Julian Cope presents Head Heritage | The Modern Antiquarian Forum

Branwen

824 posts

Edited Mar 06, 2010, 16:22

Re: Ballachulish figurine

Mar 06, 2010, 15:28

Divine twins might be just two sides of male and female aspects. The romans recorded Alauna/Alaunus as male or female, and sometimes both as part of a divine couple. The morning star and evening star; Merlin and Ganieda his twin, are both the same - Venus (not a star at all, obviously).

As well as what GWASS said, I also read that any person that embodied male and female in one person was considered touched by god in the shamanistic view of the world, and if you were one or the other you embraced your opposite gender and brought it into balance. Part of that would be to dress and live as both genders. It seems a logical extension of the idea that any "inbetween" place is magical. As well, it confuses the denizens of other realms you travel in as a shaman, meaning harm to your physical body back in the mundane realm of daily life is less likely. Right into modern times the customs of beltuinn and samhuinn included cross dressing to confuse the faeries who would be around as the veil between the worlds was thin at that time. Children would be dressed as their opposite gender to stop faeries stealing them too.

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Re: Ballachulish figurine (moss)

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