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scotianostra · 2 months

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David Stewart, 1st Duke of Rothesay and heir to the throne of Scotland died on March 26th 1402.

In all the long history of the Stewart dynasty there are many tragic figures such as Mary, Queen of Scots and King Charles I, but surely there can be no more hapless and lamentable bearer of the name than the first prince to ever carry the title of the Duke of Rothesay.

David Stewart was the heir to the throne of Scotland at the end of the 14th century until he lost his claim to kingship, and his life, at the behest of his own uncle. His death occurred in the strangest of circumstances in this week of 1402.

t was a time of great jostling for power within the Stewart clan and their fellow Scottish aristocrats. David was born on or around October 24th, 1378, as the son of John, Earl of Carrick, the heir to the Scottish throne, and his wife Countess Anabella nee Drummond. On becoming King he took the name Robert as John and it’s association with the Balliol's’ was considered unlucky, the third to use the name.

Robert III had been kicked by a horse two years before his coronation and as well as physical injury he suffered from melancholia, or depression as we know it.

His younger brother, confusingly also called Robert, was the Earl of Fife who had assumed the Lieutenancy and taken control of the governance of Scotland in the early part of Robert III’s reign.

Both Fife and 19-year-old David Stewart were created Dukes, the first in Scotland, in 1398 after David was knighted at the Great Tournament of Edinburgh arranged by his mother. Fife became Duke of Albany and David became Duke of Rothesay, the title which has passed down to the heirs to the Scottish throne – Prince Charles is the current holder.

Albany’s grip on power had seemed secure at first but as her husband’s health deteriorated, Queen Anabella began to take more control, and she also pushed the cause of her son David as the heir, arranging for him to become the Lieutenant in 1399. The problem was David’s personality – he was a self-indulgent wild child, who grew increasingly debauched as his teens wore on.

He was also arrogant to a fault, and despite being engaged and probably married to Elizabeth Dunbar, daughter of the Earl of March, he decided for dynastic reasons to marry Mary Douglas, daughter of the hugely powerful 3rd earl of Douglas, known as Archibald the Grim.

The Earl of March was furious and switched allegiance to King Henry IV of England who promptly invaded Scotland but had to go home when Edinburgh Castle thwarted his siege. Poor David got the blame for the invasion and his already sagging popularity hit a new low.

When both Archibald the Grim and his mother died in 1401, the Duke of Rothesay was in a very vulnerable position as his uncle Albany moved to complete his control of the kingdom. Albany was assisted in this by Archibald, 4th Earl of Douglas who greatly disliked Rothesay.

Early in 1402, Albany moved to consolidate his power by conspiring with Archibald Douglas to have his nephew David arrested and imprisoned in Albany’s Falkland Palace in Fife on trumped up charges.

It was there that David died on March 26, 1402, most probably from starvation. Whether he was murdered or not is unknown. The official verdict was that Rothesay died of natural causes but the circumstances said otherwise.

His father, the virtually insane King Robert III, presided over a council of enquiry and had to put his name to a document which exonerated Albany and Douglas.

The King wrote: “We consider as excused the aforementioned Robert and Archibald, and anyone who took part in this affair with them, that is any who arrested, detained, guarded, gave them advice, and all others who gave them counsel, help or support, or executed their order or command in any way whatsoever, and in our said council we openly and publicly declared, pronounced and determined definitively and by the tenor of this our present document declare, pronounce, and by this definitive sentence judge them and each of them to be innocent, harmless, blameless, quit, free and immune completely in all respects.”

Robert even ordered the end to malignant rumours: “Wherefore we strictly order and command all and singular our subjects, of whatever standing or condition they be, that they do not slander the said Robert and Archibald and their participants, accomplices or adherents in this deed, as aforesaid, by word or action, nor murmur against them in any way whereby their good reputation is hurt or any prejudice is generated, under all penalty which may be applicable hereafter in any way by law.”

The opposition silenced, Albany was in complete control and remained so even after Robert III died in 1406, when David Stewart’s younger brother James became King. But having fled from the marauding Douglases, young James was at that time in the custody of the English court and would remain an exile for 18 years.

How much pressure was put on the King at this time is not known, however as insane as he was, he decided to send his other son, Prince James, aged only about 1, to France for safety. As you know from last Tuesday’s post, his ship was boarded by pirates and he ended up as a “guest” of the English, for the best part of 20 years.

When Robert III heard of his son's capture, he became even more depressed. He refused any food and died within a few days on April 4th, 1406.

Robert asked to be buried under a dunghill with the epitaph: Here lies the worst of Kings and the most miserable of men as he did not consider himself worthy of the honour. He ended up being buried in Paisley Abbey.

David Duke of Rothesay is said to have been buried at Lindores a Tironensian abbey on the outskirts of Newburgh in Fife, which never survived the vandalism of the Scottish Reformation.

Pics are Falkland Palace, then and now, and Lindores Abbey ruins.

#scotland #scottish #history #Royalty #The Stewarts #Albany Stewarts

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thatsbutterbaby · 1 year

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Wreath / Iraq / Ur / Early Dynastic III / 2600-2450 BCE / Shell, Gold, Lapis Lazuli, Carnelian

Queen Shubad's headdress. fourth crown. 14 gold flowers. inlaid petals. blue lapis and paste. 13 groups of willow leaves of gold, with tip of carnelian, 3 strings, gold, laps and ribbon.

This wreath was found above the other wreaths on the skull of Queen Puabi in grave 800 in the Royal Cemetery at Ur. Here three willow leaves are gathered 11 times, and two are gathered twice. In between the gathered leaves are lapis and paste flowers (13 of them) which have alternating lapis and paste petals around a gold center with a lapis bead at the center of that. The flowers themselves are gold. All of the willow leaves are tipped in a carnelian ring, but for one which is missing it. [and one, which is broken] . Unlike the poplar leaves on her other crowns, these are not one piece of gold, but the central leaf seems to be the solid one that is folded over on itself for the bead joiner. There are three holes created, which mean there are three strings of beads between each element. There are also three holes through the flowers, again, creating three strands between element. the pattern appears to be: top strand, alternating gold and lapis balls; middle strand: alternating gold and lapis squat biconical beads; and the bottom strand has alternating gold and lapis pendants separated by a small lapis ball. There are clearly acceptions to this throughout, but this is the basic pattern.

The two cuneiform signs that compose her name were initially read as "Shub-ad" in Sumerian. Today, however, we think they should be read in Akkadian as "Pu-abi."

Penn Museum

#wreath

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pwlanier · 2 years

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Statue of Heqat, the Frog Goddess, c. 2950 BC

Egypt, Predynastic Period, Late Naqada III Period (3100-2950 BC) to Early Dynastic Period, Early Dynasty 1

Cleveland Museum of Art

#frog

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isadomna · 4 months

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Isabel of Castile, First Duchess of York

Isabel was the third of four children of King Pedro I, also known as Pedro the Cruel, who ruled the Crown of Castile from 1350. Her mother was the vivacious and intelligent Maria de Padilla, often described as Pedro's mistress. In 1361, when Isabel was only six, her mother died. The following year, Pedro declared that he and Maria had been lawfully married before he was forced to espouse his estranged French wife, Blanche of Bourbon, who was by then also dead, some said murdered by her husband. His claim of an earlier marriage was subsequently endorsed by the Cortes, thus legitimising Pedro's children by Maria. Pedro was killed by his illegitimate half-brother and deadly enemy Enrique of Trastámara in March 1369. Trastámara became King Enrique II of Castile.

Isabel accompanied her elder sister Constanza to England, and married Edmund of Langley, son of Edward III and Philippa of Hainault, in 1472 at Wallingford, as part of a dynastic alliance in furtherance of the Plantagenet claim to the crown of Castile. Isabel was only 16 or 17 to Edmund’s 31, and brought him no lands or income or even the promise of such because her sister Constanza – who married Edmund’s elder brother John of Gaunt as his second wife – was their father’s heir. John and Constanza spent many years trying unsuccessfully to claim her late father’s throne from her illegitimate half-uncle Enrique of Trastamara, while Edmund and Isabel were required to give up any claims to the kingdom of Castile and were not compensated.

As a result of her marriage, Isabel became the first of a total of eleven women who became Duchess of York. She was appointed a Lady of the Garter in 1379. In their twenty years of marriage, the Duke and Duchess of York had three children:

Edward of Norwich, Duke of York

Constance

Richard of Conisburgh, Earl of Cambridge

Contemporary sources suggest that Edmund and Isabel were an ill-matched pair and their relationship was a rocky one, with Isabel accused of having an affair with John Holland, Duke of Exeter and half-brother to Richard II. The affair is believed to have started as early as 1374 and likely continued for a decade. As a result of her indiscretions, Isabel left behind a tarnished reputation. The chronicler Thomas Walsingham considered her to have somewhat loose morals.

John Holland has also been suggested as the real father of Isabel’s youngest son, Richard of Conisburgh, who was the grandfather of Edward IV and Richard III. The fact that his father Edmund of Langley and brother Edward, both, left him out of their wills has fuelled this theory. However, leaving a son out of your will was not entirely unusual, and Richard had died when his brother made his will.

Isabel of Castile died in December 1392 at the age of about 37 and was buried at Langley Priory in Hertfordshire. In her will, Isabel left items and gifts of money to close relatives by blood or marriage, and to numerous servants of hers, men and women. Isabel referred to Edmund of Langley as her "very honoured lord and husband of York", and left him all her horses, all her beds including the cushions, bedspreads, canopies and everything else that went with them, her best brooch, her best gold cup, and her "large primer". Isabel named King Richard II as her heir, requesting him to grant her younger son, Richard, an annuity of 500 marks. Isabel left nothing at all to her older sister Constanza, duchess of Lancaster, and failed even to mention her. Isabel doesn't forget John Holland in her will, at this time married to Elizabeth of Lancaster, John of Gaunt's daughter.

About 11 months later her widower married Joan Holland, niece of Isabel's supposed lover, John Holland. In another bizarre family twist, it was Joan’s brother, Edmund Holland, Earl of Kent, who had an affair – and an illegitimate daughter – with Constance of York, the daughter of Edmund and Isabel. In Edmund’s own will of 1400 he requested burial ‘near my beloved Isabele, formerly my consort.’ Despite Isabel of Castile's bad reputation and supposedly having been involved in a court scandal that humiliated her husband, Edmund seems to have felt great affection for her as demonstrated by his willingness to rest eternally with Isabel and not with his second wife.

Source:

#Isabel of Castile #Edmund of Langley #Duchess of York #Duke of York #women in history #english history #spanish history

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goodqueenaly · 1 year

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Bonus House Words Wednesdays: House Elesham of the Paps

I don’t do House Words Wednesdays as a regular thing anymore, but if I get a request to come up with words for a House and I feel like I have enough to say then I’ll come back to it from time to time. @ravensinthedaylight requested words for House Elesham, so fuck it, here we go. (The list of Houses I’ve done, as always, can be found here.)

House Elesham of the Paps is a noble House from the Vale, though very little is known about its past (or present, for that matter). We don’t have a solid idea of when the Eleshams settled on their island, or from whence they came - whether they were, say, early-arriving Andals, drawn by the supposed divine promise to Hugor of “great kingdoms in a foreign land” but planting their flag even before they arrived to continental Westeros, or a First Men dynasty which, as the Upcliffs of Witch Isle appear to have done following the death of King Robar II Royce, held out as independent insular magnates until being conquered (that their name seems drawn from a variant on the English town of Aylsham - itself derived from “Aegel's Ham”, denoting the settlement of an Anglo-Saxon thegn - hardly provides more clarity). Frustratingly, the Elesham sigil is only described as “a black star between an inverted stone-colored double-pile, on a pink field”, without noting whether or not the star is seven-pointed (as with, say, the Sunglasses and Tarbecks) and thus more obviously Andal in origin. About the only conclusion the Elesham sigil can provide (as confirmed in the WOIAF app) is the presence on the island of its namesake hills (which, if the Eleshams were Andals, might have been seen by the family as the fulfillment of the Faith’s prophesied “golden land amidst towering mountains” reserved for the Andal people).

Nevertheless, the Eleshams do not seem to be too socio-politically lowly, at least as far as Westerosi aristocrats go. King Hugo “the Hopeful” Arryn was said to have taken the Paps only after a “long” struggle, which may suggest that the Eleshams and/or the Paps had considerable resources or defenses to resist royal conquest by the Arryns. Henrietta Woodhull, last of the prospective brides presented to the young King Aegon III, was said to have been the daughter of a landed knight from the Paps, so clearly the family has (or had, at the time of Aegon II’s reign) its own knightly bannermen, and thus some level of feudal standing. The Lord of the Paps was evidently considered aristocratic enough to marry one of the (unnamed!) daughters of Elys Waynwood and Alys Arryn - a meaningful dynastic match when Lord Jon Arryn had no surviving child before the birth of young Robert and none of the other Waynwood-Arryn children had surviving legitimate children of their own (save the (unnamed!) mother of Harry Hardyng), (No Eleshams have yet appeared in the main novels, though I would give a gold star if GRRM had as one of the guests at the Tourney of the Winged Knights Harry’s maternal aunt and/or her lord husband.)

So I made the Elesham words Fertile and Free. Whether or not the Paps as an island is a bountiful one is unclear, though the presence of multiple noble families (and the suggestion from Yandel that the Paps is one of those “quite large and oft inhabited” islands off the coast of the Vale) may indicate as much; in any event. the hills which give the island its name certainly evoke a sense of maternal fertility. (Too, if the Eleshams were Andals, such an emphasis on fertility might recall the land spiritually envisioned by Hugor of the Hill, full of the Seven’s gilded bounty.) Likewise, the “freedom” of these words works whether the Eleshams were First Men or Andals: either the Eleshams would boast of their independence from any of the native kings of the continental Vale (the foundation of that same disunity which Robar II tried vainly to correct), or the Eleshams would praise the freedom from Valyrian enslavement which their immigration to Westeros provided. Yet these words would be ironic in both senses: the Eleshams would have to bend the knee to the Arryn kings after their struggle, while the Waynwood-born Lady Elesham would “prove barren”, denied the potential of continuing the Arryn line through her children.

(Also don’t @ me if this sounds similar to the Tallhart “Proud and Free” because I’m not GRRM who made three separate mottoes “None So Wise”, “None So Fierce”, and “None So Dutiful” and two other ones “We Light the Way” and “We Guard the Way”.)

#asoiaf meta #house words #house words wednesdays #house elesham

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twilightcitadel · 2 months

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Top 5 Best Medieval Strategy Games

Using our carefully curated selection of the top 5 greatest medieval strategy games, take a trip through time and immerse yourself in the epic realm of medieval conquest. For aficionados of the genre, these games provide unmatched depth and excitement, from leading powerful armies to creating expansive empires. Prepare to be astounded by the majesty and difficulty of these medieval masterworks, regardless of your level of experience as a tactician or your potential as a strategist.

Crusader Kings III

In Crusader Kings III, you yourself in the position of a medieval monarch and negotiate the perilous political, scheming, and combat situations. This expansive strategy game, created by Paradox Interactive, features a rich tapestry of dynastic intrigue against the backdrop of medieval Europe. You will make alliances, set up marriages, and plot your path to power as you lead the dynasty of your choice through the years, all the while fending off rival nobles and outside dangers.

I love playing strategy games and medieval history, and Crusader Kings III provided me with an immersive experience unlike anything else. I became engrossed in my dynasty's destiny, excitedly arranging connections and marriages to preserve my family's heritage. My interest was piqued for hours on end by the complex character interactions and dynamic events, and I felt a great feeling of success when my dynasty succeeded.

Both reviewers and gamers have praised Crusader Kings III extensively, praising its richness, intricacy, and compelling narrative. It is evident from the game's highly positive rating on sites like Steam that players admire the replayability and attention to detail in the title.

Platforms: Steam, Playstation Store

Stronghold Crusader II

In the real-time strategy game Stronghold Crusader II, you take leadership of forces fighting for supremacy in the Holy Land. Feel the heat of combat. This Firefly Studios-created follow-up to the renowned Stronghold Crusader offers additional units, better multiplayer features, and better graphics. It also expands upon the formula.

Stronghold Crusader II's difficult gameplay and evocative setting took me back to the Crusades. It was thrilling to lead legions of knights and siege engines against my enemies, and the added strategic element of building and fortifying my own castle made the experience even more engaging. Stronghold Crusader II captivated me, whether I was playing it alone or in online competition with pals.

Fans have praised Stronghold Crusader II's upgrades and expansions for fixing bugs and introducing new content, despite the game's initial mediocre reviews. It's evident that Stronghold Crusader II is still a highly regarded game in the series because there is a devoted player base that is still active today.

Platforms: Steam

Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord

The much awaited follow-up to the beloved Mount & Blade series, Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord, transports players to a world of swords and sieges. In this dynamic sandbox world full of chance and peril, you can carve out your own road to dominance in this medieval action-RPG, developed by TaleWorlds Entertainment.

I was impressed with Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord because of its expansive universe and flexible gameplay. The game gave me a degree of freedom not often found in games of this kind, whether I was commanding my soldiers in combat or negotiating with other factions. I will never soon forget the excitement of starting from zero and watching my own business grow.

Fans have praised Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord for its vast world and intricate gameplay mechanics, even if it is still in early access. The game has received excellent reviews overall, despite some criticism of its development, and users are looking forward to more updates and enhancements.

Platforms: Steam, Playstation Store

Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition

Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition is a remastered version of the well-loved RTS classic that allows you to relive the splendour of the Middle Ages. This definitive edition of Age of Empires II, created by Forgotten Empires and released by Xbox Game Studios, features amazing 4K graphics, improved audio, and an abundance of new content to bring the game's classic gameplay to contemporary audiences.

Being one of the first strategy games I ever played, Age of Empires II has a particular place in my heart. My expectations were far exceeded by the Definitive Edition, which added contemporary enhancements while keeping the allure and captivating gameplay of the original. Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition is still a mainstay in my game collection, whether I'm playing through old campaigns or taking on friends in multiplayer.

Both critics and players have lauded Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition for its accurate replication of the old game while adding contemporary features. It's evident that the Age of Empires fanbase is still as fervent as ever because of the game's extremely good rating on websites like Steam.

Platforms: Steam, Microsoft Store

Total War: Medieval II

In Creative Assembly's critically acclaimed strategy game, Total War: Medieval II, you can lead armies to victory and alter the course of history. In this expansive real-time strategy game set in the turbulent Middle Ages, players take control of well-known groups like France, England, and the Holy Roman Empire in their struggle for dominance over Europe, the Middle East, and beyond.

I was enthralled by Total War: Medieval II because of its strategic depth and epic scale. The game provided an immersion level that was unsurpassed by other games in the genre, from controlling economies and cities to planning large-scale wars involving thousands of warriors. Every choice seemed significant and important, whether it was to fight faraway empires or form agreements with nearby nations.

Both critics and players have lauded Total War: Medieval II for its rich gameplay mechanics, historical realism, and engrossing atmosphere. The game remains a popular classic among strategy fans, with a committed modding community producing new content and experiences.

Platforms: Steam, App Store, Google Play

Forge Your Destiny

The age of conquest awaits you when you have these top 5 greatest medieval strategy games at your disposal. For every couch general and aspiring monarch, this has plenty to offer, whether of whether they are more drawn to the grandeur of dynasty politics or the excitement of epic battles. So prepare to carve out your own position in history by marshalling your forces and resources. You have the task of taking over the medieval world!

My Own Dark Fantasy Realm

Hi there, fellow fans of dark fantasy! Thanks to your unflinching support, our blog—which is packed with tales and inspirations of dark fantasy—is making waves on TikTok, Pinterest, and YouTube. Even more thrilling is the fact that we're creating a captivating Trading Card Game to further engross you in Twilight Citadel's eerie mysteries. Explore the depths of the shadows with our website, where you can get eerie yet lovely phone wallpapers and posters. Furthermore, we've got you covered with free resources like desktop wallpapers and profile pictures to make sure your gadgets are brimming with eerie fantasy atmosphere. Come along with us on this surreal adventure, where fears come true and shadows dance. Are you prepared to welcome the gloom?

#medieval games #fantasy games #medieval #fantasy #medieval fantasy #strategy games #rpg games #video games #games #gaming #pc games #top 5 #Crusader Kings III #Total War: Medieval II #Mount & Blade II

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ancientfabricspreservation · 4 months

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30 January 680 ... the death of Balthild, the Anglo-Saxon slave girl turned queen of the Franks.

The background to Balthild’s enslavement is a mystery, but it seems she was a native of East Anglia and perhaps an innocent victim of dynastic fighting over the throne.

Her biographer, writing a decade after Balthild’s death, says she taken when very young 'from across the sea' (i.e., from Britain).

In Francia, she became the protégé of Erchinoald, the top official in the royal palace and the protector of the young king Clovis II. (Of Erchinoald, a chronicler said, “he lined his own pockets, to be sure, but quite moderately”.)

In 648, king Clovis II chose her as his bride. When he died nine years later, Balthild acted as regent for their son Chlothar III until he too came of age. She spent the last 15 years of her life in retirement (possibly forced) in the nunnery at Chelles, which is now a suburb of Paris.

Within a decade of Balthild’s death, she was on her way to sainthood.

The nuns of Chelles opened the grave and Balthild’s long plaits of hair (greying strawberry-blonde and tied with red, yellow and green silk ribbons) her bones and her burial clothing were all bundled up and placed in a reliquary casket. The nuns, thinking ahead, even left authentication slips for future generations!

What’s extraordinary is that these relics survived the French Revolution (when they were already 1,100 years old). That’s because Chelles sent its entire medieval collection into hiding before the Revolutionaries got there.

The caskets stayed in a local church until 1983, when a local historian persuaded the Church authorities to open them.

To their astonishment, they found the relics that Chelles had been hoarding since its foundation in the 7th-Century.

These included the bones of Queen Balthild. It turns out she was just over 5 feet tall.

The fragments of textile show the queen went to the grave in a brown silk dress and a silk girdle woven with animal motifs; a yellow silk veil; and a fringed mantle of red and yellow silk fastened with a small gold brooch.

Surviving in much better condition is a white linen pinafore apron embroidered at the neckline with necklaces, pendants and the cross.

The story goes that the retired queen used to attend mass decked out in all her royal jewels until a visiting holy man rebuked her for her lack of humility in church.

Balthild took off the trappings of wealth, kept one pair of gold bracelets and gave away the rest. After that, she wore the linen pinafore with the ghostly outline of the jewels she no longer owned.

This way, she advertised her piety to the nuns inside the convent walls ... while at the same, subtly reminding them of the royal power she had given up to join them.

For photos by Genevra Kornbluth:

https://www.kornbluthphoto.com/TunicBalthild.html

Source: Facebook

The Early Middle Ages

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yamayuandadu · 1 year

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I don't really have any tips, but I can provide a quick terminology rundown. The reply got too long to respond to the ask normally, my sincere apologies. Some 6 pages worth of text under the cut.

Mesopotamia is, broadly speaking, the area between Tigris and Euphrates, in other words most of modern Iraq and part of Syria. At the dawn of recorded history, in the Early Dynastic period, the inhabitants of the area were Sumerians and Akkadians. These are largely just linguistic labels, they do not correspond to states in the modern sense. Sumerian is a language isolate, Akkadian belongs to the family of Semitic languages, though the “East” branch it is assigned to is now extinct, and has been for a long while. There was a lot of borrowing between the two languages, including individual words, phrases, and even grammatical structures. The oldest texts are, generally, Sumerian, but Akkadian names already pop up here and there. Some of the major city-states in the early period of Mesopotamian history were Uruk, Ur, Umma (with its religious center in nearby Zabalam), Lagash (with religious centers in Girsu and Nigin/NINA), Adab (with religious center in Kesh), Kish and Mari. Nippur and Sippar were religiously significant, but not political powers in their own right. Additionally, a major city in the third millennium BCE was Ebla, located to the west of Mesopotamia. The Eblaites spoke a language similar to Akkadian, Eblaite. It is presumed other related dialects were spoken all over northern Syria through most of the third millennium BCE, for example in Nagar and Nabada, but they eventually vanished in favor of Amorite and other similar languages, which belong to the western branch of the Semitic language family, much like Hebrew or Aramaic. The Early Dynastic period was followed up by the Akkadian Empire, ie. the Akkadian or Old Akkadian or Sargonic period. The formerly insignificant city of Akkad gradually conquered all of Mesopotamia and quite a few areas beyond it, but this all eventually fell apart after a bit more than a century. This resulted in the establishment of Gutian rule over (part of) Mesopotamia, which is typically not treated as a distant era. The Gutians and their homeland Gutium (presumably located in the Zagros) hardly figure in historical records, and were essentially synonymous with the notion of crude mountain-dwelling barbarians in the eyes of Mesopotamians. Little is left in the way of material culture which can be linked to them, but the names of the few recorded kings or chieftains do not appear to match any known language. For the time being Gutians are largely an obscure curiosity and not much can be said about them. There are a few other similar labels too, like Lullubi or Turukkeans, similarly nebulous for now. A few indigenous dynasties coexisted with the Gutian rulers, for example the Second Dynasty of Lagash, but it took the rise of the Third Dynasty of Ur to warrant a fully new label: near the end of the third millennium BCE, the Ur III period - also known as Neo-Sumerian - began. A new development was the influx of foreigners in Mesopotamia from both west and north - most importantly Hurrians (more on them later) and Amorites. The latter, who I already mentioned earlier, lived in most of what is now Syria, but they migrated en masse to southern Mesopotamia, where they gradually assimilated. It should be noted “Amorite” is not an entirely homogenous group, and the term is actually how Mesopotamians called westerners and the land they came from, not an endonym. The term Martu has the exact same meaning. The initial perception of Amorites was negative - they were portrayed as barely civilized and barbaric, presumably due to their nomadic agricultural-pastoral lifestyle differing from that generally followed by Mesopotamians. The Ur III period ended abruptly after less than 200 years. What followed was the Old Assyrian period in the north, where the city of Assur became the unquestionable cultural hegemony, paving the road for later Assyrian culture, and the Isin-Larsa period in the south. Isin-Larsa is sometimes treated as a part of the Old Babylonian period, which I personally find preferable. Old Babylonian period proper refers to the rise of the city of Babylon, formerly utterly insignificant, as a new hegemon. However, Babylon did not just magically rise to the top: to reach its status, it had to defeat the other great powers of its era. As you can guess, two were Larsa and Isin; additionally, Uruk held on for a while, Mari came back on top under new management, and in the Diyala area (which for much of Mesopotamian history maintained distinct unique traditions but remains relatively poorly known) Eshnunna attained a similar position. There was obviously also Assyria, which was involved either in (long lived) establishment of new trade routes or (for now short lived) conquests. A further powerful state was Yamhad in northern Syria, centered around Aleppo, which de facto belonged to the broader Mesopotamian political sphere. Many of the old centers of power vanished - Umma and Lagash in particular fared poorly. There are also areas we simply do not know all that much about, for example Der in the far east of Mesopotamia had its own monarchs, but the site has yet to be excavated. The newcomers to Mesopotamia, Amorites, did pretty well - many new dynasties used Amorite names. However, Akkadian was the most commonly spoken language at this point, and it seems with time the vernacular use of Amorite ceased. Sumerian was no longer spoken, but continued to be used as a language of the learned, not unlike how Latin survived in the middle ages and later. Much of what is labeled as “Sumerian mythology” online are texts compiled in Old Babylonian scribal schools to teach Sumerian. We know relatively little about the end of the Old Babylonian period. A somewhat uniform culture started to emerge, and this arguably is the point at which it becomes fair to call the entirety of southern Mesopotamia “Babylonia”, though this term is also used in scholarship to refer to earlier periods which is a bit confusing seeing as Babylon was but a small, irrelevant town. Two further plot twists were the formation of the so-called “Sealand”, a kingdom in the Iraqi Marshes which remains poorly known, and the arrival of another new group of people, the Kassites. We know next to nothing about the early history of the Kassites. We have a decent idea where they came from - the Zagros - but people with Kassite names are absent from earliest records from eastern locations so they might have migrated from somewhere else. Their language, which is only known from personal names and a handful of synonyms in Mesopotamian “dictionaries” is most likely an isolate. Under unclear circumstances, a dynasty of Kassite origin took over Babylonia, eventually conquered its only rival, the Sealand, rechristened the entire area “Karduniash”… and promptly much like Amorites earlier got gradually assimilated - so thoroughly that I’ve seen a proposal to refer to the Kassite dynasty as “kings with Kassite names” rather than as strictly Kassite kings. The same presumably happened to ordinary Kassites, though it is plausible that their culture in its non-Mesopotamified form might have survived in their Zagros homeland until Hellenistic times. At least early on, the Kassite rule brought Babylonia an unprecedented level of stability, and the religious centers which did survive fared pretty well, especially Nippur. Meanwhile, the Assyrians entered the Middle Assyrian period, and decided to give this “empire” thing a try, with varying results. Generally speaking, this was bad news to you first and foremost if you were a Hurrian - more on that in their own section later. Despite its early successes, the Kassite state eventually fell apart. What followed were various brief dynasties which remain poorly known - the second dynasty of Isin, second dynasty of Sealand, Bazi dynasty, Elamite dynasty (with a whopping total of one ruler), and the E dynasty (yeah). This is typically referred to as the Middle Babylonian period, but note that some authors refer to Kassite period as already “Middle Babylonian”, while others basically count the entire history of Babylonia down to the establishment of the Neo-Babylonian Empire as “Middle Babylonian”. In the Middle Babylonian period in the strictest sense, two new groups arrived or emerged, the Arameans and the Chaldeans, both of them speaking West Semitic languages. Arameans were also active virtually all over Syria, where they founded new kingdoms such as Aram-Damascus. A further group were the Suteans, “southerners”, who already show up here and there earlier and probably spoke a language similar to Amorite, but remain very nebulous. Due to political uncertainty, raids of various newcomers to the region, inept rulers etc. Babylonia was not particularly stable through most of this period Eventually, the Assyrians, who built a sizable empire once again, decided they might as well give taking over it a try - and succeeded. While Akkadian remained in use under their rule, Aramaic rose to an almost equal status, and seemingly gradually displaced it as vernacular in more and more areas. While the Assyrians incorporated many other states into the Neo-Assyrian Empire, somewhat homogenizing the culture of the region in the process, their dominion did not last forever, and eventually they were themselves conquered by politically resurgent Babylonians, who established the new Neo-Babylonian Empire, in vintage literature called “Chaldean” sometimes. Obviously, this did not end Assyrian culture and identity per say, but its role as arguably the foremost hegemon in the history of the world up to that point was over. Babylonians reigned for a few centuries, consolidated Assyrian conquests, got to be the villains in the freshly compiled Hebrew Bible, and finally lost to Persians (who will get a brief paragraph later).. The final period of the history of ancient Mesopotamia is sometimes referred to as “late Babylonian” and “post-Imperial Assyrian” and essentially refers to the intellectual and religious life of culturally Mesopotamian communities under Achaemenid, Seleucid and Parthian rule. As expected, it is basically a gradual decline (though the city of Assur did recover, and Uruk was doing reasonably well) coupled with occasional pursuit of “traditional” lifestyle resulting in puzzling developments like the construction of a new enormous temple for previously seldom worshiped sky god Anu in Uruk, Akkadian continued to be spoken and written, but less and less often, and finally went extinct, though it lived on via loanwords in Aramaic, and less directly in Arabic, Hebrew and Greek. A symbolic end of ancient Mesopotamian culture is often assumed to be the death of cuneiform - it is presumed that the last people capable of reading it lived in the early centuries CE. Some customs presumably persisted longer, especially in Harran, but do not fall for the unhinged wikipedia claim that Mesopotamian religion was alive in the eighteenth century CE, sources from Simo Parpola, a man whose work I can only describe as devious. Dude is convinced Sumerians were basically Finnish, Assyrians were monotheist, and rewrites everything about personal gnostic beliefs. With this crash course in the history of Mesopotamia proper done, let’s look at the periphery of the cuneiform world..

The north was known as Subartu in Mesopotamia, and its inhabitants as Subarians. Subarian was not an endonym, obviously; today it is agreed that in the overwhelming majority of cases, it corresponds to the label “Hurrian”. The Hurrians entered the scene in the Old Akkadian period. They initially lived in the distant north, possibly initially migrating to Mesopotamia from the area around lake Van but eventually spread through much of the north of modern Syria and Iraq, as far as the Kirkuk area in the east, as well as through southeastern Turkey. Hurrian soft power, chiefly in terms of naming patterns and religion, reached even further. Mesopotamian perception of the northerners is a bit mixed: on one hand, they dodged the label of subhuman barbarians and whatnot, on the other the term “shubur” was essentially a fancy synonym of “servant”. However, overall the positive associations seem more common: they could hold prominent positions in royal administration, their religious expertise was often recognized, and there were even cities where the vernacular was seemingly something like a pidgin or creole mixing Hurrian and Akkadian, Nuzi being the main example. The Hurrian language itself was not related to Sumerian or Akkadian, and has only one known relative, Urartian. Both are extinct. The oldest known Hurrian state was Urkesh, a client of the Akkadian Empire. In later periods the well attested examples include Nineveh and Arrapha. The apparent religious capital of the Hurrian world was Kumme, the city of the weather god Teshub, which has yet to be properly located. While Mesopotamians were considerably less invested in weather gods than many of their neighbors, we do nonetheless know it had enough prestige for Zimri-Lim of Mari to honor the local god. The only Hurrian state to reach a more or less imperial scale was Mitanni, roughly contemporary with the Kassite period in Mesopotamia. For unknown reasons, kings of this empire often had names seemingly borrowed from an early Indo-European language, despite writing in Hurrian and Akkadian. How come remains unresolved, and the online discourse sadly often is in thrall of 19th century race science, gleefully kept alive by youtube talking heads, twitter trads with names like AryanHunterGatherer420, Hindu hypernationalists, and other similar groups. It’s basically a largely irrelevant bit of trivia. While Hurrian language reached a degree of prestige midway through the second millennium BCE, with kings in many Syrian cities taking Hurrian regnal names and Hurrian deities spreading to local pantheons as far south as Ugarit on the coast and Qatna inland, the success was ultimately not meant to last, and the resurgent Assyrian state eventually conquered Mitanni, its clients and Hurrianized Syrian statelets, which resulted in the extinction of Hurrian language probably at some point in the early first millennium BCE. Obviously Bronze Age collapse did not help, either.

As a side note - the closest linguistic relatives of Hurrians, Urartians, were not really culturally similar to them, and only entered history in the first millennium BCE. They fought Assyria, built a network of enormous fortresses in the mountains, eventually lost nonetheless and… that seems to be it. They might have played a role in the early history of Armenia.

More parallels can be drawn between strictly Hurrian states and the partially Hurrianized part of Syria. I do not think there is a single agreed upon term meant to refer to this area, sadly, at least one more precise than “archeological sites in northern Syria”. The primary cities of this cultural sphere would be Ugarit, Alalakh, Carchemish, Nuḫašše, Tunip… The degree of “Hurrianization” varied between periods and locations, obviously. Ugarit is a special case: while most sites in the region have not yielded any texts written in a local vernacular language, this city does have an enormous corpus of such texts, often written in a unique script, alphabetic Ugaritic. It was used to write Hurrian locally, too. Labeling Ugarit as “Canaanite”, as often done by neopagans, Bible scholars, wikipedia editors, SMT compendium entry authors and the like is not really correct, as the inhabitants of this city-state themselves were pretty clear about this term designating a completely different area from their point of view.

Ugarit was separated from Canaan with a poorly known kingdom apparently called Amurru. Not much is known about it so I’ll skip it. How come an exonym for westerners used in Mesopotamia came to be an endonym for a kingdom well to the west to traditional sphere of direct influence of Mesopotamian states is beyond me. Canaan in the strict sense starts roughly around Byblos and ends in Gaza, encompassing cities such Sidon or Tyre. After the Bronze Age collapse, the culture Greeks referred to as “Phoenician” arose there. Ugarit by design isn’t really Phoenician because it’s well to the north of that and was gone by the time the maritime Phoenician networks of colonies arose, which seems hard to grasp for Wikipedia.

To finish this section it’s worth noting that the “Hurrianized” zone overlaps with what is typically referred to as “Middle Euphrates”, an area including cities such as Emar (capital of a kingdom known as Aštata) and Tuttul. Technically the term can also encompass the kingdom of Mari which was already discussed before as well (as well as areas such as Suhu and the city of Hit). The primary unifying cultural factor in this entire region was the presence of Dagan as the head of the pantheon; in Mesopotamia he was more or less just a god granting authority over the west, on the coast he is rare, and in Hurro-Hittite sources almost absent.

Anatolia is much more straightforward to explain, at least the part of it which is broadly speaking relevant here. The oldest inhabitants of at the very least the north of the area were the Hattians. Hattians spoke Hattic, which is a language isolate as far as we know, though it has been proposed it might be distantly related to various languages spoken in the Caucasus today. Hattian culture was evidently urban and reasonably complex, to the point that when subsequently a wave of new groups arrived in Anatolia their culture came to be largely patterned after that of the Hattians; these were the Hittites.

Hittites actually did not call themselves Hittites - they used the term “land of Hatti” for the area they inhabited, and “Nesite” for their language; the latter is derived from Kanesh, a famous and well documented city.

Next to Hittites, speakers of two other Indo-European languages played a role in shaping Bronze Age Anatolia: Palaians, who spoke Palaic and lived in the far north and Luwians who spoke, wait for it, Luwian. In the long run, the last of these groups fared best, and remnants of Luwian religion persisted well into Roman times. Luwians were also seemingly the majority of the people inhabiting the so-called “Neo-Hittite” states which arose after the fall of the Hittite empire; these were eventually all swept up by Assyria and that was pretty much it for their history. I won’t lie: I can’t actually name most of them.

Comparatively little is known about western Anatolia; contrary to what you might hear from Greek mythology fans online, Troy was NOT Hittite (also, Hittites were considerably more interested in east than west, the world, in fact, does not revolve around Greece). It is presumed that the inhabitants of western Bronze Age Anatolia were the forerunners of Lycians, Lydians and Carians of classical antiquity; Phrygians arrived much later.

Already mentioned Hurrians lived in Anatolia too, specifically in the southeast in the kingdom of Kizzuwatna, whose capital was Kummani (not to be confused with Kumme!). It eventually became a Hittite dependency, leading to a period of “Hurrianization” of Hittite culture near the end of the Bronze Age. Hurrian deities suddenly came to occupy the top of the Hittite pantheon. Hittites also started compiling or translating Hurrian literature. The translations sometimes dabble in interpretatio, with some, but not all, Hurrian gods appearing under Hittite names, with variable results (I will never understand what the hell was going through the head of the Hittite who used Anzili as stand-in for Shaushka), but the locations, themes and core plots are evidently Hurrian in origin, and reflect Hurrian theology. And, needless to say, they cannot be randomly combined with Hittite elements - Teshub did not fight Illuyanka nor does he have anything to do with Telipinu, contrary to what shoddy online sources may tell you.

The last part of the question, regarding Persia, is also pretty easy to explain. The history of modern Iran begins roughly contemporarily with Mesopotamia with Elam - this is basically the Mesopotamian term for the area, though, there were multiple states which can be considered “Elamite”. Elamites spoke, wait for it, a language isolate, Elamite. We know there were multiple Elamite states - Awan, Anshan, Shimashi et cetera - but their full extent, detailed history and so on are presently impossible to write. A special case is Susa, which due to proximity to Mesopotamia was a bit like a contact zone between Elamite and Mesopotamian culture, with a heavily “Mesopotamized” pantheon; we do know this city’s history reasonably well. Mesopotamian political interests rarely, if ever, reached further east than Elam; we know there was a state further east, Marhashi, which might correspond to the so-called “Jiroft culture”, and that merchants from even further east, ie. the Indus Valley, were sometimes present in Mesopotamia, but that’s about it. There is no real indication Mesopotamians were aware of the Bactria-Margiana Complex.

Persians only come into the picture in the first millennium BCE. Presumably they started moving into Elamite territory and got at least partially acculturated since the first sources, the Achaemenid archives, indicate that the earliest Persians worshiped both Ahura Mazda (“Auramaza” at the time) and Elamite gods, especially Humban; there is also evidence for coexistence of speakers of Elamite and Persian in various strata of society. Eventually Elamite went out of use though. Other peoples who arrived alongside Persians include the Medes and the Parthians, who spoke closely related languages. That’s basically it.

While the history of the Arabian Peninsula actually does not overlap with Mesopotamia in the discussed period, I suppose it is worth to at least mention Dilmun and Magan, the Bronze Age names for, respectively, Bahrain and Oman; both areas actively traded with Mesopotamia and were seemingly inhabited by speakers of languages related to Amorite. Also, the label “Arab” first appears in the Neo-Assyrian sources and I think it’s safe to assume it was an endonym but little can be said about it other than people using it at the time lived south of Damascus at the time. I can’t really help much with the first millennium BCE kingdoms in that area because I do not actually know much about them.

#mesopotamian miscellanea

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priestess-of-the-north-west · 8 months

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The goat head is made with copper (alloy), mollusc shell and (red) stone. Early Dynastic III: 2550–2250 BCE. Picture by University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.

Wild sheep (Ovis) and goats (Capra) were the earliest livestock domesticated during the Palaeolithic to Neolithic transition ca. 9000–7000 BCE in northern and eastern Mesopotamia. Pigs (Sus) and cattle (Bos) were predominantly domesticated in southern Mesopotamia. The use of goats in ritual and symbolism has provided us with many motifs related to goats that are still in use today: fertility, intelligence and craftiness. From all accounts, Enki was a benevolent god, always available to solve problems, and often assisting mankind to avert extinction. The imagery associated with Enki, as in the sacred tree, the sweet waters, the apotropaic suḫurmašû and ultimately the goat, communicates Enki as a symbol of life and an averter of evil. These are powerfully hopeful and positive images. The heritage of Enki as the constellation Capricorn is significant.

From: Goats in the Ancient Near East and Their Relationship with the Mythology, Fairytale and Folklore of These Cultures. DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.82531

#stone age #neolithic #ancient sumer #goat #copper #sea shell #capricorn

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scotianostra · 1 month

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The 1st May marks the anniversary of the death of a remarkable Scottish born woman.

She is known to us by the Norman-French title “Matilda of Scotland” born around 1080 at Dunfermline and Christened with the name Edith,one of the eight children of King Malcolm III of Scotland and his second wife Saint Margaret. At her christening were her godfather Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy and the eldest son of King William I of England (the Conqueror) and her godmother, Matilda of Flanders, the wife of King William I of England (the Conqueror). The infant Matilda pulled at Queen Matilda’s headdress, which was seen as an omen that the younger Matilda would be a queen one day. In fact, she would marry Queen Matilda’ s son and Robert Curthose’s brother, King Henry I of England.

Thus with links to three different cultures, Anglo-Saxon, Scottish and Norman French, Edith was a marriageable prospect, but her eventual betrothal to Henry I of England seems, by all accounts, to have been a love match as much as a dynastic union. She was free to marry only after a court case at which she had to prove that her stay in a convent was for purposes of protection and that she never formally took the veil of a nun, such were the religious complexities at the time.

The character, education and birthright of Matilda of Scotland seem to have given her a high degree of autonomy at Henry’s court. She also had her separate sources of income, her own retinue of staff and was frequently left in virtual charge of the realm during his regular absences in Normandy. Her charters cover a wide range of issues and she was particularly interested in architecture, being responsible for several abbey building projects as well as bridge construction and the provision of England’s first public toilets, attached to a bath complex near at Queenhithe, a small and ancient ward of the City of London.

It is possible that in 1114 she sent masons north with her brother Alexander when he returned to Scotland after fighting alongside Henry in Wales. She herself was said to have “fluent honeyed speech” by Marbodius of Rennes and she filled her court with poets and musicians. She was responsible for commissioning a biography of her mother Margaret who was also renowned in Scotland for bringing light and colour to the Scottish Royal Court.

It is believed that Matilda (Edith) only returned once to Scotland during her lifetime and, due to the lack of surviving documentary evidence, her influence in Scotland is unknown. However, she is believed to have had a close relationship with her brothers, three of whom were kings north of the border.

Also absent from our history books, she may just possibly be better known to us as the “fair lady” in the nursery rhyme “London Bridge is falling down”. Her works of charity made her a queen beloved of all Londoners who also probably claimed her as a Wessex girl despite her Scottish birthplace.

Matilda of Scotland fulfilled her dynastic duty by giving birth to both a daughter, also called Matilda, and a son, William. William died in a tragic boat disaster shortly after Matilda’s own early death in 1118. She was only 38. Her daughter Matilda married the German Emperor Henry V and is known to us today as the Holy Roman Empress Matilda, the princess who became embroiled in a bitter English Civil War.

There is loads more about our forgotten English Queen here http://garethrussellcidevant.blogspot.com/.../daughter-of...

#scotland #scottish #history #England #Normandy #royalty

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sag-dab-sar · 1 year

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Hi, I’m Nik. I was wondering what’s ur opinion on worshiping/working with demigods? Thx💛

Hi Nik! I'm sorry this is all the way from October I simply haven't had the energy.

🍁 Definition 🍁

Well people view "demigods," in different ways. The word in English comes from Latin "semideus" (semi meaning half, deus meaning god) for lesser divine beings.

🔹This could include what a lot of literature labels "lesser gods" or "minor gods." For example: nymphs such as a Dryads (trees, forests, groves) or Naiads (fresh waters).

🔹This could include what Homer & Hesoid both referred to people of "good character, family, strength, and power" as hemitheoi (hemi meaning half, theoi meaning gods) after death. This individual didn't need to be part immortal to make it into this category. They tended to be people with hero worship cultus. They could be real people or legendary ancestors whose historicity is dubious.

🔹Related to the above, sometimes great rulers were considered Gods, such as Alexander the Great or various Roman emperors. Sometimes while alive sometimes posthumously.

🔹Some consider an individual with one mortal parent and one immortal parent to be demigods, Herakles would be a good example; his father being the immortal Zeus & his mother being the mortal Alcmene. However, in some cases Dionysos was considered the son of the immortal Zeus and the mortal Semele.... and he was one of the 12 Olympians in some locations and even more important in various other cults so this categorization doesn't hold up well.

🍁 Other Pantheons? 🍁

The word comes from Latin and is most properly used in regards to the Roman and by extension of history Greek pantheons (The semideus and hemitheoi); and possibly closely related ones. But of course people are going to plaster the term across any other pantheon as they see fit so lets talk about that for a second.

I find it difficult to use this term in regards to other pantheons because other pantheons have there own terms.

I'm a Sumerian polytheist so if I was to attempt to use these characteristics to pick out Mesopotamian demigods I might bring up these examples:

🔹It could be say, Lama/Lamassu goddesses & Alad/Šedu Gods, who were unnamed protective deities who might be regarded by modern eyes as "lesser divine" compared to the named city gods.

🔹Pazuzu a demon, not god, who was used in exorcism rituals, as protective talisman, and was considered to hold the much more evil Lamaštu and Lilû demons at bay. Is he a demigod? As a protective powerful being.

🔹Mortals who became immortals— Ziusudra, Ūt-napišti, (possibly) Atrahasis—but there is no term I know of for "half god" that could apply to them. They simply did a thing (build an ark) and were granted immortality.

🔹Deified rulers (while alive and posthumously) especially the kings of Ur III. Such as Narām-Suen or Samsuditāna, they claimed to be sons or brothers of various Gods, but I don't know if they would be seen on the exact same level as the Gods or a lesser level that could be labeled "demigod."

🔹Gilgameš (In Sumerian: Bilgames) is a mess when it comes to this idea. He was likely a historical king during the earliest part of Early Dynastic Period, if he was deified during his life is unknown. By the later part of the Early Dynastic period there was a deity being worshipped named Bilgames/Gilgameš that probably derived from this early king. He was a patron deity of King Utu-heĝal of Uruk, as a full divine being. Yet, the Gilgameš known in the most well known tales, is not a God, he is not even immortal. He is more akin to a hero going on adventures and destroying monsters. Some accounts say he is the son of the Goddess Ninsun and a mortal man which would also make him half mortal half immortal [edit: I think hes actually described as 2/3rds divine 1/3 human]. The very few depictions we are certain show Gilgameš do not have him with a horned cap the sign of divinity. So is he a demigod? a deified king? a half mortal half immortal? a hero? a great ancestor? Most academics use the term hero for him based on the myths even though a much more ancient Bilgames/Gilgameš was possibly worshipped as a full fledged deity.

It really does not make sense to try and parse out Mesopotamian religious figures using this word's conception (though I'm sure it appears in academia at some point) thus it doesn't make sense to use it elsewhere either. The term, like most, does not work well for pantheons that it does not derive from. I'm sure you'll see it used for pantheons and religions across the entire globe but I can't speak to any of them.

🍁 My Category Summary 🍁

For the Roman & Greek traditions (and any surrounding similar ones that I'm not going to attempt to pretend I know such as Etruscan)

Category 1: "lesser divine beings"

Category 2: People of good character after death who eventually received honor and worship. Historicity aside. (Homer & Hesoids' "hemitheoi")

Category 3: Rulers, Emperors

Category 4: Half mortal half immortal individuals

In these contexts worship of demigods in Greece & Rome has deeply entrenched historical precedent. I would see their worship as no different than worshipping other Gods or spirits from a revivalist standpoint. I love me some Dryads and have considered Herakles worship. I do find worshipping Roman emperors odd but they were deemed Gods and had cultus so I can't state that it's ahistorical or inherently bad. Basically: go right ahead! Honoring and worshiping these demigods.

🍁 Modern People 🍁

However, what about these categories in the modern world.

Category 1: Well that hasn't changed much "lesser divine beings" are still the same

Category 2: This could be construed as worshipping modern individuals who fall into this "good character, good family, strong, and powerful" idea described above. For example, idunno lets pretend Albert Einstein falls into that characterization in someone's opinion. I'd be deeply uncomfortable with someone declaring and worshipping him as a demigod. However, including him in ancestor worship seems to be a valid way to honor him, or so thats the consensus among most modern pagan and polytheists that I take no issue with.

Category 3: This might lead someone to the idea of worshipping "recent" powerful rulers. I mean Alexander the Great was a bloody conqueror who made a vast empire. ...So was Queen Victoria (albeit without going into battle) she ruled over the largest human empire in history. I'd be deeply uncomfortable and essentially offended to see her worshipped as a demigod considering the sheer brutality the colonies suffered under her reign. This idea also plays a role in white supremacist groups unfortunately, in some "Esoteric Hitlerism" where Hitler is essentially a divine figure, savior of humankind, deified as a demigod. Unlike the heros and ancestors of category 2 deified rulers tend to get their god status from their conquests and policies which should be looked at very critically. Its one reason I take pause when I see pagans whose primary Gods are Roman emperors.

Category 2/3 offshoot: Category 2 was defined by the person after death. While category 3 could include prior to their death. This could lead to worshipping [insert currently living person] as a demigod. Which makes me deeply uncomfortable, especially because that person probably hasn't consented.

Category 4: This is kind of up to the individual. Most mythical characters who are half/half have their own ancient cultus that will tell you whether they were worshipped as heros (demigods) or Gods

Modern communities: Godkin; Godshard; Demigod (as an identity); Offspring of God X (claiming to be literally part immortal); etc etc etc. No.

🍁 TL;DR🍁

The word has varying meanings. There is plenty of historical examples and definitions for demigod honor and worship in the Greek and Roman traditions (and probably extremely close or syncretic ones). The word should be avoided for beings outside those pantheons & traditions in my opinion. We should be very very careful when using it to talk about modern (or relatively modern) humans both living and dead.

-definitely not audio proof read sorry for whatever my dyslexia did with this post-

#polytheism #paganism #hellenic polytheism #religio romana #demigods #steppingontoes #ofthetheoi #ask

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