christianity. Thus, these groups say, the Bethen represent the suppressed original matriarchy and their worship would be an act of female liberation. [...] I

[whiteling]

I hadn't heard of the 'red hat ladies' before - thanks for giving me that name and info, it sounds good. But yes, I wholeheartedly agree with you regarding the tunnel vision of certain feministic groups, to think the goddess (aka the feminine aspects of God) would belong only women.
Do you remember my post many, many moons ago, in which I reported of the art project of a friend of mine who want people make "Goddesses for Mannheim"? She never ever planned that exclusively women should take part in this action. It was clear that the Mother of the Land IS for everybody.
(I should ask her at the next opportunity how the project is going; it's been a while since I heard from her)