Julian Cope presents Head Heritage

Very rough guess, I only know of the Festival of the Serpent from folklore, and it fell the 15th to 17th before it was taken over by the banisher of the serpents - St Patrick.

You know Tiompan, its just been so much an accepted fact in paganism that Europe wide the Pleides divided the year this way, that I dunno which source it came from, its everywhere, folklore ties in too, especially those connected Samhain. Books mentioning the subject always say "ancient sources". I've a feeling it's part of the coligny calendar... my brain won't go that far back to where I first heard it but I will look it up.

Festival of the serpent was roman on the website I saw it on, but don't remember what it was and didn't save it as it wasn't of interest to me. I only remembered it cos its my birthday, in fact.

If Thom discounted the pleiades as an important calendar division, it would make us one of the few countries that didn't acknowledge such. I assume he just discounted them as megalithic alignments? I'm gonna shut up though as I keep mentioning stuff and it being wrong, which I have no problem being wrong, but would hate anyone to think I'marguing to be right, when really I just want to learn, which would include learning things I've accepted at face value for years were wrong. It's hard to tell what is right or wrong without asking though. Worth if I can avoid pissing people off with suchlike though, as it gets the brain going.

You certainly don't piss anybody off and please don't stop posting .

I'm gonna shut up though as I keep mentioning stuff and it being wrong, which I have no problem being wrong, but would hate anyone to think I'marguing to be right, when really I just want to learn, which would include learning things I've accepted at face value for years were wrong. It's hard to tell what is right or wrong without asking though. Worth if I can avoid pissing people off with suchlike though, as it gets the brain going.

I'm not taking Tiompan on, though, tjj.

When I have a question Tiompan is often the one that can be bothered answering me, even if I don't put the question very well, and I'm grateful for that. I don't care if an answer isn't what I hoped, being ignored and in ignorance would be worse. Or humoured.

In this case I have no position of knowledge to defend, or argument to give, apart from grasping at the straws of every obscure mention of every ancient but unsubstatiated festival I've ever heard of in the hope it might ring bells somewhere, which just fustrates people I guess. Sorry.

In this case, that isnt working. Turns out the answer to "what are the lost neolithic festivals mentioned on Ancient Lothian site" is "dunno, the chap didn't give enough information to know what he's referring to and the dates and locations aren't enough of a clue in themselves". The site in question is bursting with interesting stuff though, so I'll just have to wait, as he's adding stuff all the time since beginning the updating process.

As far as pleiades go, I'm always asking about them within other disciplines, not just this one, due to wealth of folklore about the nine/seven maidens. I do it with a lot of folklore. Seeing how stories originate interests me. Kicking around Weary Well stuff on here and getting other opinions and viewpoints gave me lots more ideas. Probably just newer and more numerous suppositions, but it's interesting to me. A lot of stuff fell into place as part of a whole by doing so with that thread, though the only good it did was to expand a folklore link I'd put on the TMA site. A contribution worth a millionth of a percent compared to the whole site, I guess.

Still. Lurk more, ask less, maybe. LOL. Doesn't pay to exasperate the people with the knowledge, who took pity, and answered...

If the pleiades were markers then precession would be a problem , but as both can be calculated from the more reliable solar /lunar cycles why should anyone bother ,with a the pleiades and how do we know they did ?