Greeting all! My sincere apologies for not having updated for the last week and a half or so. I am currently (as mentioned previously) in the proofing stages. This means I'm going through my own text with a fine-tooth comb to ensure that I have caught as many mistakes as I can. I'm fairly certain that no venture can be mistake proof, but I like to minimize the existence of mistakes that can be prevented. As a result there is has not been much to say or post in the past few days. Stay tuned because within the nest week I hope to post a number of pages that have been proofed so that you can see what I've been doing.
In the mean time, take a look at LotR section on calligrapher/cartographer/artist Daniel Reeve's website http://www.danielreeve.co.nz/LOTR/ Mr. Reeve is an exceptionally talented man and is responsible for the maps of Middle Earth as found in Jackson's movies, along with calligraphy, other props, and the title menus on the Extended Edition DVDs. He's also done work for Narnia, maps for LotR: Online, King Kong, Underworld: The Rise of the Lycans, etc. A phenomenal site that I highly recommend you check out.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Brigid the goddess and Brigid the saint discussed
Originally this was part of the previous post 'rose' is in and 'air' is out, a mythological angle is discussed this blurb made the entry far too long. to get the full picture have a look-see at the former post to see how this all relates.
What you are about to read is my layman's interpretation of the connection between Brigid the Celtic goddess and St. Brigid the Catholic Saint so please excuse any discrepancies that you might see concerning the aforementioned figures. This is meant largely to inform those subjecting themselves to this blog about the connections that I draw between the two figures. Since I claim "artistic licence" on the mythological angle of The Host of the Air, I deem it only fair that the reasoning behind imagery used in the future be explained now - as I will be drawing from the background of both Brigids. I would love to hear what anyone reading this has to say on the subject. As with every other post on this blog, you do not have to be a member of blogger/Google to comment; and can even post anonymously or with a pseudonym should you so desire.
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Brigid the goddess and Brigid the saint are connected how?
You might wonder why I draw a connection between both the pagan goddess Brigid and the Christian saint Brigid. The answer is simple, for all intents and purposes they are the same. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that the ancient celts worshipped a saint, or that the modern Catholic Church revers a celtic goddess. However, at some point in time the two figures were the at least similar. For example, not only do they share the same celebration day, but they are both protector/parton of very similar groups. About four years ago I wrote a paper called Celtic Christianity: St. Patrick, the Druids, and the Saints, which focused on the idea that "the ministry of Saint Patrick, the post Roman world, the Druids, and the mythology surrounding the Celtic Saints all combine to create the basis for what is considered to be the origins of Celtic Christianity." The following is an excerpt from the paper, which directly addresses the "Brigid issue."
Ian Bradley, author of Celtic Christianity and other books concerning the Celts and their culture, states that “the extent to which pre-Christian material was woven into early Celtic Christian literature is fiercely disputed among modern scholars and lies at the heart of the debate between nativists in the field of Celtic studies” (8). While the amount of influence pre-Celtic culture had on Celtic Christianity may be disputed, the fact that it did is indisputable. The influence of Druidic beliefs and Celtic myth on Celtic Christianity is most evident is in what Dáithí Ó hÓgáin, a folklore professor at The University College Dublin, calls “the cult of the saints” (202). As was the practice of the early Catholic Church, customs from pagan regions were often used in forming an area’s “local theology.” Pagan ideals were meshed with Christian ideals in an effort to win over the local populace and assimilate them into the Christian Church. To some extent, Celtic Christianity was no different in Ireland. Wherever “popular practice and belief” were not seen to conflict outright with Christian theology, they were often allowed to continue in slightly different forms (Ó hÓgáin 202). The most obvious example of this is found in the case of the Celtic Saint Brighid (Brigit). Not much actual fact is known about her, but the stories surrounding her existence demonstrate the role that pagan beliefs played in her life - or what the ancients believed her life to have been. Two main conflicting ideas concerning her life are currently recognized. The most referenced of these is found in the 12th century document by Leabhar Breac Of the Life of St. Brigit. Breac recounts that Brigit was the illegitimate daughter of the Irish king Dubthach by his valued bondmaid. Raised by a “wizard” and his consort, she was eventually placed under the watch of a certain Bishop Mél. Later, she was given the rights of a bishop with eight “virgins” under her, in her care (Breac 55, 67). This is the only source I found that cites her as a bishop. Others describe her as an abbotess, but most sources agree that her order resided on land that had once been consecrated for pagan religious purposes. Despite its unusual location, which was possibly the location of an ancient goddess’s temple, Miranda Green, the author of many books concerning Celtic religion, states that St. Brigit’s “convent” was “jointly for women and men” (43). If what Miranda Green asserts about Brigit’s religious establishment is true, than her order defies the conventional ideals of Early Christianity and alludes to the order of the Druids. Druidic priests and priestesses are believed to have worked side by side, while Christian monks and nuns dwelled and worked in separate self-sufficient communities. The celebrated Brigit is also unique in that she shared her name with an ancient goddess. Ó hÓgáin suggests that perhaps she was originally not so celebrated as a saint for her accomplishments, but the original success of her “cult” and the vast numbers of her followers was due to this connection with the pagan deity. He hypothesizes that if she did indeed “Christianize a pagan sanctuary” as legend tells, than to the locals her role as abbotess took on an “aspect of a mother-goddess” (202). Even some Christian writers as late as the 5th century referred to her as “another Mary,” and today she is often called Muire na nGael, or “the Mary of the Irish” (Ó hÓgáin 202).
______________________________________
My Deductions
My paper from 2004 discussed Brigid the saint from the hypothesized angle of a Druidic priestess who adapted to fit the christian mold as an abbottess. There is certainly research to back up this angle, however, a little bit of reading done in the past couple weeks has made me wonder if the Saint Brigid and the goddess Brigid really aren't just one and the same. They are patrons of the same people groups (well Saint Brigid is patron of many more than my limited information on the goddess reveals), they share the same feast day, they share the same symbols, and all information I could find after a short search had something akin to a see "Saint Brigid/see Brigid, goddess" clause. The Catholic Church has a history of adapting the feast day dates of various pagan religions in order to ease native groups into conversion to Catholicism. If this was done with dates, was to keep it from happening with gods/goddesses or figures of great local significance? This in no way demeans or questions the religious significance of the Saints to the Catholic Church or the holiness attributed them; but with the history of St. Brigid (as written by Leabhar Breac) being questionable at best, who is to say that the Celtic goddess wasn't used as a basis for the saint. It is known that the goddess Brigid was important to the local area and turning her into a saint as part of the local theology would certainly have been a powerful factor in making converts to Celtic Christianity. From this angle, your truely feels justified in using iconography associated with both figures (shared and not) in hosts of the air.
What you are about to read is my layman's interpretation of the connection between Brigid the Celtic goddess and St. Brigid the Catholic Saint so please excuse any discrepancies that you might see concerning the aforementioned figures. This is meant largely to inform those subjecting themselves to this blog about the connections that I draw between the two figures. Since I claim "artistic licence" on the mythological angle of The Host of the Air, I deem it only fair that the reasoning behind imagery used in the future be explained now - as I will be drawing from the background of both Brigids. I would love to hear what anyone reading this has to say on the subject. As with every other post on this blog, you do not have to be a member of blogger/Google to comment; and can even post anonymously or with a pseudonym should you so desire.
_______________________________________
Brigid the goddess and Brigid the saint are connected how?
You might wonder why I draw a connection between both the pagan goddess Brigid and the Christian saint Brigid. The answer is simple, for all intents and purposes they are the same. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that the ancient celts worshipped a saint, or that the modern Catholic Church revers a celtic goddess. However, at some point in time the two figures were the at least similar. For example, not only do they share the same celebration day, but they are both protector/parton of very similar groups. About four years ago I wrote a paper called Celtic Christianity: St. Patrick, the Druids, and the Saints, which focused on the idea that "the ministry of Saint Patrick, the post Roman world, the Druids, and the mythology surrounding the Celtic Saints all combine to create the basis for what is considered to be the origins of Celtic Christianity." The following is an excerpt from the paper, which directly addresses the "Brigid issue."
Ian Bradley, author of Celtic Christianity and other books concerning the Celts and their culture, states that “the extent to which pre-Christian material was woven into early Celtic Christian literature is fiercely disputed among modern scholars and lies at the heart of the debate between nativists in the field of Celtic studies” (8). While the amount of influence pre-Celtic culture had on Celtic Christianity may be disputed, the fact that it did is indisputable. The influence of Druidic beliefs and Celtic myth on Celtic Christianity is most evident is in what Dáithí Ó hÓgáin, a folklore professor at The University College Dublin, calls “the cult of the saints” (202). As was the practice of the early Catholic Church, customs from pagan regions were often used in forming an area’s “local theology.” Pagan ideals were meshed with Christian ideals in an effort to win over the local populace and assimilate them into the Christian Church. To some extent, Celtic Christianity was no different in Ireland. Wherever “popular practice and belief” were not seen to conflict outright with Christian theology, they were often allowed to continue in slightly different forms (Ó hÓgáin 202). The most obvious example of this is found in the case of the Celtic Saint Brighid (Brigit). Not much actual fact is known about her, but the stories surrounding her existence demonstrate the role that pagan beliefs played in her life - or what the ancients believed her life to have been. Two main conflicting ideas concerning her life are currently recognized. The most referenced of these is found in the 12th century document by Leabhar Breac Of the Life of St. Brigit. Breac recounts that Brigit was the illegitimate daughter of the Irish king Dubthach by his valued bondmaid. Raised by a “wizard” and his consort, she was eventually placed under the watch of a certain Bishop Mél. Later, she was given the rights of a bishop with eight “virgins” under her, in her care (Breac 55, 67). This is the only source I found that cites her as a bishop. Others describe her as an abbotess, but most sources agree that her order resided on land that had once been consecrated for pagan religious purposes. Despite its unusual location, which was possibly the location of an ancient goddess’s temple, Miranda Green, the author of many books concerning Celtic religion, states that St. Brigit’s “convent” was “jointly for women and men” (43). If what Miranda Green asserts about Brigit’s religious establishment is true, than her order defies the conventional ideals of Early Christianity and alludes to the order of the Druids. Druidic priests and priestesses are believed to have worked side by side, while Christian monks and nuns dwelled and worked in separate self-sufficient communities. The celebrated Brigit is also unique in that she shared her name with an ancient goddess. Ó hÓgáin suggests that perhaps she was originally not so celebrated as a saint for her accomplishments, but the original success of her “cult” and the vast numbers of her followers was due to this connection with the pagan deity. He hypothesizes that if she did indeed “Christianize a pagan sanctuary” as legend tells, than to the locals her role as abbotess took on an “aspect of a mother-goddess” (202). Even some Christian writers as late as the 5th century referred to her as “another Mary,” and today she is often called Muire na nGael, or “the Mary of the Irish” (Ó hÓgáin 202).
______________________________________
My Deductions
My paper from 2004 discussed Brigid the saint from the hypothesized angle of a Druidic priestess who adapted to fit the christian mold as an abbottess. There is certainly research to back up this angle, however, a little bit of reading done in the past couple weeks has made me wonder if the Saint Brigid and the goddess Brigid really aren't just one and the same. They are patrons of the same people groups (well Saint Brigid is patron of many more than my limited information on the goddess reveals), they share the same feast day, they share the same symbols, and all information I could find after a short search had something akin to a see "Saint Brigid/see Brigid, goddess" clause. The Catholic Church has a history of adapting the feast day dates of various pagan religions in order to ease native groups into conversion to Catholicism. If this was done with dates, was to keep it from happening with gods/goddesses or figures of great local significance? This in no way demeans or questions the religious significance of the Saints to the Catholic Church or the holiness attributed them; but with the history of St. Brigid (as written by Leabhar Breac) being questionable at best, who is to say that the Celtic goddess wasn't used as a basis for the saint. It is known that the goddess Brigid was important to the local area and turning her into a saint as part of the local theology would certainly have been a powerful factor in making converts to Celtic Christianity. From this angle, your truely feels justified in using iconography associated with both figures (shared and not) in hosts of the air.
brainstorming for "wandering aengus" first initial #3 & #4
In all the brainstorms for this letter, two elements remain the same - the fish and the berry - the way they are pictured, however, changes. Here are brainstorms #1 & #2 from back in November for reference. Off the bat, it is clear that the following images were influenced by my positive experience with brainstorms #4 & #5 of withering boughs. The string wrapped around the theta (and thus effectively tying the theta and short carrier together) was brought over from the previous images, resulting in a pleasing effect. One element that I wish had been retained from brainstorm #2 was the use of a star for the theta. the star would bring the alchemical references back into the illumination and make the image more interesting without causing it to become overworked.
Brainstorm #3 is a bit same 'ole same 'ole and comes across rather uninspired as it really is just a new arrangement for the fish than in previous initials.
#4, however, has something going for it. The string carries on beyond the traditional confines of the letter (which is rather short in stature) and is rather pleasing a result. While I like the two fish, the idea of two fish has nothing to do with the poem and will therefore be nixed. Instead think of it as a study of the fish's position (sketching with pen does have it's downsides) as I was unable to erase the first fish.
The second image and the last images are skeches playing around with the way tha tthe string wraps around the theta and different fish styles.
Brainstorm #3 is a bit same 'ole same 'ole and comes across rather uninspired as it really is just a new arrangement for the fish than in previous initials.
#4, however, has something going for it. The string carries on beyond the traditional confines of the letter (which is rather short in stature) and is rather pleasing a result. While I like the two fish, the idea of two fish has nothing to do with the poem and will therefore be nixed. Instead think of it as a study of the fish's position (sketching with pen does have it's downsides) as I was unable to erase the first fish.
The second image and the last images are skeches playing around with the way tha tthe string wraps around the theta and different fish styles.
brainstorming for "stolen child" first initial #2
The following image is a simplified version of brainstorm #1 which was posted back in November. All the elements were retained (fey, basket of berries, plants), but this time around they were simplified and rearranged for what I believe to be a more appealing image. Take a look for yourself an see what you think.
brainstorming for "stolen child" and "wandering aengus"
Alright everyone, I am terribly ashamed that I did not have this up sooner as it has been floating around my house for almost a week. Below is a page of doodles created earlier this past week when I began to sit in on history lectures in prep for grad school. Doodling enhances the listening process and below is one of many pages that resulted. Letter close ups are given their own entry for commentary sake.
A number of things are going on currently behind the scenes of TTP. Proof reading transcriptions has commenced yet again (not a whole lot to post there, but I just might post a few pages that are bleeding so that you can get an exaggerated look at the proofing process) and images are still mulling in my head as pictures for title pages try to come together (you'll see results when something is actually down on paper). In unrelated news, yours truly is pulling together the beginnings of an Etsy shop and will announce when it opens.
A number of things are going on currently behind the scenes of TTP. Proof reading transcriptions has commenced yet again (not a whole lot to post there, but I just might post a few pages that are bleeding so that you can get an exaggerated look at the proofing process) and images are still mulling in my head as pictures for title pages try to come together (you'll see results when something is actually down on paper). In unrelated news, yours truly is pulling together the beginnings of an Etsy shop and will announce when it opens.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
time invested in "TTP"
About a month ago I promised myself that I would start recording the amount of time it took me to do everything in this project so that in the end I could say that i took ### man hours to complete. This evening as I finished transcribing the postscript I realized that I still have yet to record anything. Thee some things I can pretty accurately guess For instance:
- The postscript took 3hours to write (because I had to actually put my process down on paper and was cross referencing to make sure the information I was writing was correct)
- The postscript took 4 hours to transcribe because I had to continually edit the information in my head
- "Host of the Air" took 3 hours to transcribe and 1 hour to find
- I have spent about 13 hours dreaming up illuminated letters and other illustrations (you don't see all the spectacular epic fails).
- 15 hours (if not more) searching for and identifying alchemical imagery in the texts
- About 10 hours finding the correct texts to begin with (I'm pretty picky)
That all adds up to 30 minutes shy of 50 hours.
If you consider that each of the poems transcribed took between 2 and 3.5 hours each to transcribe and about 30 minutes to proof read you can add in another 21 hours on average making the total roughly 71 hours. Then factor in a good 20 hours of semi-extraneous research on my part concerning topical information and art materials, and the total swells to an estimated 91 hours. Id' say when all is said and done, A good 100 hours have been invested so far in this version of the project. I say this version b/c I have gone through the text choosing and transcription process two and a half times prior to settling on William Butler Yeats. At this moment I'm afraid to think about the amount of time invested in this piece, counting those two and a half failed attempts.
Sometimes I'm a little sad inside to think that I'm investing all this time, and yet the work will result in only one singular hand bound volume. However, what a fantastic singular volume it will be.
- The postscript took 3hours to write (because I had to actually put my process down on paper and was cross referencing to make sure the information I was writing was correct)
- The postscript took 4 hours to transcribe because I had to continually edit the information in my head
- "Host of the Air" took 3 hours to transcribe and 1 hour to find
- I have spent about 13 hours dreaming up illuminated letters and other illustrations (you don't see all the spectacular epic fails).
- 15 hours (if not more) searching for and identifying alchemical imagery in the texts
- About 10 hours finding the correct texts to begin with (I'm pretty picky)
That all adds up to 30 minutes shy of 50 hours.
If you consider that each of the poems transcribed took between 2 and 3.5 hours each to transcribe and about 30 minutes to proof read you can add in another 21 hours on average making the total roughly 71 hours. Then factor in a good 20 hours of semi-extraneous research on my part concerning topical information and art materials, and the total swells to an estimated 91 hours. Id' say when all is said and done, A good 100 hours have been invested so far in this version of the project. I say this version b/c I have gone through the text choosing and transcription process two and a half times prior to settling on William Butler Yeats. At this moment I'm afraid to think about the amount of time invested in this piece, counting those two and a half failed attempts.
Sometimes I'm a little sad inside to think that I'm investing all this time, and yet the work will result in only one singular hand bound volume. However, what a fantastic singular volume it will be.
postscript transcription
Well this monster is finally transcribed - the postscript! It is an abbreviated version of the TTP post back in Nov 08 entitled transcription - the method to my madness . Let it be known that I do sense the great irony of the explanatory text being transcribed - after all if you can't read tengwar than you won't be able to read the explanatory text. However, I figure that if you can't read tengwar to start with, than the postscript really won't matter much in the end anyways as the majority of it explains conflicts i ran into and how I solved the problem. Before you scroll further down and look at the pictures, let me point out that I'm well aware of transcription errors in this text from the get-go. For about a page in a half, my mind transcribed "w+o" as if it was "o+w" and completely forgot that there is a special symbol for the word "of." I'm sure there are a couple others, for instance I think that a couple of my "g"s look like "j"s or possibly "b"s (The "b" is a "g" just flip flopped over a y-axis), but all of this will be corrected once I go back and proofread. In the meantime enjoy the scribblings below!
Thursday, January 1, 2009
"the host of the air" transcription
Happy New Years all! Yours truly is starting the year out in style with a brand new transcription of the latest TTP poem The Host of the Air. All five pages are posted below. I would apologize for the scribbles and self editing marks; but it's really all part of the process, so take a moment to revel in its rough draft qualities.
With the holiday season finished until April (Valentine's Day doesn't really count), be looking for posts to be up once again at fairly regular intervals. I used the French Paper, Parchetone "Natural" #1046, 80lb text that TTP will be written on for various Christmas presents this year. The only word for this paper is luxurious. The pen and pencil slide over it as effortlessly as a knife cutting through room-temperature butter. It was a real treat, and I even indulged myself by creating a mock booklet and flipping through the pages to see how the experience felt. It was incredible. Yours truly absolutely can not wait to begin work on TTP's final form, so that the paper can be put to good use!
With the holiday season finished until April (Valentine's Day doesn't really count), be looking for posts to be up once again at fairly regular intervals. I used the French Paper, Parchetone "Natural" #1046, 80lb text that TTP will be written on for various Christmas presents this year. The only word for this paper is luxurious. The pen and pencil slide over it as effortlessly as a knife cutting through room-temperature butter. It was a real treat, and I even indulged myself by creating a mock booklet and flipping through the pages to see how the experience felt. It was incredible. Yours truly absolutely can not wait to begin work on TTP's final form, so that the paper can be put to good use!
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