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The Goddess and her Enemies

Ancient Goddess Worship

35,000 BC saw the emergence of the Cro-Magnon people, the first recognizable human society. Within a few thousand years, worship of the Great Goddess or Great Mother developed. For these people, deity was female. The importance of fertility in crops, in domesticated animals, in wild animals and in the tribe itself were of paramount importance to their survival. Thus, the Female life-giving principle was considered divine and a great mystery.

This “old European” culture lasted for tens of thousands of years in what is now Europe. They generally lived in peace. Males and females were treated equally. Their society was matrilineal—children took their heritage from their mothers. Life was based on lunar (not solar) calendar—time was experienced as a repetitive cycle, not linearly as we think of it.

Among hunters and gatherers, the power of women to give birth was great magic, but the main concern of males was success in the hunt. Initiation rites of passage into adulthood reflect these differences. Rites for girls focus on teaching and public affirmation of the girls' womanly status. Rites for boys are trials and tests. Girls move into womanhood naturally, proving it through processes over which they have no conscious control—menstruation and childbirth. Their “magic” is inborn and powerful. The role of males in procreation was not clear to these early humans and boys had to prove their manhood through action and conscious self-control. They had to separate themselves from childhood and particularly from the women who until then had had care of them. Their “magic” is based on courage to prepare them for the hunt.

Goddesses have been called by many names by different cultures and ages: Anath, Aphrodite, Arianrhod, Artemis, Aseneth, Astarte, Brighid, Ceres, Cybele, Demeter, Diana, Eostre, Freya, Gaia, Hera, Ishtar, Isis, Juno, Kali, Lilith, Ma'at, Mary, Minerva, Neith, Ostare, Persephone, Venus, Vesta, and many others.

The development of agriculture was the next big cultural step, starting about 11,000 years ago in the Middle East. Life became settled in villages, populations increased, and huntable game dwindled. The focus of religion was on fertility and death. The deity was a Goddess often visualized in three aspects: maiden, mother and crone. The Maiden represented youth, emerging sexuality, the huntress running with her hounds. The Mother symbolized feminine power, fertility, and nurturing. The Crone was wisdom, the compassion which comes from experience, and the one who guided us through the death experience.

But the goddess was triple in three ways. She was also goddess of the earth, the sky and the underworld, and each of these three aspects had the three aspects of maiden, mother and crone. Thus she had nine aspects overall and was depicted often as an ennead rather than a triad. The goddess of the earth was goddess of the three seasons, spring, summer and winter—the ancients not seeing autumn. The sky goddess was the moon in each of its phases, new, full and waning. The goddess of the underworld was the goddess of procreation, birth and death.

Marija Gimbutas, an Eastern European archaeologist, wrote most extensively on goddesses in ancient sites. She aimed to “reconstruct” the religious symbols and iconography of “the Goddess” in Neolithic artefacts (8000-3000 BC). Our ancestors, she says, had “a complex symbolic system formulated around the worship of the Goddess in her various aspects”. These societies were matrilineal, and peaceful.

Paleolithic and Neolithic symbols and images cluster around a self-generating Goddess and her basic functions of Giver-of- Life, Wielder-of-Death, and as Regeneratrix… The religion of the Goddess reflected a matristic, matrilineal, and endogamic social order for most of early human history. This was not necessarily “matriarchy” … The emphasis in these cultures was on technologies that nourished people's lives, in contrast to the androcratic focus on domination…

Marija Gimbutas sees two principal religious systems in human development: the matristic gylanic or peaceful goddess society, and the androcratic or belligerent patriarchies. The matristic gylanic symbols are further divided into subsystems according to the function of the goddess as Life-giving, Renewing and Eternal Earth, Death and Regeneration, or Energy and Unfolding.

As all life flows from water, Gimbutas claims it is the Mother Goddess as the Life-Giver. Gimbutas says the earliest symbol in human history, the zig-zag, drawn by Neanderthals around 40,000 BC is also water. “M” (Mother) and W (Woman) are zig-zags standing originally for water. The “M” is found on water containers. The chevron and “v” symbols, are variants of this and also stand for the Bird Goddess. It is conjectured that the “V” is the pubic triangle and is found on many bird figurines seemingly identifying birds as feminine. It first arose in the 7th millennium BC on painted pottery, and was then found in the 6th millennium.

Bird-shaped vases are found with the “V” and chevron sign, as are bird-woman hybrids with beaks and “V” necklaces, according to Gimbutas. Graves from 3,000 BC on Malta contained bird-woman hybrids. Megalithic monuments, which might have been prayed to and embraced, were possible bird Goddesses. Female figures are sometimes given owl-like eyes suggesting that one of the birds associated with women was the owl. In Hungary and Lemnos, owl-shaped burial urns with umbilical cords or human vulva date back to 3000 BC. Ornithomorphic female figurines are found with their fronts engraved as chevrons and their posteriors as meanders. In “all of Old Europe between Greece, Scandinavia, and Ireland,” the “same symbolism” of the Goddess's “pubic triangle… a symbol of regeneration” is found.

A Paleolithic Pavlovian and a Vincan figurine from 5000-4500 BC shows an apparently female deity with a stream running over her body. A female figurine of about 4000 BC found in a flint shaft in Ireland is parallel to the Vinca Bird Goddess. “The Goddess very likely was patroness of crafts including metallurgy and flint tool making.”

Gimbutas interprets the bull head as the goddess because it is shaped like the uterus, but whether this is the reason or not, the association exists. Gimbutas's critics fail to realize, presumably willfully because they should know better, is that she does not present her claims as facts, but hypotheses for consideration. If she seems more convinced than her critics she would not be alone among scientists in standing up for her beliefs, before they were proved.

Life seemed to be a miracle and women were plainly responsible for it. The Earth Mother or Fertility Goddess is shown as a pregnant woman holding her belly in figurines such as those of Laussel, Dordogne, France, and the Ukraine from 7000-6000 BC. The lozenge containing a dot is also found on pregnant figurines, especially the belly, which Gimbutas interprets as the child within the womb. In the Vincan culture, the pregnant figurines wear sow masks presumably because the sow was fertile and her piglets fast-growing—desirable qualities. Gimbutas observes that the graves of Neolithic Europeans were modelled on the female uterus so that the buried dead could feel like they were in the womb of their Earth Mother ready to be re-born. At some stage they oriented the uterus towards the rising sun as if they realised the purpose of intercourse, and felt the sun was the real fertilising agent. Perhaps they long knew that intercourse was necessary for procreation but because it was such a hit-and-miss affair, they took it that the Goddess or the sun had to give a blessing for it to succeed. Caves were sometimes painted entirely red as if it were meant to stand for the menstrual blood or the afterbirth, perhaps. Animals that shed their skin such as snakes were also seen as standing for women being regeneration.

Artefacts from such as the Sesklo culture of northern Greece (Thessaly, 6500-5500 BC) seem overwhelmingly to be images of goddesses, a bird goddess, a snake goddess and a nurse, seemingly temple or house figurines. Others, such as the pregnant goddess, were worshipped in a courtyard at specially prepared platforms. Pottery had designs of flames, triangles, zigzags, lozenges, and steps on them, all possibly symbols of the Great Goddess. Red ochre is accepted as standing for blood and therefore life, and is associated often with the Goddess artefacts, symbols and images.

Death was not something to be feared in ancient cultures because they had seen that from death comes life. The vulture is an obvious symbol of death. Paintings from temples in Çatal Hütük depict a vulture with human legs and therefore possibly standing for a Goddess, devouring heads of corpses.

The egg is a symbol of regeneration. Most cultures use eggs in some form or another to celebrate the coming of spring and the renewal of growth. The egg can be found on vases, water containers, figurines, and bowls. It is sometimes found in relation to water and the bull. A dish from Malta contains all three of these Goddess symbols, dating back to 3,000 BC.

Snakes, caterpillars, and any animal that sheds a former body or skin are other examples of the Goddess as Regeneration. The spiral is a representation of the snake, which is an archetype for the cyclical mode of life. The spiral first arrived as a symbol on pottery in 7th millennium south-eastern Europe. Spirals will sometimes have life branch out from them in the form of leaves and branches, like those of the megalith temples from Malta (3000 BC). Spirals are often located on feminine parts of the body, such as the breasts and uterus, in figurines. Symbols of the moon and lunar cycle are found with snake coils, owl-shaped figurines, and bull’s horns, linking them all together under the Goddess. Whirls are considered to represent life becoming, as are opposed snakes, both of which can be found on the breasts and abdomen of the female figurine. The opposing snakes are one of the most common motifs on Neolithic vases with a snake on either side of the opening and can be seen especially in Cucuteni vase painting.

Anthropologists are also turning to the so-called “fringe cultures” such as the modern foraging and horticulture societies for proof of the goddess civilization's persistence: “cultures do not seem to be aware of the male role in procreation”. For these cultures life seems to originate within the female alone.

In Çatal Hütük, an alter and temple dating back to 7000 BC with many clay figurines of the Great Goddess, an idol, and wall paintings depicting some of her symbols, such as the bull, provide signs of former goddess worship. The famous statue of a woman giving birth upon a throne with two leopards at her side is also found here, in which form the Great Mother is known in Phrygia as Cybele. Part of the Magna Mater cult was to castrate and sacrifice a bull and be baptized in its blood, which is a basis for the bull as a symbol of the Great Mother.

In northern Europe, triangular or trapezoidal barrows are “symbols of the regenerative triangle of the Goddess herself”. A staff or digging stick with a human head top is a “sculpture probably portraying an Owl Goddess”. Wooden ladles with ducks heads are “religious” objects.

The Goddess is symbolized by “symbols of the uterus,” the frog, toad, bull's head, and triangles, and by insects. Male deities are only 3-5 percent of neolithic sculpture. Gimbutas summarises:

The multiple categories, functions, and symbols used by prehistoric peoples to express the Great Mystery are all aspects of the unbroken unity of one deity.

Old European society was organized around a theacratic, communal temple community, guided by a queen-priestess, her brother or uncle, and a council of women as the governing body.

Evidence for the Goddess culture is not unequivocal, but feminist ideas in archaeology have obliged archaeologists to think on new lines. The patriarchal religions have conditioned thought for so long, it was taken for granted as the basic relgion of mankind, with Goddesses as a sort of aberration. Yet in simple societies based on hunting and gathering, and even into the early agricultural period, generation of surplus was wasteful not beneficial, and so there was no economic basis for priests and warlords to impose their protection rackets. Not only did women provide the basic sustenance of society, they had the time while gathering and cooking to gossip and formulate ideas. Wisdom was a female quality because women did more thinking and exchanging of ideas. Women as mothers, providers and philosophers were looked on with awe. This was the nature of the primitive matriarchy. It was a matriarchy by consent.

The next stage in this history was the discovery of the role of males in procreation and the revolution of men against matriarchy. The plains of Eurasia were the home of nomadic herders, moving their cattle, sheep and horses to the seasonal pastures. Population pressures and technological change accompanied the discovery of male fertilization and led to some of the herders opting to be professional warriors—effectively robber barons who would raid distant tribes or the settled agricultural populations that had recently established themselves to the south.

With the development of technology, particularly the warhorse and chariot, these robber barons realised they could take what was not rightfully theirs, and another breed of bandits realised they could use trickery to take what was not theirs. Soon all the tribes had a class of warriors, the leaders of whom declared themselves to be god-kings, and priests who acted for the gods. Patriarchy was borne and literally conquered the world. The concept of the Stone Age Great Goddess cult being a matriarchy in the sense of women ruling is probably untrue merely because the concept of rule was not valid. No one ruled but women were looked upon for their wisdom in tackling problems in this society and had an especially honoured position.

On these vast and featureless plains, the sky dominated and the first male theology was directed at sky, storm and sun gods who had subjugated the earth-goddess. The struggle against an older female supremacy entered their mythology, and Goddesses were shown as ravished, as daughters and as wives—all subjected to men—the subjugation of women began. Humanity was expelled from the Garden of Eden, began to sweat, fight for supremacy and murder mothers and their sons. Actions that were deliquent for millennia became accepted.

Previously threats to survival had been starvation and disease. Now they were banditry, war and oppression. Natural religions featuring natural events based on a Great Mother were replaced by artificially constructed religions featuring acts of warfare and power, presided over by a stern father god. War, murder, robbery and oppression became virtues that helped maintain the socio-economic order that produced them.

So it has continued since. It has to stop before it stops us. Women must not become surrogate men. If they do, the patriarchs have won the ultimate victory. Amazons are a male fantasy, even if some women were warriors! Women must understand how to control men once more, and stop them from behaving badly—behaving in ways that are no longer appropriate with modern technological power, however progressive their behaviour might once have been.

Boys today have no need to ritually separate themselves from their mothers to become men. The warrior age needs to be killed off for good and all. Women can do it. Men no longer have to hunt wild aurochs or be taught to joust in the lists. If they incline that way their surplus energy can be drained by aggressive sports, sufficient for them to feel “proved,” while otherwise exhausting them and making them feel bruised. If they prefer chess or scholarship, all is well. Men need to realize that heroes no longer have to carry a sword. The modern hero is the healer, the craftsman, the scholar, the gardener—those who discover Nature's kinunity, and keep us connected to the family of life, not the necrophiles that love the technology of war.

Goddess page at the U Texas
Bibliography for this site
Marija Gimbutas
Goddess Revival
Mother Goddess
Basque
feminist spirituality movement
Çatal Hütük
Magna Mater

Last uploaded: 19 April, 2008.

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