Since Ariadne's Tribe is a living spiritual tradition, it has taken us a number of years to complete our sacred calendar. This post and the next one will be the last additions for the foreseeable future. This has been a long-term community effort in the Tribe, and I'm grateful to everyone who has participated in this process.
So where are we in the calendar right now? We've just passed the Blessing of the Ships and are now in the season that leads up to Summer Solstice.
In Ariadne's Tribe, our mythos is intricately interwoven with our sacred calendar. This connects the stories of the deities with the movement of celestial objects, from the Sun and Moon to the planets and stars. When we look up in the night sky, we see those stories spread out in sparkling array above us.
The Tribe mythos is organized into micropantheons, with each small group of deities having their own story cycles that are reflected in the stars. Micropantheons have been around in the Mediterranean since at least the Bronze Age, possibly earlier, so it's likely the Minoans had multiple ways of viewing the constellations depending on which deities their personal spiritual practice revolved around.
Let's continue our exploration of Minoan clothing, shall we? Perhaps the most well-known item of Minoan clothing is the open-front top that Minoan women wear in much of the art. As I mentioned in Part One, this style probably involved sacred symbolism and would not have been considered racy or immoral in that time and place.
People are fascinated by Minoan clothing, but they're also confused by it. I thought I would take a little time to explain and show you some images from Minoan art so we can all enjoy the lovely garments the Minoans wore.
Please note that this is a two-part blog post (Part Two coming next week) but it's NOT divided into men's vs. women's clothing, because there is considerable overlap in some of the styles of clothing worn by different genders.
I've been thinking about roads the past couple of days. The Minoans were famous for their paved roads, an unusual feature of Bronze Age cities. Archaeologists think they had roads (not all of them paved) running all around the coastline of Crete and crisscrossing the island.
These are Rhea's Roads, since Rhea is the Minoan Earth Mother. It's her soil we walk on, especially on Crete, even if there's pavement on top of it.
The Mediterranean climate has its own unique seasonal cycle. In Ariadne’s Tribe, we’ve created a sacred calendar that acknowledges this climate and gives names to three sacred seasons: Summer, Winter, and the Blooming Time. You can find more details about this seasonal structure in this blog post.
Today I want to talk about the Blooming Time. It begins the day after Spring Equinox and ends with the Blessing of the Ships in mid-May, so it’s a fairly short season. We call it the Blooming Time because, although various trees and flowers bloom throughout most of the year on Crete, the wildflowers bloom in profusion during the Blooming Time and flowers are an important symbol of this unique season.
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