(A version of this story first appeared in 'Mountain Music'. To see
the full narrative of 'The Voyage of the Bloody, Snake Chariot' see
www.libbyhome.blogspot.com )
The oldest and most joyous celebrations/festivals are those that mark
the end of the dead season and the rebirth of life around the time of
the spring equinox. These celebrations/festivals, often are centered
around a re-occurring theme (an archetype). This archetype is of the
dying, sojourning in the underworld and then being reborn with the
spring - gods/goddesses. And these joyous celebrations/festivals often
have a dark side.
These gods'/goddesses' deaths/rebirths coincide with the deaths and
rebirths of life in general but specifically are focused on the
deaths/rebirths of vital agricultural foods such as barley, corn and
grapes.The gods/goddesses become the personification of the food
plant.
Barley was the most important food crop in Northern Europe until the
16th Century. The old English folk song 'John Barleycorn Must Die' ,
(popularized in the modern world by the band Traffic) is the personalization of
the pagan Anglo-Saxon god of the barley, Beowa, whose name is the old
Anglo-Saxon word for barley.
In the song John Barleycorn is made to suffer the way the barley plant
is made to suffer through the stages of its cultivation, such as its
harvesting and threshing. But the last verse of the song speaks of the
revenge of the god of the barley's spirit which resides in the beer
and brandy made from his body - the hangover.
'And little Sir John in the nut brown bowl (beer vessel)
Proved the stronger man at last
And the huntsman he can't hunt the fox
Nor so loudly blow his horn
And the tinker he can't mend kettles and pots
Without a little of Barleycorn.'
The song alludes to the primal realities of the human condition and in
particular the annual sacrifice of the Barley King.
The men of the ancient Anglo-Saxon tribes, every year, would choose
among themselves the man who would be the Barley King.This man would
be treated as a king, for a year, until the planting of the barley,
sometime around the spring equinox.. Then the Barley King would
carefully dance amidst the freshly planted barley. Then he would be
quickly, violently, bloodily killed, his body dragged between the rows
of barley so his blood would run in the fields' furrows - so that the
barley would grow.
The Barley King's body was then eaten during the fertility feast that
followed and the next Barley King took his place.
In the Americas the agricultural gods and goddesses of death and
rebirth personalized the corn crop.
In the Creek Indian myth of the origins of corn, the Corn Woman
Goddess is an old woman who appears to be in all ways mortal, except
that every day she produces these abundant, delicious meals of corn.
Her family has no idea where the food is coming from. One night her
sons spy on her. In the various versions of the myth the sons find
that the corn is being transformed and produced from the old woman
scraping her sores or scabs, or cutting her nails, or from the water
that washes her feet, or even from the old woman's feces. In all
versions of the myth, the origin of the old woman's corn is something
so disgusting that her family refuses to eat the corn.
The Corn Woman Goddess then tells her sons to clear a large plot of
land, and then to quickly, violently bloodily kill her, and then drag
her body around the clearing seven times. This the sons do and where
the old womans blood splashed or fell, seven months later, there the
sons found corn.
In the Penobscot Indian myth of the Corn Mother, she is the first
goddess of the people, before the people filled the land. But when the
people fill the land they kill all the animals and there is no food.
The Corn Mother tells her husband to quickly, violently bloodily kill
her and then to have her sons drag her dead body on cleared ground by
her long, silky hair, until her flesh is torn off, scraped off of her
bones. Seven months latter they find corn where the flesh of the Corn
Mother had been scraped off her bones.
Bacchus/Dionysus was violently killed as is the grape in the process
of making wine. His body was torn into pieces, he sojourned in the
underworld, and challenged the powers-that-be that he found there and
then he is reborn in the first shoots of the grape vine.
The Romans celebrated the Bacchanalia, on March 16 and 17th, to
celebrate the rebirth of the god, the rebirth of the grape.
In the Bacchanalia Bacchus/Dionysus is celebrated as the god of
spring, of fertility, of new life, merriment, mirth, wine, and
revelry. The god was celebrated with drunkenness and orgies.
The Jesus Christ of conventional Christianity shares most of the
attributes of these suffering/dying/rebirthing agricultural gods. Easter was the
first Christian holiday, and in many places the myth of the death and
rebirth of Christ was superimposed on pagan holidays and festivals
that celebrated the rebirth of the suffering/dying gods/goddesses of the
cultivation.
[read blog-style -- first entry at bottom of page]