While in a café, Freaks, in Carcassonne, sheltering from the cold in a cosy chair, I perused from the book shelf a brill old gypsy book with super black and white photos from the 60's and 70's, 'Tsiganes et Gitanes' by Hans Silvester and Jean-Paul Clebert. So good the photos were that I was sharing them with my gypsy friend Ella May, who so delighted in them that she instantly ordered the book second-hand online. Such an olde way of life was portrayed, even through from not so far back, photos of gypsies dwelling in caves, travelling with bears and monkeys, which would dance to the beat of their tambourines, and such a beautiful photo of a young girl kissing the deity of Sara Kali at St Marie de la Mer.
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I decided to try doing avatars for my other ancestors, despite a lack of photos, which can make for rough results, so I did this for my great grandfather D'Auvergne Bane, and yes, as expected, the results bore little of worth, but those that worked out were really cool, and when I shared them on social media were much liked. D'Auvergne was a gentlemanly artistic soul, whose family lived for a while in Barbados, though he was born in London.
Much absorbed in my oracle cards project, I wanted to generate Indian style goddesses via the AI art, as had been so with Harshita and Priyanka's avatars, prompted by the Indian jewellery they had worn at their weddings. So I donned a couple of sari's for photos and draped necklaces over myself, along with bindi and pendant dangling over my third eye. I was not rewarded with any Indian style AI goddess pictures at all, and what's more, my amber beads which I had worn around my head in some of the photos I'd taken, were replicated in nearly every photo. I wasn't so impressed at first, but then realised a few of those amber bead ones, particularly in the galactic and a few other categories, had come out well. And it dawned on me that I was looking at something known to our paleolithic ancestors. Amber was popular item of jewellery for our ancients, empowering, protective, and beautiful. They were considered to be sun ray particles, and even the tears of nymphs, and to have magical potency. Anciently amber was sourced from Sicily, and then from the Baltic, and was as if gold in value. There was a amber trading route down through the rivers of Europe, now being recreated as a cycling track. Our ancients absolutely adored amber and those AI pictures were as if they were reaching out to me to show me this. The AI generated pictures were beautiful really, some of the third eye pendants even being marked with fossilised insects in them, as is often the way with some types of amber. My own chunky amber necklace I had got from the Tibetans in Dharamsala. In understanding how special this was to my ancestors I now appreciated it all the more. Carnelian beads, which I also have, from my friend Akila, given to me by her son after her death, were also loved by the ancients. Green jade, another much liked, was also to be found in Europe. Garnet, another bead necklace I have, was another popular with the ancients. And not to forget seashells, like the cowries I liked as a child, ivory (gifted to me by an uncle living in Africa), tusk and bone, and birds talons. The amber, I was so loving it. AI had revealed something to me there. It was my goddess cards which had urged me with this idea to glam up ethnically for the photos; an intent I could not have forseen. Looking more at amber in antiquity, wow, an amber head of Medusa was one of the engravings these jewels would have, with her snake hair, and anyway did that not speak really of plaits and dreadlocks, for which snake hair has always been a trend. Amber was dedicated to female divinities and amber objects would be buried with women and their children. So it was that amber was special to the divine feminine. Pliny wrote of amber that the French Celtic women wore amber necklaces, not only for adornment, but because of its medicinal properties, healing tonsillitis and other throat ailments. As I have seen it that babies in France are to this day gifted amber amulets, so it was in ancient times too. Christianity tried to put an end to all this, declaring it to be diabolic, due to amber being considered to have magical properties. Sometimes amber beads were tear drop shaped and sometimes crescent shaped. One large amber bead with the head of a gorgon, as in Medusa and her sisters, had around it the heads of humans and wild felines. It was written of old that a mother would bless amber in the sunlight every morning and then hang it around her childs neck, thereby keeping her child safe, healthy and alive. For the magic of amber to be accessed it would be touched, kissed, stroked and rubbed. Of prehistoric caves, amber has been found in the Aurensian and Isturitz caves of the Pyrenees, and interestingly in the Cheddar caves of England it has been found, where was found the Cheddar man whom I share quite some archeogenetic dna with, as well as in other British caves such as Cresswell Crags and Star Carr. In the Isturtz cave not only was amber found as a bead but also as a horses head. The Cheddar caves people also used seashells as ornamentation. In the Isturtz cave, in which Neanderthals had lived prior to more modern humans, there have been discovered to be cave paintings. Flutes made of bone and ivory have also been found, this being the first known prehistoric musical instruments.
Chris, of Watchwell House near Glastonbury, shared with me that on an ancient Greek urn, found in a Celtic burial site in France, at Vix, there is what appears to be a Kali style goddess depiction with lions and snakes and her tongue sticking out. The Black Madonnas of Europe may indeed have an old Kali connection, as the gypsies do see in the deity of Saint Sara at St Marie de la Mer. This urn of Vix, it has been proposed, was made in the workshops of southern Italy, where is the origin of my son George's fathers lineage. Not only does the lady of the urn have the Kali sticking out tongue, but she also has a third eye bindi. Her legs are depicted as snakes, for which it may be considered that she was a snake goddess or that her power was of kundalini. The urn was in itself a wine mixing pot, in which wine would be mixed with water, and this being the largest of its kind ever found, dated to around 500 BC. These wine pots were known as kraters and would have been placed in the middle of the room at a banquet. Archaeologists don't appear to have made a connection between Kali and the lady of the urn. Rather she is a gorgon, which was much used as a symbol by the ancient Greeks, her hair being of snakes, she who if gazed at may turn the observer to stone. Yes, her braids did look snake like on the urn. Medusa, of fame, is one of the gorgons. To wear the pendant of a gorgon is to have her protection, both Athena and Zeus having worn such pendants, which in itself reveals that the gorgons are remnants of more ancient goddesses and that their power was still recognised. She had wings and maybe tusks and her eyes were magical; and yes, snakes. As with Kali her power was terrifying to evil-doers, while she also protected those she loved.
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AuthorSusie Harrison and her hobby of genealogy, always looking into her own and her friends family trees. Categories
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