More about the golden bees
Mar. 16th, 2009 01:32 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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queensthiefI was just skimming through an article on Demeter and Persephone, and came across this:
"The priestesses of Demeter at Eleusis were called melissae, "bees," "producers of sweetness." Perhaps they saw their role as helping bring forth the fruitfulness of the Earth Mother, drawing from her the sweet sustenance of their living. The bee was also sacred to Artemis of Ephesus; her chief priest was called Essen, "bee." Priestesses of Cybele were named Bees. The oracular priestess of Delphi was called Bee. And deborah, the Hebrew word for bee, was also the name of the most well-known woman prophet of Israel. Plato likened the souls of lyric poets to bees, as "light and winged and holy," "bring[ing] songs from honeyed fountains." Bee goddesses, priestesses or queens, honeycombs and beehives are found in the artwork of Tiryns, Mycenae, Delphi and Crete. The "tholos" tombs of Anatolia, Crete and Greece are shaped in the form of the beehive. It appears that the lives of nectar-gathering bees, "fed on honey fresh, food of the gods divine," and housed in well-structured communal societies centered about a queen, were seen by peoples of the ancient Goddess cultures as exemplary of a good life." (Keller, Mara Lynn. "The Eleusinian Mysteries of Demeter and Persephone: Fertility, Sexuality, and Rebirth." Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, Vol. 4, No. 1 (Spring, 1988) if you have access to JSTOR and want to read the whole article)
I couldn't help but think that all of those references would be things Attolia would want to evoke. What a perfect symbol for earrings for a queen who needs to subtly emphasize her power and her right to rule. Not to mention, the story of (um, I'm blanking here and my books are elsewhere) Hespira (?) that Eddis tells Gen and the Magus in QoA (which parallels Gen and Irene's story) is a riff on the Demeter and Persephone story. :D
Anyhoo, back to the grindstone for me.
"The priestesses of Demeter at Eleusis were called melissae, "bees," "producers of sweetness." Perhaps they saw their role as helping bring forth the fruitfulness of the Earth Mother, drawing from her the sweet sustenance of their living. The bee was also sacred to Artemis of Ephesus; her chief priest was called Essen, "bee." Priestesses of Cybele were named Bees. The oracular priestess of Delphi was called Bee. And deborah, the Hebrew word for bee, was also the name of the most well-known woman prophet of Israel. Plato likened the souls of lyric poets to bees, as "light and winged and holy," "bring[ing] songs from honeyed fountains." Bee goddesses, priestesses or queens, honeycombs and beehives are found in the artwork of Tiryns, Mycenae, Delphi and Crete. The "tholos" tombs of Anatolia, Crete and Greece are shaped in the form of the beehive. It appears that the lives of nectar-gathering bees, "fed on honey fresh, food of the gods divine," and housed in well-structured communal societies centered about a queen, were seen by peoples of the ancient Goddess cultures as exemplary of a good life." (Keller, Mara Lynn. "The Eleusinian Mysteries of Demeter and Persephone: Fertility, Sexuality, and Rebirth." Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, Vol. 4, No. 1 (Spring, 1988) if you have access to JSTOR and want to read the whole article)
I couldn't help but think that all of those references would be things Attolia would want to evoke. What a perfect symbol for earrings for a queen who needs to subtly emphasize her power and her right to rule. Not to mention, the story of (um, I'm blanking here and my books are elsewhere) Hespira (?) that Eddis tells Gen and the Magus in QoA (which parallels Gen and Irene's story) is a riff on the Demeter and Persephone story. :D
Anyhoo, back to the grindstone for me.
no subject
Date: 3/16/09 02:54 pm (UTC)Great job with this, madly awesome.
*wonders if the Magus will find another version of the story involving BEES...*
no subject
Date: 3/16/09 04:10 pm (UTC)A link to the article.. click on pdf file to view. On page 33
http://www.jstor.org/stable/25002068?cookieSet=1
no subject
Date: 3/16/09 05:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 3/16/09 07:11 pm (UTC)really has no clue what ppl see, so i ask. oo i see another source, hum gives up attempting.
anyways nice catch.
no subject
Date: 3/16/09 07:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 3/16/09 05:28 pm (UTC)