Frost Flowers



My niece Holly (who just so happens to have been born on Christmas day :-) gifted me a book called, 'The Field Guide to Natural Wonders'.  It really is quite wonderful and I'm enjoying it very much.  In particular, I was fascinated by a phenomenon called 'Frost Flowers' which only ever bloom in Winter and can never be found in any field guide to flora or fauna.  This is because they're not really flowers but beautiful, natural ice formations created by Demeter's fallen tears (well, I like to think so...)

The scientific explanation determines that these 'flowers' are formed out of dead plant stems and appear to favour certain species - white crownbeard, yellow ironweed, frostweed and wild oregano.  Because of their delicacy, they quickly vapourise when temperatures rise above freezing - which accounts for their rarity.

Whether scientific or fanciful, nature truly is beautiful...

The Contest of the Holly and the Ivy

For the remainder of December I had decided to concentrate on the simplicity and beauty of winter flowers and plants, however, it soon became apparent that this newly found Goddess (well, new to me) just wasn't going to let go that easily.  For many years, myself and my husband ran a horticultural nursery and, in the winter, it was my job to make the wreaths and garlands for the local florists.  I continue to do this, although my husband is now a landscaper and we no longer have the nursery. I enjoy doing this work and I'm aware and at ease with the change and flow of the seasons. However, I never really looked deeply into the symbology of the plants or the spirituality of the ever changing seasons.  I didn't feel a need to do this because, due to the nature of working the land, I just kind of felt it.  So, it was my intention to upload a couple of pictures of holly wreaths with maybe a youtube of Annie Lennox singing 'The Holly and the Ivy' from her new Christmas album, 'A Christmas Cornucopia'.  I thought it would be a good idea to look into the history of this, apparently, Christian Christmas carol, with the intention of bulking the blog out a bit.  However, it was at this point that the Goddess prodded me to open my eyes a wee touch more.

The Holly and the Ivy

The holly and the Ivy,
When they are both full grown
Of all the trees that are in the wood
The holly bears the crown
O the rising of the sun
And the running of the deer
The playing of the merry organ
Sweet singing of the choir

The holly bears a blossom
As white as lily flower
And Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ
To be our sweet Saviour
O the rising of the sun
And the running of the deer
The playing of the merry organ
Sweet singing of the choir

The holly bears a berry
As red as any blood
And Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ
To do poor sinners good
O the rising of the sun
And the running of the deer
The playing of the merry organ
Sweet singing of the choir

The holly bears a prickle
As sharp as any thorn;
And Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ
On Christmas Day in the morn.
O the rising of the sun
And the running of the deer
The playing of the merry organ
Sweet singing of the choir

The holly bears a bark
As bitter as any gall;
And Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ
For to redeem us all.
O the rising of the sun
And the running of the deer
The playing of the merry organ
Sweet singing of the choir

The holly and the IvyNow both are full well grown,
Of all the trees that are in the wood,
The holly bears the crown.
O the rising of the sun
And the running of the deer
The playing of the merry organ
Sweet singing of the choir
 
Looking at the lyrics of the Holly and the Ivy, it is clear that it is full of Christian symbolism.  The general consensus is that:

• Holly's "white as lily" flower in the second stanza is an allusion to Christ's purity, through Mary.
• In the third stanza, a correlation is drawn between the red colour of holly's berry and Christ's blood.
• Holly's thorny "prickle" in the fourth stanza is an allusion to the "crown of thorns" worn by Christ.
• And the bitter taste of holly's bark mentioned in the fifth stanza could be a reference to the drink offered Christ as he hung on the cross.

However, for a carol to be written about both the Holly and the Ivy, there is very little mention of dear old Ivy.  Looking into the symbology of the Ivy I found, lo and behold, it is associated with Lunar Goddesses, and in pagan rituals it is used to enable them to open the portals to the 'Other World', or more specifically, the 'Dark Side of the Moon'.  Thus, Ivy was representative of the mysterious and the mystical and was symbolic of the journey of the soul toward  the self. It encouraged assistance toward others in their search so that they, in turn, might offer assistance. And, relating to its growth, the Ivy grows in the shape of a spiral which the ancients considered a sacred symbol for:

• Consciousness
• Development
• Expansion
• Rebirth

Also, Ivy's five-pointed leaves depicts a symbol of the harmony between the  four elements, unified by the one common bonding energy:

• Fire
• Water
• Earth
• Air
• Spirit

Pondering all of the above, I began to suspect that maybe the Christian version of the 'Holly and the Ivy' had an older, much more pagan, version of the song.  With a little bit more digging and a lot more googling I did, indeed, find the original.  Called 'The Contest of the Holly and the Ivy' it was written in medieval times and appears to be a remnant of a defeated Goddess:

The Contest Of The Ivy And The Holly

Nay, Ivy, nay, it shall not be, I wis,
Let Holly have the mastery as the manner is.

1 Holly standeth in the hall fair to behold,
Ivy stands without the door; she is full sore a cold.
Nay, Ivy, nay,

2. Holly and his merry men, they dancen and they sing;
Ivy and her maidens, they weepen and they wring.
Nay, Ivy, nay,

3. Ivy hath a lybe, she caught it with the cold,
So may they all have, that with Ivy hold.
Nay, Ivy, nay,

4. Holly hath berries, as red as any rose,
The foresters, the hunters, keep them from the does.
Nay, Ivy, nay,

5. Ivy hath berries as black as any sloe,
There come the owl and eat them as she go.
Nay, Ivy, nay,

6. Holly hath birds a full fair flock,
The nightingale, the poppinjay, the gentle laverock.
Nay, Ivy, nay,

7. Good Ivy, what birds hast thou,
None but the owlet that cries How! How!
Nay, Ivy, nay.

As you can determine from the above,  it seems that there is some sort of battle going on between the Holly (male) and the Ivy (female).  Furthermore, the Ivy plays an equal role to that of the Holly in this version of the song.  To all intents, it would appear that the writer of this version was aware, consciously or not, of the patriarchal take over of the female Goddess. However, the influence of  this earlier version was apparently so strong that the Ivy was given a cameo appearance in the much later Christian one too -- despite the fact that only the holly has any major role to play in it.   Below is another medieval carol which I came across, only in this rendition, it is the Ivy which wins the day.


Ivy Queen of Trees, She Is

The most worthye she is in towne -
She is the worthiest in the world -

He that seith other do amiss -
Those who say otherwise, are wrong

(And) worthy to ber the crowne.
And she is worthy to bear the crown.

Veni, coronaberis.
Come, you shall be crowned.

Ivy is soft and mek of spech,
Ivy is soft of speech, and mild,

Ageinst all bale she is blysse.
In the face of evil she stands for good.

Well is he that (may) her rech.
He who attains her is blessed indeed.

Veni, coronaberis.
Come, you shall be crowned.

Ivy is green with colour bright,
Ivy hue is brilliant green -

Of all trees best she is,
Among trees, she is the most exalted -

And that I preve well now be right.
And now the truth I prove to you:

Veni, coronaberis.
Come, you shall be crowned.

Ivy bereth beris black.
Ivy bears berries of deepest black -

Goddess graunt us all your blisse,
Goddess grant that we all reach you at last

For there shall we nothing lack.
For in that place we shall nothing lack.

Veni, coronaberis.
Come, you shall be crowned.

There are many accounts of the Ivy also being a symbol of survival and determination.  It seems to be virtually indestructible and will often return after it has suffered damage or has been severely cut back. This symbology represents the survival of the human spirit and the strength we all have to carry on regardless of how harrowing our setbacks may have been. And perhaps, more importantly, it is symbolic of the Ivy Goddess herself, whispering to us all that she will one day return.  I hope so.

Nella Fantasia

In my fantasy I see a just world
Where everyone lives in peace and honesty
I dream of a place to live that is always free
Like a cloud that floats
Full of humanity in the depths of the soul

In my fantasy I see a bright world
Where each night there is less darkness
I dream of souls that are always free
Like the cloud that floats

In my fantasy exists a warm wind
That breathes into the city, like a friend
I dream of souls that are always free
Like the cloud that floats

Cold Caledonia

Scotland is experiencing one of the coldest winters on record - Demeter must be weeping cold tears... Here are a few pictures I took down the glen, by the river.

The River Avon

Cousin It :-)

Mary Hoses Bridge

Ivy but no Holly

Too Much Yang, Not Enough Yin

It would appear that poppies have long been companions of the human race. Archaeological evidence suggests that there use dates back as far as Neolithic times, implying that they once played a significant role in human culture. Opium and poppy remains have been found at Neolithic settlements and burial sites all over the Mediterranean.  Moreover, in the Eleusinian Mysteries (an ancient ritual adopted by the Greeks and the most prestigious in the Classical world) Demeter and Persephone play the central roles.  Although much of the actual initiation has long been lost, archaeologists believe it was related to the worship of The Goddess, and goes back much further than the classical Greek Gods.  Sadly, it was forcibly ended by the Christian Emperor Theodosius in 392AD - the Goddess was seen to be too powerful and too dangerous to the new Christian religion and, above all else, they feared her.

Poppy Goddess

So who was this Goddess that the Christians feared and appeared to be older than time itself?  Archaeologists have discovered representations of the goddesses in Europe, Asia, Australia, and Africa. Figurines, paintings, and relief sculptures dating back as far as 40,000 BCE prove that, since humans first developed a consciousness of the divine, they worshipped a goddess. Scholars suggest that this reverence for the female stemmed from a woman’s mystical abilities to create new life. Creation stories were spun, and the Goddess was celebrated as the Creatrix of life and images were painted and carved in her honer.  One of the most famous is the Venus of Laussel, a 26,000 year-old relief carving found in a cave in France. This is a woman holding a horn in one hand while resting her other hand on her belly.


                                                          

The nude female figure is holding a wisent horn in her right hand. Some think it may be a cornucopia. The horn has 13 notches which may symbolize the number of menstrual cycles or moons in one year. 

Looking at the etymology of the name Demeter you will find that, in fact, it in no way relates to her being simply an 'earth mother' (although most popular sources still perpetuate this).  Eric Partridge, the famous philologist, believes that what we actually have is de-meter - God Mother; often anciently abbreviated to deo - simply, God.  Therefore, it makes sense to assume that Demeter was a goddess incorporated into the patriarchal pantheon of Greek gods and important enough to be the main protagonist in their Eleusinian initiation. Archaeologist, Marija Gimbutas, in her digs in Italy, Greece and Turkey discovered artifacts that gave more evidence of Goddess worship.  She found hundreds of stone, bone and ceramic figures dating from 7,000 BCE to 3,000 BCE depicting symbols derived from nature and representing feminine energy in all it's glory. This prevalence of female figurines, with their beautiful, symbolic designs and a notable absence of weapons and warfare, led Marija to believe that in Neolithic Europe, women, the Goddess and the giver of life, were venerated and worshipped.  Furthermore, she concluded that these were egalitarian societies in which women and men were equal and were partners in every sense of the word.  So what became of this matristic culture (note: not matriarchal as this arouses the idea of dominance and can be compared with patriarchy) and why is it not being promoted?

                                                      

Marija Gimbutas

Marija was one of the first archaeologists to realize that the culture of the Indo Europeans, who arrived in Europe from the Russian Steppes, was entirely different from the one it supplanted.  These invaders were warriors and their gods were warrior gods; the Sky God, the God of the Underworld and the Thunder God. The symbolic nature of these two cultures was also expressed in their social structure.   The Indo Europeans had weapons and horses (the horse appeared only with the invaders) and in old Europe there were no weapons other than for hunting.  The old Europeans were agriculturists, living in the same area for a very long time and in the most beautiful of places. When the warriors arrived, they established themselves high in the hills, sometimes in places which had very difficult access.  In each aspect of culture there appears to be opposition - the matristic v the patriarchal.  There is archaeological evidence that suggests this clash of culture had a devastating effect on the old Europeans.  The dominating culture who had the weapons, the horses, the smaller families and were mobile, ie the Indo Europeans, were the victors. 

Demeter and Persephone

However, the Goddess survived, albeit in the guise of pretty consorts to the warrior Gods.  The Greek story of Demeter and her daughter are the remnants of a much older story of death and rebirth.  If de-meter was, indeed, a 'God Mother', who had a daughter that died and was reborn so that the mortals could be saved, you can begin to understand why the Christians feared her.  It certainly does appear to be some strange feminine parody of Christianity. The death and resurrection of the Child of God is one of the oldest stories in the world, and the feminine version long predates the masculine.  It is preserved in the cultus of Demeter and Persephone, which proved too strong to entirely eradicate.

Demeter and Persephone

                                       
Whilst looking into the symbolism of the poppy (having decided to concentrate on a particular flower each month for my blog) I came across the beautiful, yet heartbreaking, story of Demeter and Persephone.  In Greek mythology, Demeter was worshipped as a vegetation/earth goddess and her symbols were, amongst others, the corn and the poppy. As the corn comes from the earth and flourishes, it is touched by the Sun where it manifests as the rich Solar gold of matter.  But it is also symbolic of death and resurrection: as the corn is cut down by the scythe of death, it always returns and grows again the following year. The symbolism of  Demeter's poppy, however, is a lot more ambiguous and decidedly more human... but also more mysterious.

Demeter, being the goddess of grain, harvest and the seasons, was responsible for the earth's bounty.  She gave birth to a sweet and lovely daughter, Persephone, the Maiden of Spring.  Demeter delighted in her beautiful daughter and her love and happiness kept the earth in bloom all through the year.  Mother and daughter were rarely apart, but one day Persephone wandered into a field full of red flowers (some writers describe the flowers as being poppies).  Unfortunately, Hades, Lord of the Underworld, saw her there and fell in love with her.  As she was busy admiring the flowers, Hades rode up from the bowels of the Earth on a chariot drawn by 7 black horses. He pulled the young maiden on board before descending back to the Underworld.  Persephone cried out in anguish for her mother but it was too late, Hades had captured her and was determined to make her his bride.

When Demeter realized that her beloved daughter had gone, she was inconsolable. Eventually, after much searching, Demeter went to Apollo and asked him if he knew where Persephone had been taken.  Apollo informed her that she now resided in the kingdom of the dead where Hades had made her his wife. This news broke Demeter's heart, the thought of her beautiful daughter residing in that dark, shadowy wasteland was more than she could bear.  She wandered the Earth in the hope that she would find some way of getting her back. Because of her anguish and despair, according to some writers, Demeter used the opium from the poppy to ease her grief. In so doing, Demeter no longer had the will to bless the crops or look with  favour at the harvest.  The Earth, which was once lush and green, became cold and barren and all the inhabitants suffered. 

This state of affairs alarmed and worried the other gods.  They realized that unless Demeter was consoled in some way, the human inhabitants would eventually die off, leaving no one to worship them.  They pleaded with Zeus to do something about it.  Zeus decided to send Hermes, the messenger god, to the Underworld in an effort to retrieve Persephone.  When Hermes demanded the return of the maiden, Hades gave her up quite willingly.  However, unknown to Hermes, Hades had managed to persuade Persephone to eat a seed from the pomegranate - the fruit of the dead.  This meant that she was doomed to spend part of the year with him in the Underworld.

When Persephone and Demeter were reunited, they wept tears of joy. Persephone told her mother how Hades had abducted her from the sunny meadow and carried her down into the dark Underworld to make her his queen. She described how she pined for the sight of the sun and the beauty of the earth and the sky. She had been so unhappy, that she ate nothing the entire year, despite Hades constant attempts to get her to eat, until finally, so that he would leave her alone, she had eaten a pomegranate seed.

Demeter was horrified to hear this for she knew that her daughter would be condemned to spend part of the year in the dreaded Underworld.  Consequently, when Persephone has to return to the Underworld, Demeter goes into mourning and, in her grief and loneliness, she makes the earth turn barren and cold.  This is what we now experience as the autumn/winter months.  The world then waits with Demeter for Persephone's return each spring, when the earth will turn green and warm again, leading us into summer.

And that concludes the story of Demeter, Persephone and the poppy... but does it?

It would appear on the surface, at least, that this is a simple, though inspiring, description that the Greeks gave to explain the four seasons.  However, on closer inspection, there is a whole lot more to be revealed...
which I hope to do in my next blog entitled Too Much Yang, Not Enough Yin :-)

Dulce Et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

Wilfred Owen

The Flower Duet (Lakmé)

Under a dome of white jasmine
With the roses entwined together
On a river bank covered with flowers laughing in the morning

Gently floating on it's charming risings
On the river's current
On the shining waves
One hand reaches
Reaches for the bank
Where the spring sleeps and
The birds, the birds sing.

Under a dome of white jasmine
Ah! calling us
Together!

Under a dome of white jasmine
With the roses entwined together
On a river bank covered with flowers laughing in the morning
Let us descend together
Gently floating on it's charming risings,
On the river's current
On the shining waves,
One hand reaches,
Reaches for the bank,
Where the spring sleeps,
And the birds, the birds sing.

Under a dome of white jasmine
Ah! calling us
Together!

Georgia On My Mind

                                           
I absolutely adore Georgia O'Keefe's art!  This is one of her most famous paintings called 'Oriental Poppies.'  The poppies cover the whole canvas, which is 30 inches tall and over 40 inches wide. She painted it in 1928 and the painting is part of a collection at the University of Minnesota. Throughout her life she painted hundreds of flower images of many different colours, shapes, and sizes.

Many of these paintings evoke a veiled representation of female genitalia, although she consistently denied painting vaginal imagery.  However, many prominent art historians have linked her work to feminist artists of the 1970s.  Georgia herself said that her flower paintings expressed what she saw in her mind and felt in her heart.

Beautiful...

Wake Up!!! Be Here Now...

Truth

Truth, like the juice of the poppy, in small quantities, calms men; in larger, heats and irritates them, and is attended by fatal consequences in excess.
Walter Savage Landor

A Tale of Two Poppies

Yesterday, David Cameron and his delegation were asked by their Chinese hosts to remove the remembrance poppies from their lapels.  It was explained to the Prime Minister that allowing his team to sport the symbol would cause offence by reminding the Chinese people of the tragic Opium Wars.  Characteristically, the Old Etonian's aide said, 'We tried to explain the importance of the poppy in Britain and informed them we would be wearing them all the same.'  The arrogance and lack of empathy of this remark dismayed and saddened me.

The Opium Wars, between China and the then British Empire, were the climax of trade disputes over Chinese attempts to stop British opium trafficking.  The chaos and devastation of opium to Chinese society prompted the Manchu Emperor to ban any opium from entering their ports.  He named the commissioner of Canton, Lin Tse-Hsu, to lead the campaign and he duly seized massive amounts of opium and threw them in the river.  This outraged the opium traders and they demanded that the British Government retaliate.  Sadly, the British agreed and in 1839 the first of the Opium Wars began.  The Chinese army, weakened by ten years of opium addiction, were no match for the British who attacked and decimated cities and blockaded ports.

The war ended in 1842 with a British victory.  A treaty was drawn up which guaranteed the opium traders the right to enslave an entire population with opium.  This treaty included: the full legalization of the opium trade in China, compensation for the stock-piles confiscated by Tse-Hsu, territorial sovereignty for the British Crown over off-shore islands and a demand that Traders, Britain and France be reimbursed for the cost of the war - a tidy sum of 20 million taels of silver each.  However, they made one demand too many; that all of interior China be open for uninterrupted opium traffic.  The Manchus resisted this and the second of the two wars, which began in 1856, escalated.  The Prime Minister of the time, Lord Palmerston, declared, ' We shall teach such a lesson to the perfidious hordes that the name of Europe will hereafter be a passport of fear.'  The British besieged Peking (now known as Beijing, where, ironically, David Cameron is now visiting) and sacked and burned temples and sacred shrines in an effort to show Britain's total contempt for China and her people.  Again Britain was victorious and in 1860 gave the traders the right to expand their opium trade all over China.  However, they were quick to point out that there would be no opium imported into Britain or, indeed, anywhere in Europe.

The story behind the Remembrance Poppy is decidedly more poignant.  Thanks to an American lady named Moina Belle Michael, this vivid red flower has become synonymous with great loss of life in war.  On the 9th of November 1918, Moina came across a poem in a magazine entitled, 'We Shall Not Sleep'.  It was written by Canadian, John McCrae, who had written it for a fellow soldier who had recently been killed in action.  Lieutenant-Colonel McCrae was inspired by the vibrant red poppies growing defiantly in the shattered, war-torn land of Flanders.  The first lines of the poem have become some of the most famous lines ever written in relation to the first World War.  More commonly known as, 'In Flanders Fields', it captures natures unyielding beauty amid the chaos of war:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.


However, it was the last verse of the poem that deeply moved Moina:

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.


In her autobiography, entitled 'The Miracle Flower', Moina describes this experience as being deeply spiritual.  It inspired her to buy and sell some artificial poppies to be worn in remembrance of the soldiers who died.  Her work and experience with ex-servicemen after the war, led her to widen the scope of the remembrance idea. She thought it could be developed so that it could be used to help all servicemen who needed help for themselves and their dependants.  The rest, as they say, is history. 

Many historians believe that the mistrust the Chinese feel towards foreigners today is the direct result of the rampant greed and the worse of imperialism before, during and after the Opium Wars.  If only Mr Cameron and his aides had remembered this and, while still proudly wearing their poppies, apologised for any offence this may have caused.