The great goddess : reverence of the divine feminine from the Paleolithic to the present / Jean Markale ; translated from the French by Jody Gladding.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Markale, Jean.

Standardized Title:

Grande déesse. English

Language:

English

French

Subjects (All):

Mother goddesses.

Physical Description:

266 pages : maps ; 23 cm

Edition:

First U.S. edition.

Place of Publication:

Rochester, Vt. : Inner Traditions, 1999.

Summary:

In ancient Babylon she was Anat, in Egypt, Isis and Hathor, Dana in Celtic Ireland, Rhea and Demeter in Greece, and in India, Anapurna the "Provider." She is the Great Goddess, the symbol of earth and the giver of life, the Vast Mother, who represented all the powers and mysteries of creation for our ancestors.

In this comprehensive exploration of the Goddess figure, Jean Markale, one of today's foremost Celtic historians, examines how over time patriarchal societies tried to force the preeminent power of the feminine into an obscure and subservient position, shifting her solar association onto masculine deities and discrediting those of her symbols, like the serpent, that could not be easily assimilated. With its extensive investigation of all the myths, sites, and sanctuaries devoted to this influential figure, The Great Goddess provides us with abundant evidence of the extraordinary permanence of her worship--even at the heart of those religions that tried to destroy her.

Markale explains how the Goddess did not simply disappear when her position was usurped, but went underground, resurfacing time and again in altered but distinctly recognizable forms. The great solar goddess of Celtic culture reappears as the mythical Grainne and in the well-known legend of Tristan and Iseult. Features of the primordial Lilith, relegated to darkness in rabbinical tradition, can be discerned in the incomprehensible Black Virgins of Christian sanctuaries. And one of the key figures of modern Christianity, the Virgin Mary, possesses all the characteristics of the ancient Mother Goddess: wisdom, beneficence, nurturance, and sacred sexuality. Whether in Ancient Egypt, the Roman Empire, Celtic Europe, or the present day, the goddess played, and continues to play, an integral part in society's need to connect with the source of all creation.

Contents:

Introduction: The Vast Mother 1

Part 1 Images and Sanctuaries of the Goddess

1. Our Lady of the Beginnings: The Paleolithic Period 48

2. Our Lady Under Ground: The Megalithic Epoch 61

3. The Eclipsed Virgin: The Bronze Age, the Celts, and the Gallo-Romans 80

4. The Triumph of the Mother: The Christian Middle Ages 104

5. The Eternal Return of the Divine Woman: The Sixteenth to Twentieth Centuries 123

6. The Sacred Places of Our Lady 133

Part 2 Our Lady in All Things

7. The Indian Subcontinent, the Far East, and the Americas 171

8. Ancient Egypt and the Near East 180

9. Greece and the Aegean Sea 191

10. Continental Europe 207

11. Far Western Europe 220.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

0892817151

OCLC:

42021409