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Lunar beasts (part seven)
June 6, 2007 at 12:17 pm by mahud
- Lunar Beasts (part 1)
- Lunar Beasts (part 2)
- Lunar Beasts (part 3)
- Lunar Beasts (part 4)
- Lunar Beasts (part 5)
- Lunar Beasts (part 6)
- Lunar Beasts (part 7)
- Lunar Beasts (part 8 )
In part six, I introduced the mythical representation of a sacred tree in the form of a pole sumounted by a lunar crescent, containing the orb of the sun.
Lunar-horn pole
Left: Mesopotamian (1920 BC); Middle: Assyrian (700 BC); Right: Mesopotamian (2000 BC).
The Lunar-horn pole is an archaic representation of the Tree of Life (and death), upon which numerous representations of the Tree of Life appear to be based, including the Assyrian Tree of Life, as found on the Panels from the North-West palace of Nimrud.
The Stag
The stag is also a symbolic lunar beast due to the seasonal renewal of it’s antlers. In Images and Symbols: Studies in Religious Symbolism, Mircea Eliade tell’s us that;
This symbolism is confirmed by the fact that, in decorations on baptisteries, the Tree of Life is often accompanied by the stag—another archaic image of cyclic renewal… …But, in pre-historic China, in the Altai and in certain cultures of Central and of North America (above all the Maya and the Pueblo) the stag is one of the symbols of continual creation and renewal, simply because of the periodic renewal of its antlers:.. In Greek traditions the stag renewed its life by eating serpents and then, without delay, drinking from the waters of a spring: the antlers then fell away, and the stag was rejuvenated for fifty, or five hundred years…
p.164 (Princeton University Press)
Depicted on one of the bull-headed lyres (Dated 2600 BC: British Museum), excavated from the so-called Royal Graves at Ur, are two stags flanking a sacred tree (below). Like other lunar beasts, such as the serpent and bull, they are also feeding upon the tree (Footnote: Divine Partaker). The tree is the wellspring of the ever-bounteous source of life. Comparative representations can also be found in the iconography of the Celtic Antlered/Horned god Cernunnos, where serpents, bulls, and stags, feed from overflowing bags of grain or coins (Footnote: Cernunnos).
Two stags feeding from a sacred tree
The Stag’s crescent antlers appear to represent the lunar crescent that crowns the cosmic tree, while the fruit, or flower of tree (that in other similar Mesopotamian symbolizations is in the form of an eight petaled rosette), corresponds with the sun, representing the solar principle. A comparable scene, in the British Museum, uses the ram, rather than stag, as the animal representative, due to its lunaresque horns, that also reflect the waxing and waning moon.
The Stag’s antlers are themselves tree-like, further strengthening their association with the Tree. The double and triple moon pole, is also mirrored by representations of the cosmic tree with four or six moon-like branches (Footnote: Menorah). If we then include the limb of the tree we have seven, which perhaps might be why, in the The Song of Amergin, the mystical stag is said (depending on the translation) to have seven tines.
In part six, I also mentioned that the image of the sun rising from a crescent is also the original pictographic form of the Sumerian cuneiform for ‘day.’
The Sumerian pictogram for ‘day’
Compare with this Sumerian relief (below), of two stags, that appear to be substituting the lunar crescent of the Cosmic Tree, while between them, a Lion-Bird rises like the sun.
Lion-Bird rising between two stags
Footnotes
For easy reference click on the footnote link and the page will scroll down to the footnote entry. To return to the article, click the (Return) link that follows each footnote.
- Divine partaker: The mythological victim (in anthropomorphic form) is often shown to feed upon his own ambrosial boon (further combined with the motif of sleep), including the tipsy Dionysus, when he was kidnapped (although the god wasn’t fooled for a second) by the pirates, the drunk Polyphemus, and the Dagda, who was seemingly incapacitated after devouring an inexhaustible supply of porridge, much to the amusement of the Fomorians.(Return)
- Cernunnos: The stag is Cernunnos’ prime theriomorphic form, and although he is the ever-producing life-giving source, as, for example, mythically represented by a flow of coins issuing from the mouth of a stag, he also partakes in the lunar wheel of death and rebirth, consuming his own wondrous life generating (solar) energy (or spirit).(Return)
- Menorah: I’m inclined to believe that the triple moon pole is the prototype for the seven-branched candlestick in Jewish tradition. The candlestick in the temple was crafted in the form of an almond tree (compare Aaron’s flowering staff), indicating that it was a tree of life. The symbolism is also bound up with the creation account in the opening chapter of Genesis, where the world is created within seven days. Think of the menorah as an invisible axis mundi, with each branch corresponding with the seven days of creation. The central sconce of the menorah then corresponds with the fourth day of creation, when God principally created the Sun and the Moon, returning us to the symbolism of the Tree of the Sun and Moon as found in Mesopotamian Iconography.(Return)
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- Lunar Beasts (part six)
- Lunar beasts (part five)
- Lunar beasts (part one)
- Lunar beasts (part two)
- Lunar beasts (part eight)