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…
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)...
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
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?
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?
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-…
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-…
Apr/May, Taurus, is also the time when the grain harvest begins in Mesopotamia...Hence bulls and grain...And bulls with grain tails...
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"...
"...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...
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)...
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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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.
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...
...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...
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...
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...
Thread (a quite long one, sorry, but I think worth reading to the end): A while back @another_barbara posted this 1865 beehive panel image with this description: An interesting Shrovetide tradition from Slovenija "babo žagajo" (sawing of an old woman)...
The other day wanted to write an article about this custom, and while looking around the net for more info on the subject, I came across 1960 paper by Niko Kuret "BABO ŽAGAJO, Slovenske oblike pozabljenega obredja in njegove Evropske paralele" etno-muzej.si/sl/etnolog/slo…
In which he presents all the different versions (he knew of) of the "SAWING OF THE OLD WOMAN" ritual found in Slovenian lands, and its European parallels...
Here I will translate the most interesting bits from this paper, and will then give my interpretation of the ritual...
Thread: The žirgeliai (little horses), are common motifs on Lithuanian rooftops, placed there for protection of the house...
They are a symbolic depiction of the Ašvieniai (), Baltic counterparts of Vedic Ashvins, who are said to pull the chariot of Saulė (the Sun Goddess) through the sky. As depicted on this rooftop of a house in Nida... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A%C5%A1vi…
Both names, Lithuanian ašva and Sanskrit ashva, mean "horse" and are derive from the same Proto-Indo-European root for the horse – *ek'w-...
Maruts came (to earth) along with Agni (fire) from above...
The other day I read a very interesting paper "Comets and meteoritic showers in the Rigveda and their significance" by R.N. Iyengar () academia.edu/7324390/COMETS…
Most Vedas interpreters agree that Maruts are deified moisture laden monsoon storm winds, turned into rain bringing deities armed with thunder and lightning. Even I agree with that and I even wrote a thread talking about this:
But, the Mysore Palace edition of the Rigveda, which gives in 36 volumes an exhaustive introduction, the text, traditional meaning, ritual application, grammatical explanation, and the Sanskrit commentary of Sâyan says that: Vâyu (winds) and Maruts are distinctly different...