Pre-Christian cultural heritage

This is a summary of pre-Christian cultural heritage. Shown as fragments of the society's organization, calendar, myths and whatever each characteristic for Anglo-Scandinavia before the church took over. In plain language 5000 years of culture before latinizing

Time as leader

The flying time from Sicily… credit to P.Guyou

The picture is admittedly from late period but holds of course what existed in the ethnic memory. The time seems to have as well wings as legs and there are also horns and legs as snakes as symbol of opposite asterisms. We understand doubtless that the sun runs or flies away with the day. It is idea of triskele/ swastika and there exists examples with the swastika drawn in the same way. In particular swastika exists at least 7000 years ago in the whole Old World.

That fights against what we learnt us in school about primitive people during the stone age when we see that they were equally affixed to time as we are when we look at our watch and follow precipices in the pad. Or as global directors have several watches and a "planner" in the pocket in order to square in the time. Actually, we can finished the request here with saying that the high god/idol was Time until the church took over with bells and ritual programmes for the whole year… remembers that grandmother read every day and followed the church year as all religious have done in all times. The difference is that before the Christianity people followed the local ritual the year where the time was high judge. We should remember that until 19 / 20^th century great majority lived at the countryside and followed the natural year.

… Here the dots/ cupmarks marks "second half" of year. The time can only be measured by being compared with a firm reference. Very early they symbolised time as a river and used boats to animate space-time i.e. what happens in a certain amount of time. One has to know when the period starts and when it ends since time is an endless loop. It is just natural to part the year in four after equinoxes and solstices. A loose symbol can naturally be used only when we know its use and when it is related to some known fact or here like the additional known marks.

The "naked" symbol does not tell much and we have to guess what it is about. But as soon as we know it is turning round or there are something showing the movement and direction we get a clue. Therefore there has been so many speculation since we see seldom the context and the simple sense "the sun year's division in four". Here, we get from the cupmarks and we understand other half-year and that it indicates the leg at Ramadan that was the important event of synchronising moon year with sun year and make the half year division. Next stage is to tie the symbol or the idea to a physical world. They saw that the sun stands in certain directions at equinoxes and heights of the sun at solstices. In India they invented and followed naksatras i.e. the lunations

In Scandinavian passage graves we find the crossed circle in 4^th millennium and after that it was used as symbol of "time" since it could mean a year as well as half year and a quarter and the symbol KA/ GO. Similar is the crossed footprint that animate one stands in a certain direction, i.e. toward south mostly and have the night sky in original quarters as a bowl above your head. One has to know how the "bowl" moves above your head.

It early became a convention to tie the season's beginning to the vernal equinox where the sun ascends exactly in east only a day of the year. At least in some places it is still beginning of growing season depending on the local climate of course. The monsoon countries and Egypt has three seasons and we see the trisection at Ireland and in Bretagne in 4^th millennium. All this straight forward but how many knows the today?

Since long times they followed the lunations. The new invention was to synchronise with the sun year's around 365 days/nights that is covered with 12 lunations and 11 days. It seems to have been a gigantic step all over the world to get order in time. Naturally it is like connecting the sun and the moon and mentally sees they are strictly related and there is order in universe. Once one has a calendar it is like predicting future

There are finds from the caves 10 - 20000 years that tells they followed the moon. The moon symbolise rains and fertility as for example La Madeleine and the Naked with the moon horn in Lascaux … there are almost same symbolism for the season in Skaane's rock carvings of 4^th millennium. With the cultivation came the need for planning and regulating the season and they created the Animal Round with symbolism for that around 4000 BC. The ritual implied "go-to-Underworld" and in West Europe the megalith dolmens were used as symbolic door to Underworld. The Moon Lady goes beneath at spring equinox and she is supposed to ascend again as the water in plants. That was the practical astronomy supported by people in procession learning to follow the lead during the season … mankind is natural anarchist so it may not have been easy in the beginning.

In advanced cultures we usually see similar symbolising when it comes to practical astronomy. However they also influenced smaller tribes so that we for instance find the same symbols as far as Lapland. The Meso-American calendar starts at ca. 3100 BC at the same time as the so-called first dynasty in Egypt … see macehead . In Sweden two series of grind groves starts at the same time and they are tied to the first full moon after vernal equinox when it was in Antares of Scorpio. They symbolise it as tree-way- meeting of sun; star and moon tied to the earth. From few facts we can decide that there was a world-wide idea simultaneously. The enigma is how the ideas was spread and innovated. I guess there was some renewing in some places since the ritual is older than that

There is the question about seeing the difference between on map and territory. Most often, we speak about sun and moon instead for the true abstracted time with celestial bodies as counters and dividers. Northern rock-carvings are the gateway to understanding how they described space-time with ships, circles, foot signs and so on an intelligent way. In this context, we try to understand the true role of idols/archetypes and symbols. The symbols are most often an icon in same meaning as the computer language where it stands for a function or a programme. No reason to speculate in magic, animism or occult ritual so long we can to see rational and intelligent reasoning behind it all. We have to tie it to reality at the time.

Heritage from Elam and Sumer

Picture stone from Engelstrup NW Zealand. The upper boat has the moon dog Rahu and maybe it is the winter season. Under the boat Inanna with her consort. She with spread legs transfers grain/ water to sister Ereshkigal, the pregnant in Underworld sometimes symbolised by the snake/ womb. Her sister is the dot between the spread legs

This scene copies a Sumerian seal but with Ereshkigal seen in lying figure and they are vulva to vulva. That is because they analysed motherhood step by step and this is sowing and pregnancy. The couple is found on many rocks alternatively only she with spread legs and sometimes belonging to a suite of seven. The suite is the civilisation's basis where the people learned physically to go in procession and to link it to season's works. Inannas suite is found from Lapland in north to Denmark in south. … see Inanna

Traditionally we speak about Sumer as source but the late research shows that perhaps rather Elam on the Persian side is the real early engine in culture 5^th to 4^th millennium. We should mention that remains of the world's oldest known high sea ship they found in Kuwait and it is from 5^th millennium. So we can only guess about very early trade from Persian Gulf. The building style in early Saqqara copies the walls of big buildings in Susa and they seem to be the oldest in Egypt. Earlier they maybe build wooden temples. There is also a statue that looks very Mesopotamian man with long beard dressed in long shirt and the shape is found as idol at early Naqada … The Negroid people copied the long beard that developed to the loose beard at pharaohs much later.

In Mt Sin-ai there is evidence that Mesopotamians were mining turquoise and copper middle 4^th millennium and they have found a simple moon temple. The Gebel el Araq knife illustrates a sea battle with men in long shirt and Sumerian type boats with new moon as standard. In the Delta they have also found a so-called kuddurru boundary stone with signs from the early Animal Round. … see also macehead

Like in Sumerian Eridu the archaeology layers from the early times are many meters under the surface and one should be lucky to dig at a place with significant finds. I think future will bring us much data about these early times. … Scandinavia has only one find they think came from Elam. It is the Gullrum comb from, Gotland with goat-head on one side and man-head on the other.

It is hard to recognise the real origin of the Mesopotamian myths since they are mixed Elam, Sumer and Akkad before the Babylonians that copied it all. Fore instance there are several moon deities Inanna, Sin, Nergal, Nanna however they were not at use in one place at a time. Mesopotamia consisted of city-states with their special town deities. It seems that Sin the moon god came from Elam. The Midwives came from Elam and the myths tell about goddesses that were like Mother Invention That is because fertility is the main topic and it would be natural using female animation … in spite of what modern macho men think.

Archaeology on Elam is mostly from later times and the culture is best known from the time when the Assyrians destroyed Elam to put in new religion. A modern excavator writes, "Elam characterised by uncommon reverence and respect for womanhood" (!) and a common symbol was a snake curled round a Tree of Life. The goddesses were worshipped in sacred groves.

Here we can notice that the writer has seemingly Christian and modern macho eyes and he is astonished of the status of women in early days. The Snake around the Tree of Life is not pagan in Christian use, however Christianity have lost the understanding of fertility as something natural that makes universe living. At least in Scandinavia I would say we generally respect women, however it was better in my young days at the countryside. ... see also Voluspa below.

The Mesopotamian literature is the source to the understanding of rock-carvings and megaliths in the culture's dawn. I do my best to integrate myth, figurative art/ rock-carvings, megaliths and archaeology to my description of the past. We are fortunate to have the rock-carvings in Scandinavia and the megaliths especially in Carnac and at Ireland. We can see them as moon temple with intensive use at places with agriculture. Else they were maybe used for funeral. Swedish archaeology makes too many categories of the megalith buildings and think they are different. But I would bet that the ritual was similar in dolmen and passage graves and see the types as changing fashion … see Carnac and Ireland

Sargon is called the first "world ruler" since he united or conquered Mesopotamian city-states and extended his rule to the Mediterranean at Ugarit around 2300 BC. At the time the real cuneiform was invented and that was necessary to write down long literary texts. Maybe hiss daughter high priestess Enheduanna should be called Mother of Literature since she wrote poems but also let the temple write down myth, tales, history and songs from the entire empire since beginning of time.

In my essays, I have the demand to be reader friendly and I gather an understandable version of selected cuts from literature. Then we can compare them to pictorial cuts from Scandinavia and Europe if we find some. One can see developments of the society's ideas I call World Order since the acts of creating in the civilized world was to bring order and get people to follow the time lead. In the pictorial texts at seals they always use a star symbol for the deity. That tells us about the parallel world in the night sky used as memory and imaginary world of ideas.

When we look at the early Animal Round we see it was divided in parts with 4, 3 and 5 asterisms as symbols for the moons of the year and no connection to the sun year. The moon Virgin was in lead of the season. Autumn was the Goatfish when man lived on goat and fish. The section at Orion, Gemini and Cancer was dominated by the Fishman animated as Oannes that brought civilisation to people according to one version of the creation myths. Gemini was Utu/ Shamash looking in two directions and standing in the door between years. Cancers was at the stairway to Underworld. Then follow symbols for the agriculture and we see that the Animal Round was created by people living at the river-land like at the Nile and at the twin rivers in Indus and Mesopotamia. Maybe we should see it as a common idea made by the three cultures, since we have evidence of the trade of ideas, culture and goods? … see Sumerian Animal Round

Europe adapted the ideas from the three cultures and most clearly we see it in Scandinavian rock-carvings. The bridge was Anatolia and the highways were the big rivers through Russia plus Danube - Rhine. We can compare the ship shape on the stone above and some in Bohuslen and Norway with rock-carvings at Gobustan, Azerbadjan. We can find later indications about the trade as for instance the triskele from last millennium made of three horses running around a centre.

… In my teens I used knickerbockers that were convenient when cycling. They seem to have roots in Scandinavia since early Viking Age they copied the knickerbockers at Gotland seen at picture stones. The merchants might have been at the court of Harun el Rashids maybe. They are also found at coins imported from the Parthians that also inspired to the helmet with an eagle on top.

Dawn of Civilisation

Haga-dolmen from Bohuslen probably oldest preserved in Sweden from the fourth millennium. Some people date it after some artefacts that seem to be from the wedge tomb period more than 1000 years later

The megalith period was consistent from Gibraltar to S Norway. Cornwall and Portugal have the most impressive God's Table and the oldest maybe from fifth millennium. Often big and beautiful dolmens get all the interest and all other types of early temples are overseen. But for the main idea we have to put all kind of monuments in the same category. The megalith monuments were made at the same time as they developed agriculture ritual in the river-cultures. In West Europe we begin to see cereal pollen in the curves.

The Danes use the word dysse for all kind of long barrows and megalith types except rows. We can expect that not all settlements were practising agriculture so the monuments are fitted as ritual place. There is a great variation so we find sole long barrows as just a long mound. On some there is one or more of the dolmen type but that could also be in the barrow. Other like my childhood's playing place has passage graves inside and in this case two opposite chambers in the heel so pairhood occurred already then.

Others have several chambers as for instance the Gronsal at Danish Insula Moen the mound 10 x 100 meters with 145 big boulders around and inside three chambers that shows the symbolism with three that also was common. It is so big that it was hardly used only for burial but as a ritual temple. In a few Nordic chambers there are rock-carvings and mainly the crossed circle in pair or in double pairs. Still all "dysse" present the same idea of going beneath and in agriculture the funeral and sowing ritual were similar due to resurrection.

The megaliths are silent and if we want to understand the idea we have to look at its form and attributes. This type of dolmen is difficult to analyse because they are mostly out of the true context and the surroundings are destroyed. Fortunately we have a Weoh at Skabersjo with context and we can see it was meant as temple for going-beneath i.e. the spring ritual. It is easier to see the passage graves as temple and especially at Carnac and Ireland They have found carved stones and altars inside that tells about ritual use.

See Map. for the spread of the early megalith culture Observe that they have not marked megaliths in Wessex with Kenneth, Stonehenge and Avebury which are maybe later than the first megalith period. Long barrow, cursus, avenues and earthworks are still little known and they are showing a slightly different realisation of follow Time.

In the past decades they have started to look at earthworks and avenues and I think we will get more knowledge from that. The avenue expresses place for a procession and we can understand the ritual behind. The same is case with stone rows that tells us about a suite of some kind. The number of stones fits often the practical astronomy they used. Folk memory have saved the name Brides Suite and from Egypt we can borrow the expression Shemesu Hor = Follow Time that under the season means the Moon Lady … See also Danish Stones for some complex monuments.

We can say the avenue is Mother of Parade hidden in these monuments. But in the Old World we have also the concept RTA = solving problems through negotiation and ritual. Mostly it works and we have just the carnival parades left and that is near the original. Young nations like America are often literally parading to the battlefield while ancient times paraded to the agriculture field. It takes more power to hold back one's hand than to slay. I guess that America will never get that wisdom. They have no ancient monuments as reminder. In the Old World we have the monuments reminding about good and bad days and how we overcome it all

The first myth draw a simple model for land of mankind. Enki was the first to step at the original Hill i.e. the earth. Since it was in the land with deserts around he understood the importance of the Tree of Life that shadows the plants. A tree and a forest literally suck water out of air as well as from the earth as well when it pumps it from the ground. Green woods cause difference in temperature and suck moisture to fill the reservoir in earth. It is the life-giving pump and besides that they could use the river shores with automatic watering every year. The Sumerians understood and Inanna also wrote a special song about shadowing trees. Our "intelligent" present world deforests the earth.

With few exceptions building ritual places naturally have the natural purpose of giving food on table and giving a better life. Agriculture became the safe way of feeding people and that is why population grew in places with organisation = civilisation. After making the plan and first buildings they needed the ritual to follow every year and keep it in memory.

As ideal situation they told about the Inanna sitting at her table drinking beer in the face of Leo. That was probably after harvest around midsummer since it was in the asterism Lion and it was the first offer of season. Celtic Lugnasad and harvest feast was important event in year and in Christianity they mention "Olof's cake" here in Sweden when the first bread is available. In Edda it is Lokasenna and Aegir's gille = feast.

At the Haga-dolmen we should notice the two boulders marking the door, so it is like temple. The astronomical idea was to catch the first moon of the season and tied to the asterism at the vernal equinox in order to regulate the season's spacetime. Together with "predicting" the season, planning and delegating jobs it is the idea of civilising. People learnt to follow the lead and the program that refined and educated them to agriculture

In some chambers they have found the double axe in normal size and in others as amber amulet. As single loose artefact it tells us that people at the place knew about the Inanna ritual. For instance there is a find from my vicarage still we have no dolmen or stone temple at Dal. We can go to Sumer again and the ritual where they carried the double-axe in procession in fourth millennium. The axe symbolises the crescent and also that it goes beneath as well as to the sky. It could also symbolise that it sanctifies the soil downward as well as upward protecting the seed.

For Scandinavia we have to mention the boat-axe even called battleaxe found in South-Finland South- Sweden mainly in Skaane and Blekinge where it has been big fashion and male symbol in single graves. The heydays was a short period around 3000 BC. Maybe in the very main area they were used in battle, but else I would call it boat-axe for ritual use.

The double-axe is found in West-Europe and mainly in passage-graves and similar. Montelius gathered for Sweden in 1917 around 75 types in his book from the double-axe 25 each, crescent-and-heel 20 pieces to the 30 boat-shaped axes. They have in common that many of them are the finest workmanship of polished axes nearly in class with axes from Troy in the same period. The longest blade is 31 centimetres and I would see it used in battle.

Maybe we should see the boataxe as occasional fashion and in hard use only in minor areas. In my vicarage we have a find that is a rough copy. To me it seems that the ritual crescent was the issue even in the boat-axe that maybe was invented in Russia. Some of them copies copper axes but there are no finds. The enigma is that in 2000 Lutz Klassen analysed 106 copper-axes from S. Scandinavia and found that 83 could be dated to 3500 - 3300 and no finds for 1000 years until the bronze came in use.

On Dal we have a period after that with big "chisels" probably shafted for use as ritual axe and they are found in what could have been ritual community areas. This type coincide with the ground grooves in neighbouring landscape Flyhov when they did these ca 3100 - 2300 BC. It seems to be ritually going beneath by grinding at first full moon after vernal equinox and aligned to Antares in Scorpio. The same long series of groves we find at Gotland.

Existed a time machine it would be interesting to relocate us 1000 years backward until when the church and the kings took over the society's organization. The landscape would be pastoral and maybe a lot of damp due to natural small rivers and brooks everywhere. Doubtless the living built largely on domestic animals and they have calculated that each adult needed 10 animals a year since they were much smaller than today. In the fields were small arable lands for agriculture and mostly fenced in. The old boulder monuments would be highly visible and some of them still in use. When the spiritual bonds to the ancestors were cut could people be free to rob the monuments and then mainly those building church or castle.

The first civilisation period was ruled by canonical laws and ritual and the process lasted to a break around 2000 BC. New fashion changed maybe the monuments in use, but out of piety people mostly respected ancestors places. In Denmark, they have registered 23000 early monument with big stone! That is 1 each 2 square kilometres however I guess the original number is at least the double. 19^th century hunger for arable land and stone use are BIG EATER of stone. Our time have growing cities and broad roads. Likewise all small monuments such as footstool, bautastone, altar, thing stone and so on has doubtless disappeared as appropriate buildings for the society. Bautastone each often processed or selected to be like a pillar. Very good as door stone -;). Very many have disappeared in the last 300 years as we see on drawing from 17^th century.

What man does not understand he does not respect. I have showed that there have been many smaller monuments used as signpost of society order in the late period of stone symbolism. There is a lot of good history in understanding that and it is better than academic speculations about power structures since we see the local size and proportions of the society.

The interest at the general public is however not big. This naturally depends on the fact that church made arianism heresy and they invented the word pagan that is the insult hedning. In German and Scandinavian god is abgott / avgud where the prefix is very disparaging and place our ancestors very near Hel. To that comes the academic valuation that we are all barbarians if we recognise our ancestors as equal. All this colours our attitudes and the grey boulder are not as shining as marble and other high culture building bricks. But still the very big boulders are standing strong and fit ancestors wishes to build for eternity and find eternal rules in universe

The sky's square

On Rock 5 in Högsbyn sees we in the lower row the eagle, the Dog, Herkules? and Scorpioman as a section of the Animal Round at Ramadan. On top the small character at the double dashed footprints looks like Egyptian Shu. On same rock exists Sumerian type early symbols and could probably be dated to earlier than 2000 BC

One of my big HEUREKA experiences was when I discovered that I can create a square of the ships in the middle plus two other at the thing/ court place. Nearby is Rock 4 that is nearly a square with some asterisms symbolised at the sides and the pole marked in the middle. I had to make my own discoveries since no scientist on ancient Sumer, Egypt and archaeo-astronomy have shown no interest in these things at that time since I found none.

I found that that mankind has followed the moon in ten of thousand years. In Indus they created the naksatras = mansions of the moon that are like a zodiac for the moon with 28 asterisms during the cycle. The 28^th mansion was used for adjusting the calculation and it is situated approximately at the Dog. It is represented by a wheel and sometimes we find 56 spokes that is counting fortnights / half moons. The system seems to be spread all over the world also as medicine wheel Later Indus parted the year in six double moons and three seasons due to the monsoon climate

The figures from Rock 5 are from this part of the night sky

The Sumerians needed only the practical rules and we find the boundary stone with season symbols in Nile Delta middle of 4^th millennium. Like in Indus they started with the Goat they merged to 4 moons and symbols called Goatfish. Maybe they symbolised the season when they lived on goat and fish. Later came the cow and Egypt have the Hathor cow for that period. Next three moons we should maybe call Oannes/ Fishman as we see from an amulet found deep at Eridu in a fish temple. There are symbols for Gemini and for Cancer too. The season kudurru has merged symbols for the summer moons

Next step seems to be the square or as at Högsbyn the grid around the ecliptic that is the sun orbit on the sky. They could then place the Animal Round at the grid and maybe make a square on the ground as stable reference to the night sky. Then they could at heel stone and sight stone make their observations. They could also make a pyramid grid and get the declinations. At Rock 4 I get the impressions that they stood at the rock and watched the asterisms passing by and making notes on the rock. These became idols or gods in everyday life

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Sumerian seal Utu/ Shamas = the sun steps up between the two dogs Canis and Sagittarius in Egypt Anubis … Sumerian astronomy

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Simpel square from Alta North Norway and similar is found on Saharan rock. The other almost whole square from Aamey Norse Vestland. The double dashed symbol means "second half" We should also mention the squared planetarium in Dendera Egypt

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Golden plates from Stonehenge. Observe we get the impression of declinations and the upper part with always-visible stars

If one once determines that the heavenly bowl and the world have Four Corners, we get automatically four sides of a square. Kings used the expression ruler of four directions. At the other plate the drawing looks more like three steps to Underworld like the Sumerian symbolism. They have analysed gold from around 2470 BC at Stonehenge and copper items from France or Spain 2300 BC. The so-called King of Stonehenge came from the Alps but a grave with archers show they came from Wales.

There are 56 so-called Aubrey holes that were filled soon again. I guess the first plan was to make a forthnight-wheel but they got new ideas and maybe brought by the man from the Alps? Stonehenge is the step to circular shape of the planetarium and bowl. In Finnish myth the smith Ilmarinen makes the heavenly bowl of copper.

At Högsbyn they made the most of it and build maybe a harg/ heorg At the Thing place we find the big Rock 1 telling about the Round in shape of snakes. At upper left they mark Little Bear and the star Koschab Under that maybe they mark the pole drawn to earth. I found that Koschab is versatile as polestar for the period 3000 to 1000 BC due to precession. Rock 1 seems to be drawn during a very lons period but surely the planning was intense around 2300 BC

Also in Egypt and Sumer they used time ships from very the beginning. It is often hard to see if it the idea of ship or time as ship and in some cases reality. Near Trondheim Norway sail Egyptian early reed ship and a later high-sea ship on the rocks. Were the Egyptians "on tour" to Nordic waters, we will never know? One can not borrow directly of the South without adapting to our latitudes and climates though it was much warmer then. But for instance Sweden is long as Egypt with a round a month difference in climate nowadays … see also Sailors in Spacetime

World Order in Voluspa

Valan or Völvan is comparable with tegn/speaker or why not shaman/noide in the small societies' time. In Denmark is used still the word degn= fore-singer in the church. It is an ancient tradition where one not needed someone conductors actually but had a fore-singer and in many places a girl singer. They can all old songs with saved knowledge and recited them we important occasions. Vala's spa/ seeing copy Sumer-Babylonian Enuma Elish that was recited at the spring festival. Important parts are the world order - spring ritual - harvest ritual - trashing. Spring ritual exists not directly in Voluspa and harvest ritual is implied with Balder's myth while Ragnarauk is the last moment that tells a new generation will come next year.

One should understand that this is no fortune telling in common sense but is a prediction of the cultivation year that recurs each year. Valan is assumed serving the society and the common affairs … it is thing that perhaps people engaged her private in order to predict future. Perhaps she was stupid enough to try -;) Once someone is expected to know much of course people try to get it and if possible as a bargain.

From there, three sisters came with a lot of to know

Three from the ward under the tree

The Source was called Maja

Being, June or Uni the other

The harvesting July the third

Laws they set, lives they started

for mankind's children and men's destiny

A modern interpretation of Voluspa verse 20 that show the connection between those three sisters and the plant season. Commonly called midwives and also the summer moons the ladies watching growing. The rock-carvings are from Leirfall near Trondheim N. Norway and we see the rest of the calendar fellows in a suite. It could be dated to 4^th millennium and it is a version of the agriculture myth.

From this neighbourhood there is only a little step to the Laps/ Sames. At 19^th century drums many of them have the three midwives among the illustrations that is the Samic calendar. It was a method of helping at childbirth. Juksakka/ Bow-woman was on guard at the door. She gave a miniature bow and arrow if it was a boy. The girl got a ring she should used when looking into the Otherworld . That means she should see through that when the men went for a meeting with The Bear in Otherworld. Maderakka holds the birth-giving woman on her lap and Sarakka take the new-born and cut the navel string and wrap it. In the mythology there is also the old woman Akka and much like in Elam. Neith is the bow-woman but we do not really know much about minor deities in Egypt

In Celtic culture we have the male triad as head of the three seasons. At least on female triad corresponds to midwives and we have some names from the Hadrian wall. The Frisian tribe Twihanti from Hof van Twenthe Overijsseln in the middle of Holland set an altar to three goddesses. Hnaudifridi people from north of the former and this was a small cavalry unit. The altar was addressed to Alasigae, Boudhillia and Friagabis in which we maybe see Bodil and the better-known Nordic Frigga and she maybe gave name to Frisia … Little known is that one old Polish calendar has Three Anja for the summer moons.

Hard to find the original triads in young cultures like Greece and Rome. I saw some fragment of linear from Crete mentioning Uni/ Juno that occurs in Etruscan pantheon and became Roman Juno and together with Maja they are just the rests of the original triad. The triad was use in other matters in the old cultures since it is appropriate to split a process in three idols as for instance Isis, Osiris and Horus that is originally another growing myth. Osisris was sent to Underworld and Horus was his child. At Högsbyn we have the "corpse" on Rock 1 as a balance grow or not grow. In Egypt they made a dummy of sand, reed and seed to see if it would grow. The only present original place is in the zodiac as Virgo/ Hydra, Libra and Scorpio

We can draw parallels to Sumer-Babylonian Enuma Elish. Voluspa has the disposition and certainly the beginning about Creation in common. Enuma Elish has the Inanna/ Ishtar myth while Voluspa have just fragments of the Nordic Balder Myth and it is hard to find an allegory to in south. However some elements they have in common. ... see First Myth. The long song Enuma Elish was recited at the spring festival Akitu as it initiated the season during several thousand years. It still exists in vague interpretation in today's Mesopotamia. It has of course altered and seemingly new religions have come and lost the original bonds to agriculture and natural fertility.

The wedge-tomb/ slab cist period was a short intermedium starting around 2300 BC in Scandinavia but occurred in many places in Europe. We see it as a period of agriculture in the pollen curves. Regarding ritual the big difference is that instead of going beneath they practise ritual bath. At Law Rock Högsbyn there is the rostrum with a pair of naked feet for the priestess and at the east end of the rock naked feet goes down to the nearby lake … See also Watermother steps down

My first associations went to what I have read about the Babylonian - Persian goddess Anahita but much earlier that than known Persia and she was probably the same as Anath in the Levant

"Anahita, Anahit, or "Immaculate One", which means "the humid, strong, immaculate one. She embodied the physical and metaphorical qualities of water, especially the fertilizing flow of water from the fountain in the stars. She also ruled semen and human fertility. She was viewed as the "Golden Mother" and as a warrior maiden."

On the only statue I have seen she has wings and reminds of Inanna/ Ishtar. Many small cultures had their own version. I cannot see why I should alter my first thought however I think she came via Caucasus or Armenia where we have some similarities. That is the very old trade way to Mesopotamia. There are three types of wedge tombs and I would rather call it slab-cist as common name. We have the wedge shaped from the Alps; rectangular later development and maybe from France and the third is the one with gable hole. The later is found in Caucasus as free standing dead-house.

Otherwise most elements in culture was no change since everyone lived on what nature gives: Here on Dal we are fortunate to have remains wedge tomb/ cist and artefacts. To that comes that we can see the cists are spread in the landscape with a few kilometres distance and some of them are in pair. They are in the arable lands but also in the small mountains where they made trials in mining. We have the big ritual rock-carvings with nearby cists at Evenstorp and Högsbyn and we get the impression of a highly organised culture. At the later we have the marriage code that was in use as the handtake until medieval times.

With the cist followed new technology hat was a first step to mining. I found a quarry where they took the slabs to two cists in my vicarage. Some cists are made of natural slabs but the big slabs they took from a quarry and the slabs could be very big. Perhaps the technique has origin in Egypt where they build much at the time.

Most of the ritual carvings at Evenstorp

In the centre stands "the Stork-man" that intends the to be the midsummer sun and could be compared with a line between Ursa Minor and Leo that existed also in Egypt. He seems to instruct a character that is the asterism Auriga = Isis in Egypt and she has her suite of the plant season's moons. At the bottom we have the Moon Fellows and Ramadan with the moon dog Rahu also easy to see understand.

At left we have the Worm/ Snake / Hydra and the sowing at Cancer and the season ends at Urn and the sickle. Beside the symbols of sowing there is a pair of pickaxes we call "raven". At the Plain-Dal we have finds of big pickaxes of slate in what could have been small counties and their ritual item. In many of the cists they have found a full collection for the ritual suite. There are wedge-shaped amulet for the priestess, one or two flint daggers for her guards and two crescent- shaped flint sickles. It is almost a riddle that we find the collection in many cists. In other cases the find of the amulet indicates that there has been a cist at that place. The pickaxe of slate they have found also in Bohuslen and Wermland and also some of polished stone.

In Voluspa exists no clear agriculture myth as in Enuma Elish that has Inanna/Ishtar. Instead we get hints about Balder's myth, Lokasenna/ Aegir's gille and Loke's penalties that occur on some picture stones. The origin is the canonical rule "you are forbidden to kill". But since they once animate the barley and the harvesting with human idols and maybe saw plants as living beings it ends up in an ethical question at harvesting.

Therefore, Loke, the Inventor tries to hide the act through luring innocent blind Höder to let off the sprout and the arrow of mistletoe that is also is innocent. That is much the same as when the Sumerians let the myth tells that a god is not allowed to rape. The myth become a canonical law

If we accept that "one-armed" as attribute for Tiw/ Tyr sees we him here. We see also Loke throw a spear after Tjatse in eagle guise. The third is perhaps Hanno that never can decide anything self. Cut from Lökeberget where we also find the scene with Loke when he defrauds the blind Höder to shoot Balder with the mistletoe arrow and in the background there the mourning mother.

It is maybe the biggest rock-carvings we have and it is made during a long period so it is hard to date the elements. Observe the ship of same type as on Sumerian seals from the third millennium. The man/ Tyr does not initially have to belong to the ship since he has the Halstatt cap dated to after 1000 BC. Little below this there is a leader with rattle and flail of Egyptian type.

Still this cut tells actually about "Idun's apples" when the night frost Tjatse is a threat against the cultivation. That is why the Fire Loke attacks Tjatse in eagle guise. Beerwatcher exists as asterism and is archetype for guarding the sown fields of livestock and arable land. … In court books from medieval times we can read that someone froze to dead on guard. Their job was to keep the bonfire alive to warm so much that the frost would not bite the sown seed…. See more about Balder and Tyr on the Golden Age bracts

The Time's guards

We are not aware about that masses of things in our reality were invented and tested by our ancestors. They have been toiled down and we do not know the origins. The swastika is a speaking example how a simple symbol can misunderstood and be used in quite adverse aims. One can say some people use the 19th century's neo-version of swastika with hostile aims far from the ancestor's that built permanent peace and world order. This is an example how a lot things could be associated with a simple symbol.

This part is about they animate the swastika and the question about the four directions in the spacetime. They discovered that they could set the world pole at home and set the directions to navigate from that. They must have felt that they have a grip on their world. The Rock 4 shows the centre at the cross of spacetime including heaven as well as their land. It becomes an abstraction with outer limits at the horizon. It is the first stage of Midgaard = my place and environment used as references to get hold of the universe.

In Greek they say "toward Anatolia" when they mean east. However the expression do not describe east if one sails on the Black Sea or in inner Mediterranean … I wonder if they in Stockholm say "toward Aaland?" The important innovation to understand and to use the abstract names east, south, vest and north that can to be used everywhere on the globe. The ancestors' spacetime covered also the night sky so that the sailors can use stars as references. They could see precisely how the heavenly bowl move during the day and night and the year and thanks to the references they could determine the time through a glance at the sky.

On the sea the knowledge was necessary for sailing but also so that they could somehow make notes and find the same place again. We know some early "maps" from the Pacific. Even at land in the wilderness it was good to be aware of where one is. The Inuits have to our days a preserved system that "speaks with stone" or signpost in the very wide landscape. In Arctic landscape they need ver much land to make a living

… As young tested I to walk out in the wilderness without other aids than what I learned as boy-scout. It was my romantic feeling coming from the plain lands in Denmark to the big woods in Finland with Indians and Fennimore Cooper back in my head. Most times came I home exact but it happened that there was some "drift" and many hours delayed due to having my nose in blueberry rice: Anyway I think I got a feeling of the spacetime of ancestors

The directions made order on the night sky and it became possible to use the sky bowl as rotating calendar. The asterisms carried the story of its time and they could prepare for what to do when it was in sight. We have to remember this when we speak about cardinal directions, stars and the swastika. It is important to know what each culture put into them. Generation after generation learnt this and some of it dropped out as non-use during time. And we know nothing since we do not know spacetime or our environment. Now we shall look a little at how the discussion went on when pairhood and Time guards were created

Actually, one should start with the fourth millennium and doubleaxe that doubtless intended the two blades that "to cut" up and down at least during the cultivation's quarters. We know from Sumer that they carried the doubleaxe in parade as weapon of the moon goddess to protect the cultivation or the space time of cultivation. We have finds of doubelaxes and amulets in passage graves that tie that kind of temple to go-beneath - ritual. Around 3300 - 3100 BC we can almost speak about a global ritual.

An important period started approximately 2300 BC when Sumer with Sargon almost released himself from the ritual world order and became worldly emperor and gathered the small citystates to one big. He extended the rule to Ugarit at the Mediterranean and opened possibilities for limitless trade. This sent chock waves in all directions and as result began the global trade and search for tin and copper with intensity.

At the same time, new town cultures began to grow in Levanten, Anatolien, the Minoans and the entire Aegean sphere. It is the period of the wedge tomb / slab cist in entire Europé and it seem to imply a new ritual. The bronze became a new mean for making ritualweapons and acessoaries like the neckring … see Age of the Dagger that soon was replaced with four axes and I name the type balta.

…

The axes at left from England and labrys type. At right Italian rounded type and it could be imported from Middle Europe.

In Skaane at Simris Rock 19 we can we scan see how they discussed symbolism around 2000 BC. The rock is filled with trials and I choose two we can understand. At left they parted the year in three seasons. There is an empty boat at the axe left corner and that is the vernal third. Above that the third is marked with the Ramadan dog and second third. They were not much interested in winter but have axes for that too

At right we see four axes and the summer quarters are tied together by the empty boat to be filled. It is marked with a negative/ under ground foot for vernal go-beneath. Second axe is marked with dashed footprint that symbolises the leader = the sun and second quarter.

In Swedish the word "skaera" = "to cut" has two meanings. One is to cut anything and the other to consecrate. At the Alvastra site around 3000 BC they found a small stone and beside stood a doubleaxe with an edge down and the other up. One can consider that the stone symbolise the barley and the axe protects down and up… today the farmer impregnate and protect with pesticides in both directions. The manner in Denmark during early medieval time was that when a new farmer took land from the common he throw his sickle over the the bit of land "he cut out". These axes cut out quarters from the spacetime and the symbolism in some cases document that people took the right of owning a life space. It was the age when mankind took the worlly power little by little as we also see in the Hittitan AEDICULA. "The priestking and upper class have the power below the top of the pillars".

Completed 4 quarters' guards at Simris 27 it is like four wings of the swastika

Here is symbolismen clear. We find the ritual axes single or double through the Bronze Age and mostly on time ships. May be remarked that they divided in half-year and were most often interested only of the season as ritual season suites of 7 for most of it.

We have only one pictorial presentation of true Minoan ritual. It is the sarchofagus from Hagia Triada, Crete approximately 1400 BC. We see at the picture two pillars with quadrupkle axes on top. In Mycenaean time it became known as the wanax name of the axe as well as of the king/ yearman.

The rock-carvings at Fossum Bohuslen gives us the full scoop of the axe symbolism and it is good to see the entire rock. Comments at Pairhood at Fossum

Ristningen shows also that they were only interested of planning/regulating the season. Heer they probaly followed the asterism Gemini the entire year. We know to the method from so,e temples in Egypt too. Be dated after the spring lure to Kivik time approximately 1400 BC but there are much older fragments on the rock.

For the spring quarter the axes have been replaced by lures. Perhaps the practical good was to intimidate bear and wolves away from the used lands. Wild animals think it is uncomfortable with the people near their breed. The lure blow is course also a signal to the people "now be aware the season is here!" We have the Bearwatcher in the sky as an idol for meadow guards. The Sumerians have an archer in that place

… about the spring manners in late times they to shoot in the air. The folklore tells about the animal's house as a mother. And lady of house was the housemother that let the small animals out between her legs like birth giving. When the farmer went hunting he used the same path without looking up I suppose.

Continues Section 2