Melusine, Morga
Jun. 20th, 2013 09:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
satya_firestoneGoddess of the Rim – Melusine (mel-you-SEEN-ah) - The Task-Giver. She is straightforward and speaks often of the things we must do.
I knew very little about Melusine going into this post. So, as usual, I Googled.
Mythologically, Melusine (or Melusina) was a fairy/human hybrid and married to a mortal king. Every Saturday her legs became two fishtails (or one, or a serpent tail, depending on where the story was told). Her mother, a full-blooded water faerie, had cursed her with this transformation when she plotted with her two sisters (the three were triplets) to trap their father in a cave for breaking a promise (he wasn't supposed to enter their mother's birth chamber during or immediately after their birth, but did anyway). When she married, she forbid her husband from seeing her on Saturdays to hide her transformation. Eventually, of course, he found out, and Melusine fled into the river (or the sea), and now, it is said hearing her cries fortells impending death.
There a have been nobles and royalty in Europe that have claimed to be her descendents, notably the House of Plantegenet, and Elizabeth Woodville, Queen Consort to King Edward IV. There was also an historical Queen Melisende, who was half-French and half-Armenian, who is sometimes associated with the myth of Melusine, because she was headstrong and independent, and her Armenian ancestry was considered by the French of the time to be "sub-human." Melusine also inspired the story of "The Little Mermaid," and is still found today in the Starbucks logo.
But I found even more than that in my searching. Author Philippa Gregory used Melusine's story as background for her historical fiction novel about Elizabeth Woodville, "The White Queen." An article she wrote about her findings caught my attention. Footnotes after the quote.
1 - I mentioned this in my summation of the story as well. It connects Melusine to the Sorgae mythology of vampires, Faeries, and Witches.
2 - Water, especially rivers, also symbolize crossing over/borders and rebirth. Those are important symbologies in Sorgae, as well as rivers themselves being integral. Also, as Goddess of the Rim, that indicates a border. On rebirth, Melusine was one of the first of the Sorgae pantheon to contact the Coven, and so showed the way to the rebirth of this system. The other of our early contacts, Arduina, is associated with both rivers and forests as well.
3 - As was already stated, Melusine "speaks of the things we must do." This could be interpreted as a sort of prophecy, and being constructive. It also hearkens back to Queen Melisende being so headstrong in a time when women were supposed to be meek and subservient.
4 - This last portion is very significant. Several things combine here:
A) The mythical Melusine's father first meets her mother under the Moon (some tellings even specify the New Moon);
B) Water carries strong association with all things Lunar;
C) Water is in the West, the place of Death and crossing over (as referenced in note 2 above);
D) The Rim perhaps represents an orbit, like the Moon around the Earth; and
E) We have associated Melusine with silver, much like the Moon is in Alchemy.
All this together leads me to believe I was hasty when I said Sorgae does not have a Lunar Deity. We just had not yet discovered who She was. I also then surmise that Melusine should be contacted for Sorage Luna rituals.
Though, who Her Sun-Consort may be, still remains unknown. However, the mention of Alchemy, brings my thoughts 'round to Hermes, as that is one of His classical associations.
***
[Click to enlarge]
Southwest Goddess – Morga (more-gah) – She is the leader of the Maenads who hunt their own God and tear Him to pieces to drink His blood. She is sharp and fierce and revels in all that is ecstatic in nature.
The character Maryann Forrester from season 2 of the show True Blood is a fair representation of Morga.
I didn't find any classical Greek Maenads whose name was similar to "Morga." But looking up "mor" on Wikitionary.org gave some interesting results. In the vast majority of languages listed, "mor" refers either to death, the sea, or means "mother." As leader of the Maenads, both the death and mother associations make sense. The sea I can connect to using salted water or wine as a substitute for blood, and as Morga is Goddess in the Southwest, where Fire and Water meet. I can associate Her with the Water portion, the Feminine side of Steam, as Dionysus is the Masculine, the Fire, the Passion.
I have a personal connection to the Irish Goddess collective commonly known as the Morrigan, and the associations with blood and sacrifice are common elements. However I haven't so far been able to draw further solid connections between the two, if indeed there are any more to be found.
I knew very little about Melusine going into this post. So, as usual, I Googled.
Mythologically, Melusine (or Melusina) was a fairy/human hybrid and married to a mortal king. Every Saturday her legs became two fishtails (or one, or a serpent tail, depending on where the story was told). Her mother, a full-blooded water faerie, had cursed her with this transformation when she plotted with her two sisters (the three were triplets) to trap their father in a cave for breaking a promise (he wasn't supposed to enter their mother's birth chamber during or immediately after their birth, but did anyway). When she married, she forbid her husband from seeing her on Saturdays to hide her transformation. Eventually, of course, he found out, and Melusine fled into the river (or the sea), and now, it is said hearing her cries fortells impending death.
There a have been nobles and royalty in Europe that have claimed to be her descendents, notably the House of Plantegenet, and Elizabeth Woodville, Queen Consort to King Edward IV. There was also an historical Queen Melisende, who was half-French and half-Armenian, who is sometimes associated with the myth of Melusine, because she was headstrong and independent, and her Armenian ancestry was considered by the French of the time to be "sub-human." Melusine also inspired the story of "The Little Mermaid," and is still found today in the Starbucks logo.
But I found even more than that in my searching. Author Philippa Gregory used Melusine's story as background for her historical fiction novel about Elizabeth Woodville, "The White Queen." An article she wrote about her findings caught my attention. Footnotes after the quote.
In Ireland, Melusina is the banshee1 calling over the castle to warn of a death. In France, she is one of the Dames Blanches, the White Ladies who haunt the forests and trick mortals with riddles and dances and foretell deaths by crying outside houses. In Germany she is a being of the forests as well as of water.2
[...]
J. E. Cirlot ( A Dictionary of Symbols) suggests she is an intuitive genius both "prophetic, constructive and wondrous3, and yet at the same time is infirm and malign."
Melusina's significance goes even further than this powerful folklore. The psychoanalyst Carl Jung took an interest in her role in alchemy. Here Melusina is a manifestation of Luna - the element of dark, cold, water, and spirit, and as such she makes the alchemical union with her opposite: Sol, the source of warmth and light. The union is known by alchemists as the "chymical wedding," which signified to Jung the union of body and spirit, consciousness and unconsciousness.4
1 - I mentioned this in my summation of the story as well. It connects Melusine to the Sorgae mythology of vampires, Faeries, and Witches.
2 - Water, especially rivers, also symbolize crossing over/borders and rebirth. Those are important symbologies in Sorgae, as well as rivers themselves being integral. Also, as Goddess of the Rim, that indicates a border. On rebirth, Melusine was one of the first of the Sorgae pantheon to contact the Coven, and so showed the way to the rebirth of this system. The other of our early contacts, Arduina, is associated with both rivers and forests as well.
3 - As was already stated, Melusine "speaks of the things we must do." This could be interpreted as a sort of prophecy, and being constructive. It also hearkens back to Queen Melisende being so headstrong in a time when women were supposed to be meek and subservient.
4 - This last portion is very significant. Several things combine here:
A) The mythical Melusine's father first meets her mother under the Moon (some tellings even specify the New Moon);
B) Water carries strong association with all things Lunar;
C) Water is in the West, the place of Death and crossing over (as referenced in note 2 above);
D) The Rim perhaps represents an orbit, like the Moon around the Earth; and
E) We have associated Melusine with silver, much like the Moon is in Alchemy.
All this together leads me to believe I was hasty when I said Sorgae does not have a Lunar Deity. We just had not yet discovered who She was. I also then surmise that Melusine should be contacted for Sorage Luna rituals.
Though, who Her Sun-Consort may be, still remains unknown. However, the mention of Alchemy, brings my thoughts 'round to Hermes, as that is one of His classical associations.
***
[Click to enlarge]
Southwest Goddess – Morga (more-gah) – She is the leader of the Maenads who hunt their own God and tear Him to pieces to drink His blood. She is sharp and fierce and revels in all that is ecstatic in nature.
The character Maryann Forrester from season 2 of the show True Blood is a fair representation of Morga.
I didn't find any classical Greek Maenads whose name was similar to "Morga." But looking up "mor" on Wikitionary.org gave some interesting results. In the vast majority of languages listed, "mor" refers either to death, the sea, or means "mother." As leader of the Maenads, both the death and mother associations make sense. The sea I can connect to using salted water or wine as a substitute for blood, and as Morga is Goddess in the Southwest, where Fire and Water meet. I can associate Her with the Water portion, the Feminine side of Steam, as Dionysus is the Masculine, the Fire, the Passion.
I have a personal connection to the Irish Goddess collective commonly known as the Morrigan, and the associations with blood and sacrifice are common elements. However I haven't so far been able to draw further solid connections between the two, if indeed there are any more to be found.
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no subject
Date: 2013-06-21 05:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-21 05:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-21 04:15 pm (UTC)And your information about Morga is likewise accurate and informative. I do think Morga is related to the Morrigan, but as you say, we don't have any solid connection about that.
As always, I'm so proud of you!
no subject
Date: 2013-06-21 04:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-08-24 05:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-08-24 05:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-08-24 05:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-08-24 05:39 pm (UTC)