Odd Insights into Hekate

Syncretic Egyptian / Graeco-Roman magic from the collection of texts known as the Papyri Graecae Magicae.
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monsnoleedra
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#91 » Thu Apr 12, 2018 1:04 pm

Pleiades wrote:Sticking with the Anatolian origin argued by Enchantress earlier,Hekate's Temple at Lagina has some interesting archaeological finds including the presence of large amounts of oak pollen.As one archaeologist pondered :
"Requiring more of an explanation is the large percentages of oak pollen we find within the temple floor which is clearly not an economically tithed plant." Patrick Scott-Geyer Patterns of Worship at the Temple to Hecate at Lagina 2007

Another unusual feature are the carved pillars there which display Acanthus leaves.This plant does not appear in any pollen finds in excavations of the site and is more well known as one of the most common forms of decoration in ancient Greek architecture.Not sure if the specific pillars hosting Acanthus leaves were a later addition after refurbishment.


Had to go and find Patterns of Worship at the temple of Hecate of Lagina actually. I tend to enjoy the historical side of things but find many do not engage that part of their practice. Yet the author addresses the statement with three possible answers. 1. Oak was a common tree in the area and used for fire. 2. The amount of oak pollen suggests there could have been a sacred oak grove that was later replaced by a sacred grove of willow, which replaces the amount of oak pollen with willow pollen. 3. Festival decorations.

Though the author does ask, does it prove there was in fact a sacred grove of Willow or Oak tree's at Lagina.

I know Lagina went through a couple of major renovation projects through out it's active life time. Parts of it's temple pediments were supposed to rival anything in Anatolia itself. Figure it was part of Straronicea basically and the Jewell of that area. Though destroyed in 40 BCE it was rebuilt and enhanced multiple times until finally falling by the 3rd century c.e.
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Pleiades
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#92 » Thu Apr 19, 2018 10:26 am

Another insight into Invocations involving Hekate is that despite what we would expect,love charms in ancient Greece and Rome seldom employed supplications to Venus or Aphrodite,but rather the petitions were directed at Selena and Hekate. Long,Eleanor. “Aphrodisiacs,Charms and Philtres” Western Folklore vol.32 no.3,1973, pp.153–163.JSTOR 498381.

This is merely one example of how the modern mind has accepted countless restructuring of ideas that have cemented themselves indelibly into popularised magical thinking.So move over Venus,Hekate is back!

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monsnoleedra
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#93 » Thu Apr 19, 2018 11:54 am

Pleiades wrote:Another insight into Invocations involving Hekate is that despite what we would expect,love charms in ancient Greece and Rome seldom employed supplications to Venus or Aphrodite,but rather the petitions were directed at Selena and Hekate. Long,Eleanor. “Aphrodisiacs,Charms and Philtres” Western Folklore vol.32 no.3,1973, pp.153–163.JSTOR 498381.

This is merely one example of how the modern mind has accepted countless restructuring of ideas that have cemented themselves indelibly into popularised magical thinking.So move over Venus,Hekate is back!


Personally I tend to agree. That's one reason I think the rose should belong to Hekate vice belonging to any other goddess and its attributes to love are misaligned. Figure the rose has long been associated with love and by default to Venus or Aphrodite but I was always taught that is wrong. It's an after effect in that association not a direct usage and purpose.

For me, and more UPG and familial lore I suppose, but the rose is a guardian and protector and especially a woman's plant. It was usually planted close to a home and cared for by the woman of the home and guarded the entrance to the home or other openings into the home. It was also a boundary guardian and liminal guardian and equipped with its own teeth to bite and tear at anything or any one who dared trespass its protection / restrictions. It has many eyes and those eyes peer into the realm of the living and realm of the dead and to some degree multiple realms / dimensions. Each blossom opens and closes with the day and stays alert at all times and its eyes are often taken into the home. Even in death its eye bud remained to see unless removed by force. It represented both civilization and wilderness in its cultivation and protection, and could protect via either method if left to its own devices. Yet it is also a symbol of protection that was given to one that was loved to protect them and often times a plant as well given to the new bride to protect her home. The oils, fragrances, petals, etc were all essences of the plant and its purposes & functions of protection. In its role as protector and given in that role it became associated as a sign of love and loving action but its purpose is as a protector of women and their home and hearth.
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Pleiades
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#94 » Fri Apr 20, 2018 7:53 am

monsnoleedra wrote:
Pleiades wrote:Another insight into Invocations involving Hekate is that despite what we would expect,love charms in ancient Greece and Rome seldom employed supplications to Venus or Aphrodite,but rather the petitions were directed at Selena and Hekate. Long,Eleanor. “Aphrodisiacs,Charms and Philtres” Western Folklore vol.32 no.3,1973, pp.153–163.JSTOR 498381.

This is merely one example of how the modern mind has accepted countless restructuring of ideas that have cemented themselves indelibly into popularised magical thinking.So move over Venus,Hekate is back!


Personally I tend to agree. That's one reason I think the rose should belong to Hekate vice belonging to any other goddess and its attributes to love are misaligned. Figure the rose has long been associated with love and by default to Venus or Aphrodite but I was always taught that is wrong. It's an after effect in that association not a direct usage and purpose.

For me, and more UPG and familial lore I suppose, but the rose is a guardian and protector and especially a woman's plant. It was usually planted close to a home and cared for by the woman of the home and guarded the entrance to the home or other openings into the home. It was also a boundary guardian and liminal guardian and equipped with its own teeth to bite and tear at anything or any one who dared trespass its protection / restrictions. It has many eyes and those eyes peer into the realm of the living and realm of the dead and to some degree multiple realms / dimensions. Each blossom opens and closes with the day and stays alert at all times and its eyes are often taken into the home. Even in death its eye bud remained to see unless removed by force. It represented both civilization and wilderness in its cultivation and protection, and could protect via either method if left to its own devices. Yet it is also a symbol of protection that was given to one that was loved to protect them and often times a plant as well given to the new bride to protect her home. The oils, fragrances, petals, etc were all essences of the plant and its purposes & functions of protection. In its role as protector and given in that role it became associated as a sign of love and loving action but its purpose is as a protector of women and their home and hearth.

Its certainly a woman's plant and one that represents a gateway or entrance.This latter symbolism is indicated in the Rose widows of Cathedral architecture which in turn is linked to the Vesica Piscis the root of the Christian Ichthys.Archimedes termed its mathematical ratio as 'The measure of the fish' being 153/265 or the square root of 3(almost) and this appears to reveal the meaning of the 153 fishes in the Gospel of John.
The sexual connections with fish and mechanics of the female genitalia are briefly explored by Jean Markale in Celtic Civilization 1979

It can be shown that modern thinking on the correspondences between Venus,Aphrodite and the Rose are based on kataphatic associations attributed to the sphere of Netzach on the Kabbalistic Tree of Life.Indeed,the Zohar opens with the image of the Jewish nation likened to a beloved rose with 13 petals.It is no coincidence that the 13th Path there links sexuality to beauty and that this Path has the Hebrew Nun(Aramaic lit.Fish)as its governing letter.Nun evokes the intense intimacy and emotional energy of the sea.
Some traditions stated that Aphrodite had sprung from the foam (aphros) of the sea and had metamorphosed herself into a fish, which was considered to possess the greatest generative powers.
In contrast Hekate is a 'Dark Goddess' who will be more associated in modernist thought with Lust as opposed to the rather more purist expectations of 'Love' represented by Venus in her sanitised Roman guise as the Morning Star.

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Pablo
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#95 » Fri Apr 20, 2018 9:05 am

monsnoleedra wrote:
Pleiades wrote:Another insight into Invocations involving Hekate is that despite what we would expect,love charms in ancient Greece and Rome seldom employed supplications to Venus or Aphrodite,but rather the petitions were directed at Selena and Hekate. Long,Eleanor. “Aphrodisiacs,Charms and Philtres” Western Folklore vol.32 no.3,1973, pp.153–163.JSTOR 498381.

This is merely one example of how the modern mind has accepted countless restructuring of ideas that have cemented themselves indelibly into popularised magical thinking.So move over Venus,Hekate is back!


Personally I tend to agree. That's one reason I think the rose should belong to Hekate vice belonging to any other goddess and its attributes to love are misaligned. Figure the rose has long been associated with love and by default to Venus or Aphrodite but I was always taught that is wrong. It's an after effect in that association not a direct usage and purpose.

For me, and more UPG and familial lore I suppose, but the rose is a guardian and protector and especially a woman's plant. It was usually planted close to a home and cared for by the woman of the home and guarded the entrance to the home or other openings into the home. It was also a boundary guardian and liminal guardian and equipped with its own teeth to bite and tear at anything or any one who dared trespass its protection / restrictions. It has many eyes and those eyes peer into the realm of the living and realm of the dead and to some degree multiple realms / dimensions. Each blossom opens and closes with the day and stays alert at all times and its eyes are often taken into the home. Even in death its eye bud remained to see unless removed by force. It represented both civilization and wilderness in its cultivation and protection, and could protect via either method if left to its own devices. Yet it is also a symbol of protection that was given to one that was loved to protect them and often times a plant as well given to the new bride to protect her home. The oils, fragrances, petals, etc were all essences of the plant and its purposes & functions of protection. In its role as protector and given in that role it became associated as a sign of love and loving action but its purpose is as a protector of women and their home and hearth.


:goodpost

I have often pondered if the rose was the plant attributed to the (now sanitised)Venus it had such thorns. Your UPG certainly has credence for me.
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Moonlit Hermit
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#96 » Fri Apr 20, 2018 11:17 am

Pleiades wrote:Another insight into Invocations involving Hekate is that despite what we would expect,love charms in ancient Greece and Rome seldom employed supplications to Venus or Aphrodite,but rather the petitions were directed at Selena and Hekate.


I think it is important to mention here that a lot of love spells from this era, like in the PGM, are more for coercion and inflicting discomfort than for feelings of affection or lust. Just sayin'.

This whole discussion has been interesting. I haven't really worked with Hekate directly so I have nothing of substance to add other than my general philosophy that correspondences can be somewhat fluid.
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monsnoleedra
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#97 » Fri Apr 20, 2018 12:39 pm

Moonlit Hermit wrote:
Pleiades wrote:Another insight into Invocations involving Hekate is that despite what we would expect,love charms in ancient Greece and Rome seldom employed supplications to Venus or Aphrodite,but rather the petitions were directed at Selena and Hekate.


I think it is important to mention here that a lot of love spells from this era, like in the PGM, are more for coercion and inflicting discomfort than for feelings of affection or lust. Just sayin'.

This whole discussion has been interesting. I haven't really worked with Hekate directly so I have nothing of substance to add other than my general philosophy that correspondences can be somewhat fluid.


Truthfully I can only think of one spell in the PGM (PGM IV. 2708-2784) that is described as a love spell that calls upon Hekate-Selene to secure the affections of a lover. In that instance it seems more in align with the story of Selene and Endymion as lovers and her visiting him while he dreams. She basically secures the affections of a lover and has offspring with him per the lore.

Though in many capacities Selene as the moon and Hekate as the dark moon period or placed at the moon or holding dominion over the daemons who are located at the moon under chaldean practices ties into aspects of the PGM workings. Either can dispatch "Dreams" or daemons to inflict discomfort or coerce and punish via dreams or physical manifestations.

I personally think Selene and by association Hekate are seen as seductive sexuality in an almost passive sense. Where Venus and Aphrodite are an aggressive sexuality in a firery type of seductiveness. Two sides of the same coin but Selene is the silver of the moon and sort of cold, silent and stillness, Aphrodite is hot, flashy or bright and loud like the sun. One strikes directly at you with purpose and action, the other is stealthy and covert, almost dreamlike or perhaps like a vapor or mist.
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Moonlit Hermit
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#98 » Fri Apr 20, 2018 2:09 pm

Well, in PGM IV alone we have:
IV 94-153 (a little ambiguous in terms of 'coercion')
IV 1390-1495
IV 1496-1595
IV 1872-1927 (again a little ambiguous)
IV 2441-2621
IV 2708-2784
IV 2891-2942
IV 2708-2784
IV 2943-2966
IV 3255-3274

Some of the language is a little ambiguous depending on how you interpret phrases like "put a burning in her". But this diverges from the thread. I have no place to agree or disagree about the aspects of Hekate.
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Pleiades
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#99 » Sat Apr 21, 2018 5:00 am

Moonlit Hermit wrote:
Pleiades wrote:Another insight into Invocations involving Hekate is that despite what we would expect,love charms in ancient Greece and Rome seldom employed supplications to Venus or Aphrodite,but rather the petitions were directed at Selena and Hekate.


I think it is important to mention here that a lot of love spells from this era, like in the PGM, are more for coercion and inflicting discomfort than for feelings of affection or lust. Just sayin'.

This whole discussion has been interesting. I haven't really worked with Hekate directly so I have nothing of substance to add other than my general philosophy that correspondences can be somewhat fluid.

Well like most things of this nature,depends on how the texts are interpreted.Coercion seems a fitting description for the mechanics of 'Love' spells which of course are driven by and more likely to obtain Lust.Likewise inflicting discomfort is an apt description of the recipients feelings.

The PGM is not really my thing but I found many spells for Love to bring attraction there and then you have separate charms,potions and philtres.

PGM LXXVIII. 1-14
PGM LXII. 1-24
PDM lxi. 159-96
PGM LXI. 39-71
PDM lxi. 128-47
PDM lxi. 112-27
PGM LII. 1-9
PGM LI. 1-27
PGM XXXVIII. 1-26
PGM XXXIX. 1-21
PGM XXXVI. 361-71
PGM XXXVI. 333-60
PGM XXXVI. 295-311
PGM XXXVI. 187-210
PGM XXXVI. 69-101
PGM XXXVI. 69-101
PGM XXXIIa. 1-25
PGM XXXII. 1-19
PGM XXIVb. 1-15
PGM XIXb. 4-18
PGM XIXb. 1-3
PGM XIXa. 1-54
PGM XVIIa. 1-25
PGM IV. 94-153
PGM IV. 1265-74
PGM IV. 1390-1495
PGM IV. 1496-1595
PGM IV. 2441-2621
PGM IV. 2891-2942
PGM IV. 2943-66
PGM VII. 467-77
PGM VII. 661-63
PGM VII. 973-80
PGM VII. 981-93
PGM XII. 474-79
PGM XII. 480-95
PGM XVIIIb. 1-7
PGM XIXa. 1-54
PGM XIXb. 1-3
PGM XIXb. 4-18
PGM XXIVb. 1-15
PGM XXXII. 1-19
PGM XXXIIa. 1-25

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monsnoleedra
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Re: Odd Insights into Hekate

Post#100 » Sat Apr 21, 2018 11:56 am

Wonder if this part of the discussion wouldn't be a good subject for the PGM part of the forum. Anyway, not debating that the subject of love spells is a part of the PGM or is coercion in practice only that the use of Hekate is relatively small in usage in them.

Not my site but an excellent site of reference http://voces-magicae.com/2015/04/17/hekate-in-the-pgm/ and if I recall it belongs to a member here already.

PGM IV. 1390-1495 Love spell performed in necromantic setting (with the help of “those who have died a violent death”). Invoked by herself (also as Hekate-Persephone) for three days while making the initial offering at the place of death. Later invoked with many other Chthonic deities for a secondary offering.

PGM IV. 2708-2784 Full moon hymn. In this case the petition is to secure the affections of a lover, but could be used for any form of petition or prayer. Hekate is once again identified with Artemis, Persephone and Selene.

PGM IV. 2943-2966 Love spell to cause a lover to “lie awake for me for all eternity”. In this spell it appears that Iope (Cassiopeia) is called forth to perform the deed through the authority and power of Hekate

PGM CXVII. Fragment of historical significance. It is is likely one of the earlier papyri of the collection and speaks to an already well established syncretic Greek and Egyptian tradition. Thought to be a love spell mentioning Hekate.


Basically 4 spells that could be said to be love spells and 1 of those could be claimed to be punishment of a lover more than a true love spell. So 4 out of 14 spells are potentially love spells. Then of the 4, 1 is done in the name or power of Hekate not actually calling upon her. Which sort of places it in a testament of faith sort of thing

Kimberly B. Stratton in her book DAUGHTERS OH HECATE Women & Magic in the Ancient World Oxford University Press 2014 ISBN 978-O-19-534271-0 has discussed several of these aspects already. Chapter 5 Magic, Abjection, and Gender in Roman Literature goes into some detail about this very subject. Still reading the book so may go into it more in later chapters.
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