The power of three is well known in many theories based
on physics, mathematics, and philosophy in the field of science.
In Ireland and throughout Wales and Scotland this power is
found in our legends with three-fold goddess, the three Brigit's,
and the three daughters of Eriu for which Ireland is named.
Our male heroes often travel in bands of three or are born
at the same moments that others of the same name are born.
Our ancestors placed the wisdom of our culture into forms
of three verses that were memorized and passed along in Oral
traditions. These verses were filled with relationships to
the earth and ways to guide ones daily life in accordance
with these laws, some of which were the Bretha Comaithchesa:
(Laws of the neighborhood) and the Welsh & Irish Triads.
The
triple spiral carved within the cairn at New Grange in the
Boyne Valley Ireland is perhaps becoming universally recognized.
This symbol conveys layers of meanings that continue &
evolve in organic ways to those who understand the language
living within these images. We now recognize the relationship
between art and the astronomy reflected in the presence of
engraved sundials, solar-lunar imagery and calendars that
are depicted. The triune of mind, body, soul are links to past,
present, future and even birth, death, rebirth provides essential
meaning for exploration. My personal understanding continues
to evolve as I become familiar with the layers of inter-connectness
existing between all in life. My original lesson with the
triple spiral at Newgrange came in 1959 on a cold Winter Solstice
morning, by invitation of my grandfather. We entered the cairn
in relative darkness and silently stood waiting for something
that was unknown to me to begin. When the red warm light began
to flood the darkness with its liquid gold, the movement toward
me was captivating. I had been placed in a specific spot located
directly across from the triple-spiral and it was there that
I saw the light stop momentarily focused upon the symbol,
with all the point marks that capture the light causing it
to wink and sparkle with life similar to the stars in the
night sky. I knew at that moment this space was a womb and
a place of birth and re-birth.
I have carried this knowledge with me over the years, watching
the theories from the various excavations and watching the
Boyne Valley become a tourist route of the 21st Century. I
have always stood on the threshold, between worlds, ready
at a moments notice to move in either direction, for this
is my relationship with sacred time and the consciousness
of here & there, spirit and otherworldly entities, between
and betwixt the veils of existence. I have learned how to
see between the worlds, a twilight vision offering views that
is a combining of both worlds, like the mixing of waters from
two sacred wells. I understand the fine delicate thread that
holds it all together is gently woven with each of our hands.
When we pull the thread this threatens cutting ; death, and
to follow the thread on means rebirth. This enchantment of
the otherworld has invited me deeper into the worlds that
lie beyond the normal attention of others. It has awakened
the inner knowledge living within my cells, a shape-shifting
energy from earth, to water, to air into fire. I have been
shown many times the births and re-births within the womb
of Newgrange. My eldest son was conceived in the early spring
of equinox and was born on winter solstice, as many generations
before have guided. I took him into this cairn at Winter Solstice
when he was young to show him what I had been given and he
immediately understood without language as I watched this
light & meaning fill him completely until he exclaimed
to me, " This too is my legacy !"
I have been shown that the bones of our ancestors were taken
and placed reverently into the large bowl at the time of birthing,
as an opportunity for the spirit of re-birth to occur. I had
read that the Grooved Ware People believed that the light
of Venus transferred the souls of the departed into the bodies
of the newborn. Looking at the work done at Bryn Celli Ddu
on Anglesey, built circa, 3,550 BCE, details the sophisticated
calendar, which can be used to indicate changing seasons.
This was used for creating & adjusting important elements
including the tides and length of day and the times of planting.
These will drift out of alignment when not regularly corrected
and its designers used the Venus Star to provide this means.
Venus appears as a morning star around the time of winter
solstice four years out of every eight, the remaining four
years it rises as an evening star and follows the setting
sun down. This cycle repeats itself exactly every 40 years.
This is the important work of Christopher Knight & Robert
Lomas.
In brief conclusion, it would seem that Bryn Celli Ddu was
designed for a small group of people to enter & observe
the solar and the Venus cycles with a great amount of accuracy.
Within the legends of the site are connections with the Irish
tribe of the Tuatha de Danann and Gwydion ap Don, who was
a Bard and learned man of science. This tribe is linked via
legend to the line of King David, through the daughter of
Zedekiah who according the legend made her home in the Hill
of Tara in Ireland.The site at Bryn Celi Ddu was one of many
schools of learning in the British Isles that was known around
the world at his time in our history.
When I discovered the work of Charles Ross and his experiment
where he arranged a lens in front of a wooden plank, so that
it focused the sun rays on the plank and burned a track on
the wood. Each day he put a new piece of wood in this holder
and after 366 consecutive days he plotted out the pattern
the sun's rays had burned into the planks. He found the resulting
shape was a perfect double spiral. Using what is termed an
Uriels Machine, which is nothing more than two straight sticks
to align the equinox shadows and mark out the center and the
sunrise & sunset. If those same two sticks are placed
in the ground a few feet apart, the sun will cast interesting
shadows over the course of a year. As the sun moves out from
spring equinox toward summer solstice it will trace a spiral
upon the ground, then it turns and retraces itself back to
the starting point of autumn equinox. A single spiral equals
three months time; so three spirals must equal nine months
time and this is the exact period of human gestation. The
triple spiral at Newgrange is cut into the great stone at
the entrance and onto the hidden part of the inner chamber,
where only the reflected light of Venus strikes.
This validated the information I had been given as a child
in this cairn!
The science was revealing the story I knew was truth. Women
entered this space ceremonially prior to the beginning of
labor to rest and create space within this womb cairn in preparation
for birth. There was in place a selection process to facilitate
the use of this space by all the tribes following the wheel
of the year. The tribe would camp on the nearby grounds waiting
in support and celebration of this mystery of birth/rebirth.
This sacred ceremony of birth links us to many other ancient
cultures in ways we still lack in understanding. Mating rituals
did exist and still do and these were inherited from our ancestors
and were a vital part of our seasonal rituals.
Next time you wander into the numerous stone cairns that reside
on the plains of Ireland, notice the inner shape is womb-like,
prepared in earth with fluid and curving shapes and not the
straight exact lines we know they also were capable of building.
The instructive ornamentations of great stone telling of astronomy,
calendars, and astrology along with imagery of ebbing &
flowing and the interrelationships existing within life itself.
These Cairns are familiar to the clan of women for they are
indeed shaped like our reproductive parts, the utereus, fallopian
tubes & ovaries with a long, dark birth canal to enter
from one world to the next.
I would love to know what this inspires within you and welcome
your comments.
S.Geoghegan
Email: Siofrageoghegan@yahoo.ie
Website:www.ancientgoddesspilgrimage.com
If you enjoyed the article above,
do check out these few goodies...
Spirit
and Practice of the Wise Woman Tradition
The
Goddess is Alive in Every Woman
The
Wise Woman Tradition is a Spiral
