From: cortese@skid.ps.uci.edu (Janis Maria Cortese)
Subject: more Minoan stuff
Newsgroups: alt.pagan
Organization: University of California, Irvine
Date: 4 Sep 92 02:22:23 GMT

I'm still deep in the pool of Minoan studt into which I seem to have
dived, and I just wanted to post a few more references that I've checked
out:

_The Once and Future Goddess_ by Elinor W. Gadon.  It's a big book, with
big scope, but one of the civilizations mentioned (not surprisingly) is
that of old Crete.

_Minoan-Mycenean Religion and Its Survival in Greek Religion_ by Martin
P. Nilson.

_The Road to Eleusis_ by R. Gordon Wasson.

_Cretan Cults and Festivals_ by R. F. Willetts.

_Eleusis: Archetypal Image of Mother and Daughter_ by Carl Kerenyi.

_Minoan Religion as Ritual Action_ by Peter Warren.

_Aegean Bronze Age Chronology_ by Peter Warren and Vronwy Hankey.

Ain't living near a university library great?  I get to paw through all
this junk for NOTHING!!!! 

Anyhow, this is starting to look more and more like home for me.  I
honestly think I may have found something aside from the ubiquitous
Celtic Paganism (I have often thought about how beautiful and evocative
the Celtic rites were, and how appropriate they would be for this
climate, but I've wondered at times whether or not a requirement for
being a card-carrying Pagan wasn't having a name with a bunch of w's and
ff's in it).  Instead of the images of fair and freckled people standing
around a henge, I'm seeing dark people who look a little like me dancing
around mountains.

In short, I'm enjoying the hell out of this!

To digress (or maybe re-gress), I've never quite known what to make of
my face, hair, and body.  Hair is usually called things like raven, or
silky, or riotous, or flaxen, or flaming or things like that; mine is
none of these things.  Non-African skin is usually fair or olive, and
I'm hovering somewhere in between.  Eyes -- well, you already know about
the nebulous status of them.  Bodies are usually willowy, billowy, fat,
or thin; I am none of these.  Despite entering Paganism, I have honestly
failed to see any images of myself ANYWHERE -- positive or negative --
until now.  The women are either maiden (which I'm not), mother (which
I'm not), or crone (which I'm not) -- and I KNOW these words don't mean
what they usually do.  They still have those connotations.  I've yet to
see an image of a non-chaste woman in Paganism who openly does not want
children.

The women physically are usually generous, like the Venus of Willendorf,
or Barbie dolls like, say, the one on the front cover of Doreen
Valiente's book about a tradition renewed -- basically idealized
Northern European women.  I AM NEITHER.  

The skin and eyes are either fair or dark -- again, I am neither.

Nothing about me seemed to reflect back to me in Paganism as it is,
until I saw the Minoan frescoes -- my first exposure to big hipped but
slim chested women with long dark hair and aquiline noses.  I can
honestly see myself here (strange thing for a woman who loves cool and
dry air to say about a Medi island culture, huh?  But then again, I love
mountains, and isn't Diktynna a Mountain Mother?). 

Before I either go on or wrap this up (I have no farging idea what
direction this monologue is going to take), I should say that I am not
running down Celtic Paganism for those who practice it.  I just failed
to find myself there anymore than in any other aspect of modern culture.

I'm not a believer in reincarnation (There isn't enough data to draw a
conclusion; making up my mind one way or another without reliable data
would be unethical -- to use a scientific definition of ethical), but I
sometimes wonder where all the images I get in my mind when I think
about this stuff come from.  Is there a reason WHY sacral horn-shaped
things usually pop up in my dreams?  The damned things just feel like
home.  Why do I imagine falling asleep at the foot of a throne that
looks a hell of a lot like the one in the throne room at Knossos?  Why
was the labrys such an evocative symbol for me, even before I knew what
it meant?  

I'll stop blathering now.  I'm just VERY HAPPY to find something that
feels like home, and I guess I'm bubbling it at you people.  Oh, well.
Either you duck or get it slung at you!

Blessings,
Janis