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Nov 11, 2021 16 tweets 8 min read Read on X
Thread: A while back I wrote an article about this the Khafajeh vase, which was made in Iran in the mid 3rd mil. BC by the people of the Jiroft culture...It is still one of the most amazing animal calendars I have seen so far oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2020/09/khafaj… Image
This particular scene depicts the driest and hottest part of the year in the Jiroft County, located in the Kerman Province of the South-Eastern Iran...Jul/Aug...This is symbolised by the person holding two snakes (symbols of sun's heat) standing between two lions (in Leo)... Image
This "person" is the sun god, the same dude depicted on this Bactrian seal from the same period. I talked about Bactrian snakes and dragons in this article

oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2020/06/bactri… Image
What I didn't notice at the time when I wrote my article were the tips of the lions' tails. They end in what looks like wheat ears...Why? Is this significant? Image
Well, in this article about this amazing cylinder seal, oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/05/shamas… I talked about young and old sun god Utu/Shamash from Mesopotamian mythology... Image
Utu/Shamash is also depicted as a bull with human face and long flowing beard...This is one of those depictions of the sun god Utu/Shamash as a bull with human face and a long flowing beard. But this time he also has a tail that ends in a ear of wheat...Why? Is this significant? Image
Well it is. Utu/Shamash is depicted as a bull, cause hot dry part of the year dominated by the sun starts in Apr/May, in Taurus, the time when Wild Eurasian Cattle begin to calve... oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/06/dairy-… Image
This is also the time of the peak flood of the Tigris and Euphrates, which is caused by the snowmelt on the mountains that feed these two great rivers, which is in turn caused by the sun, Utu/Shamash...Hence golden bull with blue lapis (water stone) beard oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/10/green-… Image
Apr/May, Taurus, is also the time when the grain harvest begins in Mesopotamia...Hence bulls and grain...And bulls with grain tails...

oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/10/bulls-…
oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/10/how-gr… ImageImage
But what does this have to do with the lions with grain tails from the Jiroft vase? Well..."wheat harvest season is approximately 4.5 months in Iran starting in early April up to mid-August, depending on the region and it's local climate"...
According to this paper about the affect of the global warming on grain agriculture in Iran researchgate.net/publication/33…

"...most of the wheat in Iran is cultivated in October and harvested in July..."
And finally I found this: "KERMAN, Aug. 13 (MNA) – Farmers of Deh Ziyar village in Kerman province, harvest wheat using traditional methods"...
en.mehrnews.com/photo/148819/T…

Basically they are harvesting grain in Leo... ImageImageImageImage
Is Jul/Aug really grain harvest season in Kerman province? Is this why lions on this vase made by the people of the Jiroft culture from the Kerman province of Iran have tails that end in grain ears?
I just looked at the pictures of the wheat being harvested in Kerman province. It looks like one of the old wheat types, emmer, durum, which are both awned (with bristles)... Image
Durum wheat is the predominant wheat type grown in the Middle East. And it is traditionally a "spring wheat" which is sown in Feb/Mar and harvested in Jul/Aug. It has lower yields, thick husks, long bristles and is resistant to high temperatures...
It fits...

More about animal calendar markers found in ancient cultures, start here oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/p/animal-solar… then check the rest of the blog posts I still didn't add to this page, and finally check my twitter threads I still didn't convert to blog post...I am 7 months behind now

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More from @serbiaireland

Nov 22
Thread: Boreas (1903) by John William Waterhouse...

Boreas is the Greek god of the cold north wind, storms, and winter.

When I saw this picture first, I thought: Why did John William Waterhouse depict Boreas as a young woman wrapped in a black/grey veil? Image
I wondered if he did this because Romans depicted Winter as a woman covered with a black veil...

I talked about Winter here
The problem was that The Roman winter was an Ugly Old Hag...And the woman on John William Waterhouse's painting was young and beautiful. I was sure I was missing something important, but I didn't know what...
Read 9 tweets
Oct 22
Thread: Buckle up, this is going to be quite a ride.

Meet Cetus, Poseidon's pet which he released on people that really pissed him off. Usually kings with beautiful daughters.

3rd c. BC mosaic depicting Cetus, from Ancient Kaulon, Calabria, Italy Image
Two most famous Cetuses 🙂 were so called Æthiopian (Levantine) Cetus and Trojan Cetus. This thread is about them, the two beautiful babes that were supposed to be sacrificed to them to appease them and the two heroes who strongly objected to such arrangements...

Here we go:
Queen Cassiopeia boasted that she and her daughter Andromeda were more beautiful than the Nereids. This angered Poseidon so much that he sent the sea monster Cetus to attack Æthiopia (Levant)...
Read 37 tweets
Aug 26
Thread: Few posts about the Bronze Age bull leaping ritual...
Map of the distribution of bull leaping motifs found on seals and amulets, mid 3rd millennium BC to mid 2nd millennium BC. Eagle headed dudes and bull leaping dudes 🙂 From: "Myths of ancient Bactria and Margiana on its seals and amulets" scribd.com/document/47027…
Image
Read 7 tweets
Aug 20
Thread: The other day I posted this article and it went completely unnoticed??? In this thread I want to present the full analysis of all 4 sides of this sarcophagus. Honestly this is as cool an example of symbolic religious calendar art as they come.

First, I definitely don't think that these panels depict funerary rituals, which is the most common interpretation of the scene ancientworldmagazine.com/articles/agia-…
I think that they could be depicting religious rituals related to Proto Demeter, Persephone and Poseidon. The "two queens and the king" mentioned In the Mycenean Greek tablets dated 1400–1200 BC.

They are also a religious calendar closely linked to the climatic calendar.
Read 36 tweets
Aug 4
Thread: Years ago, anthropologist Margaret Mead was asked by a student what she considered to be the first sign of civilisation in a culture. The student expected Mead to talk about fishhooks or clay pots or grinding stones.

But no... Image
...Mead said that the first sign of civilisation in an ancient culture was a femur (thighbone) that had been broken and then healed. Mead explained that in the animal kingdom, if you break your leg, you die...
...You cannot run from danger, get to the river for a drink or hunt for food. You are meat for prowling beasts. No animal survives a broken leg long enough for the bone to heal...
Read 5 tweets
Jul 3
Thread: Have you ever heard of shepherd's stick calendars? Here's one from Bulgaria...

In the mountains of the Balkans, up until the end of the 20th century, shepherds carried with them calendar sticks... Image
It was a stick with a notch cut into it for every day of the year and a cross or some other symbol for major holy days, which in Serbia are all linked to major agricultural events and major solar cycle events...
At the end of every day a piece of the stick up to the first notch, representing the previous day, was cut off from the stick. When the last piece was cut, the year was over...
Read 8 tweets

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