Thursday, March 16, 2006

Scandinavian Bronze Age String Skirt


I am pleased to announce that I have recieved a most beautiful String Skirt from Terri Allen. Modelled after the Egtved Girl's garment (see link below).

I have finished hanging the weights of bone, shell, rock, seed, wood and resin on the hem. An updated photo will appear here soon.

The Bronze Age in Scandinavia was roughly 1400 BCE. On the coast of Jutland/Denmark, there were settlements and up into the Norwegian coastline as far as present day Oslo, as far as we know.

Anyhow, the weather was milder then. Citrus grew on the coastlines. The line of Lilith, which was the migration out of Phonecia that took the Matriarchy of Babylos on the move. The runes, the SunGoddess, Herding and fine textiles, water craft, and smithwork followed these Mothers into Crete, Etruruia (Modern Day Northern Italy), Hungary, North West to Scandinavia and North East to Siberia.

This would have been the begining of the Vanir mythology, the MotherGoddess and the Twin God/Goddess pair. Lilith, the first woman God sent to Adam in the Garden of Eden, did not hang around very long. She got fed up with Adam pretty quickly and moved on. Her children by him and by many other kinds of beings, like the ones she met coming North, became the Huldre, Tomte, Nissen, Side, Yetti, ...all sorts of creatures who humans are all part kin to through Adam. (Adam's second wife, Eve, was the mother of the patriarchal migration to follow).

The String Skirt used by young women in athletic ritual are depicted in many variant forms from Crete to the Balkans.

The Runic Alphabet, mythologies and fashions combine to make a compellingly lovely picture of this migration. The philosophies of this culture can only be described propperly by women as the culture itself was propelled and sustained by the Mother's teachings in work, song, and life process.

Here is some great reading:
http://www.smith.edu/hsc/museum/ancient_inventions/stringskirt2.html

http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/EgtvedGirl.shtml


http://www.shanmonster.com/belly/gallery/strippers/belly387.html

This last one I think is especially important to read from the perspective of the Amazonian Belly Dancers and Warrior tribes of Sheba and Troy. Women celebrated their skills as warriors, athletes, and in virility of all natures. Sexual conduct was considered a natural human and divine connection and treated as holy with rituals and institutions overseen by various dieties and patron energies.

While sexuality and femininity were later seen viewed as evil and worthy of slaughtering out of our human condition, today we understand the importance of our sexuality and our female side. Both men and women are encouraged to find balance with their yin and yang or female and male selves.

Happy Equinox
Kari

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