Ancient Man in Britain

CHAPTER XIV

The World of Our Ancestors

"All Heals"—Influences of Cardinal Points—The Four Red Divisions of the World—The Black North, White South, Purple East, and Dun or Pale East—Good and Bad Words connected with South and North—North the left, South the right, East in front, and West behind—Cardinal Points Doctrine in Burial Customs—Stone Circle Burials—Christian and Pagan Burial Rites—Sunwise Customs—Raising the Devil in Stone Circle—Coloured Winds—Coloured Stones raise Winds—The "God Body" and "Spirit Husk"—Deities and Cardinal Points—Axis of Stonehenge Avenue—God and Goddesses of Circle—Well Worship—Lore of Druids.

The ancient superstitions dealt with in the previous chapter afford us glimpses of the world in which our ancestors lived, and some idea of the incentives that caused them to undertake long and perilous journeys in search of articles of religious value. They were as greatly concerned as are their descendants about their health and their fate. Everything connected with the deity, or possessing, as was believed, the influence of the deity, was valuable as a charm or as medicine. The mistletoe berry was a famous medicine because it was the fruit of a parasite supposed to contain the "life substance" of a powerful deity. It was an "All Heal" or "Cure All",154 yet it was a quack medicine and quite useless. Red earth was "blood earth"; it contained the animating principle too. Certain herbs were supposed to be curative. Some herbs were, and in the course of time their precise qualities were identified. But many of them continued in use, although quite useless, because of the colour of their berries, the shape of their leaves, or the position in which they grew. If one red-berried plant was "lucky" or curative, all red-berried plants shared in its reputation. It was because of the lore attached to colours that dusky pearls were preferred to white pearls, just as in Ceylon yellow pearls are chiefly favoured because yellow is the sacred colour of the Buddhists. Richard of Cirencester,155 referring to Bede, says that British pearls are "often of the best kind and of every colour: that is, red, purple, violet, green, but principally white".

In the lore of plants, in religious customs, including burial customs, and in beliefs connected with the seasons, weather, and sacred sites, there are traces of a doctrine based on the belief that good or bad influences "flowed" from the cardinal points, just as good or bad influences "flowed" from gems, metals, wood, and water. When, for instance, certain herbs were pulled from the ground, it was important that one should at the time of the operation be facing the south. A love-enticing plant had to be plucked in this way, and immediately before sunrise.

There was much superstition in weather lore, as the beliefs connected with St. Swithin's Day indicate. Certain days were lucky for removals in certain directions. Saturday was the day for flitting northward, and Monday for flitting southward. Monday was "the key of the week". An old Gaelic saying, repeated in various forms in folk stories, runs:

South-running water was "powerful" for working protective charms; north-running water brought evil.

Diagram of the Gaelic Airts (Cardinal Points) and their Associated Colours referred to in the text

Spring was connected with the east, summer with the south, autumn with the west, and winter with the north.

The idea behind these and other similar beliefs was that "the four red divisions" or the "four brown divisions" of the world were controlled by deities or groups of deities, whose influences for good or evil were continually "flowing", and especially when winds were blowing. A good deity sent a good wind, and a bad deity sent a bad wind. Each wind was coloured. The north was the airt156 (cardinal point) of evil, misfortune, and bad luck, and was coloured black; the south was the source of good luck, good fortune, summer, and longevity, and was coloured white; the east was a specially sacred airt, and was coloured purple-red, while the west was the airt of death, and was coloured dun or pale. East and south and north and west were connected. There were various colours for the subsidiary points of the compass.

This doctrine was a very ancient one, because we find that in the Gaelic language the specially good words are based on the word for the south, and the specially bad ones on the name for the north. In Welsh and Gaelic the north is on the left hand and the south on the right hand, the east in front, and the west behind. It is evident, therefore, that the colour scheme of the cardinal points had a connection with sun worship. A man who adored the rising sun faced the east, and had the north on his left and the south on his right. In early Christian Gaelic literature it is stated that on the Day of Judgment the goats (sinners) will be sent to the north (the left hand) and the sheep (the justified) to the south (the right hand).

The same system can be traced in burial customs. Many of the ancient graves lie east and west. Graves that lie north and south may have been those of the members of a different religious cult, but in some cases it is found that the dead were placed in position so that they faced the east. In the most ancient graves in Egypt men were laid on their right sides with their feet directed towards the "red north" and their faces towards the golden east. Women were laid on the left sides facing the east. Red was in ancient Egypt the male colour, and white and yellow the female colours; the feet of the men were towards the red north and those of women towards the white or yellow south.

All ancient British burials were not made in accordance with solar-cult customs. It can be shown, however, in some cases that, although a burial custom may appear to be either of local or of independent origin, the fundamental doctrine of which it was an expression was the same as that behind other burial customs. Reference may be made, by way of illustration, to the graves at the stone circle of Hakpen Hill in the Avebury area. In the seventeenth century a large number of skeletons were here unearthed. Dr. Toope of Oxford, writing in 1685, has recorded in this connection:157

"About 80 yards from where the bones were found is a temple,158 40 yards diameter, with another 15 yards; round about bones layd so close that scul (skull) toucheth scul. Their feet all round turned towards the temple, one foot below the surface of the ground. At the feet of the first order lay the head of the next row, the feet always tending towards the temple."

Here the stone circle is apparently the symbol of the sun and the "Mecca" from which the good influence or "luck" of the sun emanated and gave protection. One seems to come into touch with the influence of an organized priesthood in this stone circle burial custom.

The more ancient custom of burying the dead so that the influences of the airts might be exercised upon them according to their deserts seems, however, to have been deep-rooted and persistent. In England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland the custom obtained until recently of reserving the north side of a churchyard for suicides and murderers; the "black north" was the proper place for such wrong-doers, who were refused Christian rites of burial, and were interred according to traditional pagan customs. The east was reserved chiefly for ecclesiastics, the south for the upper classes, and the west for the poorer classes. Funeral processions still enter the older churchyards from the east, and proceed in the direction of the sun towards the open graves. Suicides and murderers were carried in the opposite direction ("withershins about").159 The custom of dealing out cards "sunwise", of stirring food "sunwise", and other customs in which turning to the right (the south) is observed, appear to be relics of the ancient belief in the influences of the airts. Some fishermen still consider it unlucky to turn their boats "against the sun". It was anciently believed, as references in old ballads indicate, that a tempest-stricken vessel turned round three times against the sun before it sank. According to a belief that has survival in some parts of the north of Scotland, the devil will appear in the centre of a stone circle if one walks round it three times "against the sun" at midnight. Among the ancient Irish warriors, Professor W. J. Watson tells me, it was a mark of hostile intent to drive round a fort keeping the left hand towards it. The early Christian custom of circulating chapels and dwelling-houses "sunwise" was based on the pagan belief that good influences were conjured in this way.

As the winds were coloured like the airts from which they blew, it was believed that they could be influenced by coloured objects. In his description of the Western Isles, Martin, a seventeenth century writer, referring to the Fladda Chuan Island, relates:

"There is a chapel in the isle dedicated to St. Columba. It has an altar in the east end and therein a blue stone of a round form on it, which is always moist. It is an ordinary custom, when any of the fishermen are detained in the isle by contrary winds, to wash the blue stone with water all round, expecting thereby to procure a favourable wind.... And so great is the regard they have for this stone, that they swear decisive oaths upon it."

Valentine

ONE OF THE GREAT TRI-LITHONS, STONEHENGE

(see page 174)

The moist stone had an indwelling spirit, and was therefore a holy object which made vows and agreements of binding character. In Japan a stone of this kind is called shintai ("god body"). The Gaelic name for a god body is "cuach anama" ("soul shrine", or "spirit-case", or "spirit-husk"). Coich na cno is the shell of a nut. The Chinese believe that moist and coloured stones are the "eggs" of weather-controlling dragons.

The connection between blue and the mother goddess is of great antiquity. Imitation cowries and other shells in blue enamelled terra-cotta have been found in Egyptian graves. Blue was the colour of the "luck stone" of Hathor, the sky and water goddess whose symbols included the cowrie. The Brigantes of ancient Britain had, according to Seneca, blue shields. Shields were connected with the goddess of war. In Gaelic, blue is the luck colour for womens' clothing.160 English and Scottish fishermen still use blue as a mourning colour. When a death takes place, a blue line is painted round a fishing-boat. The desire for protection by invoking the blue goddess probably gave origin to this custom.

As influences came from the coloured airts, so did the great deities and the groups of minor deities associated with them. The god Lugh, for instance, always comes in the old stories from the north-east, while the goddess Morrigan comes from the north-west.161 The fierce wind-raising Scottish goddess of spring comes from the south-west. All over Britain the fairies come from the west and on eddies of wind like the Greek nereids. In Scotland the evil-working giants come from the black north. It was believed that the dead went westward or south-westward towards Paradise. The fact that the axis of Stonehenge circle and avenue points to the north-east is of special interest when we find that the god Lugh, a Celtic Apollo, came from that airt. Either Lugh, or a god like him, may have been invoked to come through the avenue or to send his influence through it, while the priests walked in procession round the circle sunwise. Apparently the south-west part of the circle, with its great trilithons, resembling the portals of the goddess Artemis, was specially consecrated to a goddess like the Scottish Cailleach ("Old Wife") who had herds of wild animals, protected deer from huntsmen, raised storms, and transformed herself into a standing stone. The Gaulish goddess Ro-smerta ("very smeared") is regularly associated with the god identified with Mercury. The god Smertullis is equated with Essus (the war god) by d'Arbois de Jubainville.

The differently coloured winds were divine influences and revealed their characters by their colours. It was apparently because water was impregnated with the influences of the deities that wind and water beliefs were closely associated. Holy and curative wells and sacred rivers and lakes were numerous in ancient Britain and Ireland. Offerings made at wells were offerings made to a deity. These offerings might be gold and silver, as was the case in Gaul, or simply pins of copper. A good many wells are still known as "pin wells" and "penny wells". The metals and pearls and precious stones supposed to contain vital substance were offered to the deities so as to animate them. The images of gods were painted red for the same reason, or sacrifices were offered and their altars drenched with blood. In Ireland children were sacrificed to a god called Crom Cruach and exchanged for milk and corn. As a Gaelic poem records:

The ancient doctrines of which faint or fragmentary traces survive in Britain and Ireland may have been similar to those taught by the Druids in Gaul. According to Pomponius Mela, these sages professed to know the secrets of the motions of the heavenly bodies and the will of the gods.162 Strabo's statement that the Druids believed that "human souls and the world were immortal, but that fire and water would sometime prevail" is somewhat obscure. It may be, however, that light is thrown on the underlying doctrine by the evidence given in the next chapter regarding the beliefs that fire, water, and trees were intimately connected with the chief deity.

CHAPTER XV

Why Trees and Wells were Worshipped

Ancient British Idols—Pagan Temples—Animism and Goddess Worship—Trees and Wells connected with Sky—Life Principle in Water—Sacred Berries, Nuts, and Acorns—Parasite as "King of Trees"—Fire-making Beliefs—Tree and Thunder-god—The Sacred Fish—Salmon as form of the Dragon—The Dragon Jewel—Celtic Dragon Myth—The Salmon and the Solar Ring—Polycrates Story—The St. Mungo Legends—Glasgow Coat of Arms—Holy Fire from the Hazel—Hunting the Wren, Robin, and Mouse—Mouse Lore and Mouse Deity—Mouse-Apollo in Britain—Goddess Bride or Brigit—The Brigantian Chief Deity—Goddess of Fire, Healing, Smith-work, and Poetry—Bride's Bird, Tree, and Well—Mythical Serpents—Soul Forms—Souls in Reptiles, Animals, and Trees—Were-animals—The Butterfly Deity—Souls as Butterflies—Souls as Bees—a Hebridean Sea-god.

Gildas, a sixth-century churchman, tells us that the idols in ancient Britain "almost surpassed in number those of Egypt". That he did not refer merely to standing stones, which, as we have seen, were "idols" to the Gaels, is evident from his precise statements that some idols could be seen in his day "mouldering away within or without the deserted temples", and that they had "stiff and deformed features". "Mouldering" suggests wood. Gildas states further that besides worshipping idols the British pagans were wont to pay "divine honour" to hills and wells and rivers. Reference is made in the Life of Columba to a well which was worshipped as a god.

The British temples are referred to also by Pope Gregory the Great, who in a.d. 601 addressed a letter to Abbot Mellitus, then on a mission to England, giving him instructions for the guidance of Augustine of Canterbury. The Pope did not wish to have the heathen buildings destroyed, "for", he wrote, "if those are well constructed, it is requisite that they can be converted from the worship of demons to the service of the true God.... Let the idols that are in them be destroyed."163

The temples in question may have been those erected during the Romano-British period. One which stood at Canterbury was taken possession of by St. Augustine after the conversion of King Ethelbert, who had worshipped idols in it. The Celtic peoples may, however, have had temples before the Roman invasion. At any rate there were temples as well as sacred groves in Gaul. Poseidonius of Apamea refers to a temple at Toulouse which was greatly revered and richly endowed by the gifts of numerous donors. These gifts included "large quantities of gold consecrated to the gods". The Druids crucified human victims who were sacrificed within their temples.

Diodorus Siculus refers as follows to a famous temple in Britain:

"There is in that island a magnificent temple of Apollo and a circular shrine, adorned with votive offerings and tablets with Greek inscriptions suspended by travellers upon the walls. The kings of that city and rulers of the temples are the Boreads who take up the government from each other according to the order of their tribes. The citizens are given up to music, harping and chaunting in honour of the sun."

Some writers have identified this temple with Stonehenge circle. Layamon informs us in his Brute, however, that the temple of Apollo was situated in London. Of course there may have been several temples to this god or the British deity identified with him.

It may be that the stone circles were regarded as temples. It may be, too, that temples constructed of wattles and clay were associated with the circles. In Pope Gregory's letter reference is made to the custom of constructing on festival days "tabernacles of branches of trees around those churches which have been changed from heathen temples", and to the pagan custom of slaying "oxen in sacrifices to demons". Pytheas refers to a temple on an island opposite the mouth of the Loire. This island was inhabited by women only, and once a year they unroofed and reroofed their temple. In the Hebrides the annual custom of unroofing and reroofing thatched houses is not yet obsolete; it may originally have had a religious significance.

Gildas's reference to the worship of hills, wells, and rivers is by some writers regarded as evidence of the existence in ancient Britain of the "primitive belief" in spirits. This stage of religious culture is called Animism (Spiritism). The discovery, however, that a goddess was worshipped in Aurignacian times by the Crô-Magnon peoples in Western Europe suggests that Animistic beliefs were not necessarily as ancient as has been assumed. It may be that what we know as Animism was a product of a later period when there arose somewhat complex ideas about the soul or the various souls in man, and the belief became widespread that souls could not only transform themselves into animal shapes, but could enter statues and gravestones. This conception may have been confused with earlier ideas about stones, shells, &c., being impregnated with "life substance" (the animating principle) derived from the mother goddess. Backward peoples, who adopted complex religious beliefs that had grown up in centres of civilization, may not always have had a complete understanding of their significance. It is difficult to believe that even savages, who adopted the boats invented in Egypt from those peoples that came into touch with them, were always entirely immune to other cultural influences, and retained for thousands of years the beliefs supposed to be appropriate for those who were in the "Stone Age".