Glen Cailleach “Winter Hag” stones shelter in their shieling during coldest months—over Imbolc (Feb.2)—as storms rage 3 months until their priest/ess/guardians come to return them Beltane (May 1) to their original shrine. This lies within shouting distance of the Fortingall Yew, 5000-years old (oldest tree in Europe) supported in its drystane cell within the kirkyard, itself an early Pictish monastic cell.
Glen Lyon is the longest enclosed glen & loch in Scotland. Its earliest pagan inhabitants had complete control over who could enter. It is a tributary of the River Tay.
Widening construction of the Victorian dam at its head was turned down last year after overwhelming local support and protest, and the Glen itself is now a National Historical Monument!
There is a tradition of ‘special stones’ in this part of Perthshire that included charms and healing stones. RCAHMS excavations have found groups of very similar water-worn stones in Glen Quaich, and they are known to be part of a wider culture. Similar stones can be found on Fortingall kirk gateposts, guarding entry to a pre-Christian site.
Local resident quoted her aunt telling how young people would “process up the glens to these high places to give offerings at Samhain, Imbolc or solstice, to appease the ‘Winter Hag,’” as she called her, so the winter would be kinder to man and beast…she (her aunt) said that those who understand would still observe these places and occasions, but had to do it secretly or under guise of something else. [Kirk disapproval]
“The stones have clearly remained in memory and probably in active, if perhaps intermittent, tradition for hundreds of years.” Gavin MacGregor Central Highlands archaeologist. Background from 2011 post in my Devorguila blog
At the head of Glen Lyon, hidden away from the unseeing eyes of modern man–and his pragmatic concepts of our pre-Celtic sacred past–is a pre-Christian shrine whose tradition has been maintained through the centuries. A sacred ritual, kept from time immemorial–and still maintained to this day on Beltane and Samhain (May Day and ‘All Hallows’) by a few descendants–ensures that the Crooked Stones of the Black Glen (Gaelic,Gleann Dubh nan Garbh Clac) come out of their hole into the sunshine of summer and return to their hole for winter months. That ‘hole’ is the sacred bosom of the Earth Mother herself whose traditions long pervaded pre-Celtic culture of the North Britons. When Christianity came to the northern shores, some of these traditions were shielded from prying eyes–but ritual continued–other traditions were ‘lost’.
“On the Feast Day of Bride
The serpent shall come from its hole I shall…
Janus, Etruscan god of foresight & hindsight, immortalized in month of January in Roman Julian calendar, was given utmost respect at the turn of the year. Two thousand years after height of Roman power in the ‘colonies’, we are learning to become a single world nation, working our tech expertise for good: renewing and rewilding the forests, repairing and electronically reconditioning the ancient and the broken. Rethinking climate change, human footprint, messages to (and from) the stars.
Planetary response?
To astrologers, New Age prophets and ET buffs, the vast change in Kilauea’s volcanic trickle in 2018 to December 2020’s explosive eruption and creation of a lava lake—USGS’s “dome fountain”—seemed like a sign of [Aquarian Age] phenomena. More to come.
Saddle Bags full of Old Stuff, Camping Out in the New
MONTHLY CAMPFIRE CHAT CORNER FOR WRITERS, INSECURE OR OTHERWISE, BLOGGERS UNLIMITED
Janus Effect— Riding into the New on an Old Horse
Janus, an Etruscan god, borrowed by Romans for their first month of reformed Julian calendar, which previously began March—equinox. The god is pictured, right, as a young man looking forward, old man looking back.
Angels, far right, were invoked to guide the army through battle, horses blessed as bearers of essential supplies
Emperor Trajan, A.D.98-117, seen left, creator of Trajan’s Column in the Roman Forum, used his power as Optimus Princeps to erect a 1st-century video documentary in STONE of his successful campaigns in subduing barbarians throughout the Empire, being offered beheaded captives
Trajan’s column in Rome, erected after successful Dacian campaign, portrays Rome’s omnipotence in all things martial—barbarians always defeated by superior Roman knowhow/weaponry/transportation
Lots of writers use a nom de plume to distinguish between their personae – it’s the way publishing works. Blogs, too. What choice, what abundance: we can be guided by all our Muses and still retain our integrity (who doubts it?)if we are prone to take one persona more seriously than another. For this blog I become this particular blogger because the material is time-sensitive; the research is all coming together now and our way forward is mapped. That said, it’s up to us whether we take the information and run with it.
The Stellar Perspective
Youngblood Blog 