As you all might notice, I am not in my usual rhythm! I have had guests since yesterday and have hardly had time to share my weekend posts! However, I wish all my dear friends a lovely weekend in the time of summer solstice and a stunning yellow full moon; I wonder if this happens often. I hope it is a sign of fortune. 💖🌟🌞
The image on top: KinukoCraft by Kadir Nelson Painter and illustrator
Here, dear Leonard Cohen describes how I feel. Love you all!
Honestly, when I first saw the statue of the woman below in the main article, I thought it depicted a woman washing clothes in a jar. But as I read the article, I had to admit my failure: she actually makes beer! It is funny that many men, such as in Germany, think beer is a man’s business. Then look! Here we go; in ancient Egypt, the women, and even the Goddesses, brewed beers.
Yes! It is fascinating to know that there was more than one beer Goddess in ancient Egypt: Nephthys (She was associated with mourning, the night/darkness, service (specifically temples), childbirth, the dead, protection, magic, health, embalming, and beer.) The others were Menqet (The Egyptians worshipped the Goddess of beer, Menqet, and celebrated sun God Ra’s daughter, Sekhmet, whose bloodthirsty ways were calmed by beer. According to Egyptian mythology, Menqet was the Goddess of beer and ruled over the Place of Reeds.) and Tenenet (Tjenenyet), as both latter mentioned in this article.
We read here the description of this amazing story by brilliant Marie Grillot and Marc Chartier. Cheers!!
via égyptophile
In 1931, while continuing the excavations undertaken in 1929 on behalf of the Antiquities Service in the sector concerning: “the ascending routes of the Pyramid of Chephren to the north and the Pyramid of Mycerinus to the south”, Professor Sélim Bey Hassan discovers the mastaba of Mersou-ankh.
The mastaba of this chief of the Rà-wèr domains will turn out to contain numerous statues.
Among them is that of this brewer, discovered in serdab no. 1, facing a triple statue representing the tomb’s owner.
It is made of painted limestone and stands 28 cm high. It represents a woman leaning over a large jar. She wears a black, mid-length wig, while her natural hair forms a fringe on her forehead. The face is generous, the cheeks are full, the eyes and eyebrows are marked with black, the nose is wide, and the mouth seems to be smiling. A necklace in blue and white tones adorns her neck.
Her breasts are exposed, and the light-coloured, almost transparent garment she wears begins at the waist and goes down to below the knee.
The arms are relatively robust, and the hands are not visible. They are busy kneading the dough in the sieve placed on the pottery jar. “She kneads the ingredients used to make beer in the Old Kingdom, namely barley loaves, water and date liqueur,” explains Rosanna Pirelli in “Treasures of Egypt – The Wonders of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
To understand the method of production, we refer to the information provided in Thierry Benderitter’s description of certain scenes of the mastaba of Ty in Saqqara on his indispensable site, Osirisnet.net, and to Sylvia Couchoud’s sDynastyeer in Pharaonic Egypt.
The base ingredient is sprouted barley. “It is crushed in flat-bottomed containers with a mortar and filtered using increasingly fine sieves. Wheat flour is added. With this mixture, once moistened, oblong pieces of dough are made and poured into hot moulds until the crust is golden while ensuring that the inside remains raw and that the malt enzymes are not destroyed. The half-cooked bread is then crumbled in a bowl and mixed with a sweet liquid obtained with dates. The mixture is kneaded, stirred, filtered with a large strainer and collected in jugs where it will ferment. When the fermentation is finished, the beer obtained is transferred into amphorae closed with a. plug of straw and damp clay, or with a small plate and a little plaster.”
Four types of beers have been referenced: zythum (literally “barley wine,” a widely used light beer), Dizythum (a double beer), Carmi (a sweet beer), and Korma (a ginger beer).
Jean-Pierre Corteggiani (“Ancient Egypt and its gods”) specifies the importance of beer in ancient Egypt: “Personified by the goddesses Tenemet and Menqet, who are responsible for brewing it, beer plays a significant role in the divine world. It is obviously part of the offerings made to the gods and goddesses, particularly Hathor, since, like wine, it can induce intoxication.
Menqet is often represented with two jugs in her hands, associated with Âqyt, who personifies bread. With bread, it’s beer – not wine! – which the Egyptians wished to have for eternity.
The deceased wished not to lack anything in his afterlife… Thus, as we can read in the “Official Catalog of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo”: “the figurines of servants at work reproduce in the round themes previously developed in bas relief. The statuary of the tombs is enriched by a small world of brewers, millers, pastry chefs, potters or butchers, who continue their daily service in the tomb. Generally of a mediocre style, these figurines are nevertheless quite expressive and represent their professional practice well. The first known limestone models date back to the 4th Dynasty, but the vast majority occurred in the 5th.
This brewer is displayed at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo under the reference JE 66624.
Sources:
Statuette of a Female Brewer http://www.globalegyptianmuseum.org/record.aspx?id=14885 Statuette of a woman preparing beer https://egyptianmuseumcairo.eg/emc/artefacts/old-kingdom-serving-statues/ Francesco Tiradritti, Treasures of Egypt – The Wonders of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo
Mohamed Saleh, Hourig Sourouzian, Official Catalogue of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, Verlag Philippe von Zabern, 1997
Jean-Pierre Corteggiani, Ancient Egypt and its gods, Fayard, 2007
National Geographic, Treasures of Ancient Egypt at the Cairo Museum
Beer: a drink known in ancient Egypt https://egyptophile.blogspot.com/2016/04/la-biere-une-boisson-connue-et-deifiee.html
This is my first time writing a tribute to my mother on WP. To put it bluntly, I hadn’t done it before because I was unsure about the exact time; I can’t find my mother’s ID again as I am sure I have had it in my hands once. So I asked my brother-in-law and looked at Wikipedia about my father, hoping my mother’s name would also be mentioned there! After all, my father was a famous writer of his time. So, I found the time of her passing away would be today, in 1972.
She was undeniably beautiful and often caught the attention of many men. However, living with such beauty in a primitive society made it difficult for her to embrace her individuality. She had a hard time, especially after our father’s death. However, she made a considerable effort to raise us, and I will always appreciate her love.
She had leukaemia and passed away at the age of fifty-nine. I will never forget the scene when, after a long wait, you entered the house with plastic swords in your arms from the time of King Arthur, which was one of our wishes to have them.
You will never be forgotten; your compassion and love will accompany us forever. 💖💖🙏🕊
Actually, at the beginning of the week, I planned another challenging task: translating a work from Carl Jung. Still, I did have to settle for a short article because my wife’s sister-in-law, whom I might have mentioned before with a tumour in her head spending her last days, has finally found salvation.
Honestly, I am not a nature expert and know little about the names of plants or flowers. I don’t know if they ever know my name! However, I know my wife, Regina, is an expert; her highest enjoyment is walking between the flowers and the trees. Therefore, I suggested walking in a beautiful part of our town to try calming her sad heart (as I have enough experience with losing loved ones!). The city where we live is not a nice one at all, but a lot of green areas surround the environment.
So, in Ralph Waldo Emerson’s words, NaturNaturees a noble human need, namely the love for Beauty. The ancient Greeks called the world a word that means ornament, beauty.
Anyway, this time, I have more pictures than words to share, and I think there is not much to say as the images speak for themselves. Here are the photos I took during our walk.
I believe there is no need to be a plant expert, as we are partly created by Mother Nature. Still, we must be aware of our essence and keep it safe as far as possible.
By the way, I got a message from WP that I have reached 1k followers! As I gratefully wonder how it could happen, I must confess that I am just happy that many of these friendly people don’t care about my humble posts or write comments; otherwise, I would be bushed!😜🙏💖
There have been many attempts to define the extraordinary feeling of love, but it is not an easy task. I know that, as I have also grappled with it repeatedly. Here, I would like to present Khalil Gibran’s approach. I hope you will enjoy it.🙏💖
The illustration on the top by Jeramondo Djeriandi
Love gives naught but itself
and takes naught but from itself.
Love processed not nor would it be possessed;
For love is sufficient unto love.
Then said Almitra, Speak to us of Love.
And he raised his head and looked upon
the people, and there fell a stillness upon
them. And with a great voice he said:
When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as
the north wind lays waste the garden.
For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth so is he for your
pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and
caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the
sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake
them in their clinging to the earth.
Like sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred
fire, that you may become sacred bread for
God’s sacred feast.
All these things shall love do unto you
that you may know the secrets of your
heart, and in that knowledge become a
fragment of Life’s heart.
But if in your fear you would seek only love’s peace
and love’s pleasure,
Then it is better for you that you cover
your nakedness and pass out of love’s
threshing-floor,
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh,
but not all of your laughter,
and weep, but not all of your tears.
Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself.
Love possesses not nor would it be possessed;
For love is sufficient unto love.
When you love you should not say,
“God is in my heart,” but rather, “I am
in the heart of God.”
And think not you can direct the course
of love, for love, if it finds you worthy,
directs your course.
Love has no other desire but to fulfil itself.
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that
sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart
and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate
love’s ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude; And then sleep to with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise
upon your lips.
Of course, every holy book and religious ritual teaches that giving birth and having offspring is a highly important human act on this earth. No wonder, then, that it would go in the same way in ancient Egypt.
Most ancient Egyptian women laboured and delivered their babies on the cool roof of the house or in an arbour or confinement pavilion, a structure of papyrus-stalk columns decorated with vines.
In the Yogi method, the best way to bear a child is in the water! I believe if we let the newborn child into the water immediately, they would feel happy and free and could more easily grasp their changing world perception.
The standard childbirth practice in ancient Egypt has long been known from papyrus texts. It looked more natural as the woman delivered her baby while squatting on two large bricks, each colourfully decorated with scenes to invoke the magic of gods for the health and happiness of mother and child.
Let’s read this interesting report by the brilliant Marie Grillot about an enchanting find and the story of constant upspring in Old Egypt!
via égyptophile
Several figured ostraca* from Deir el-Medineh illustrate this extraordinary, touching moment of motherhood, more precisely of the mother breastfeeding her newborn. The gesture, the tenderness, and the concentrated attention paid to the nurturing function remain immutable across the centuries.
This scene, dating from the 19th – 20th dynasty, is reproduced on a piece of limestone 15 cm high and 11.7 cm wide. The three characters are drawn in red ocher while their complexion is painted in yellow ocher and their hair in black.
It takes place in a beautiful plant setting, under a canopy, supported by columns (only one is visible on the right, the left part being lacunar), covered with lanceolate leaves of bindweed or convolvulus. “The leaves of bindweed have a symbolic meaning with a sexual connotation: they are often present in scenes relating to love and the renewal of life”, explains Anne-Mimault-Gout (“Les artistes de Pharaon”).
Emma Brunner-Traut calls this kiosk “the birthing arbour” and thinks “that it was a temporary building, raised in the open air for the moment of childbirth and that the mother remained there for 14 days until her purification”…
This birth pavilion sheltered the difficult hours of suffering inherent in childbirth, just as it witnessed the intense emotion linked to the miracle of giving life… Its aim was also, most certainly, to benefit the young, give birth calmly, rest and protect her, as well as the child, from potential external risks or dangers. In “Carnets de Pierre”, Anne-Mimault Gout evokes the interesting idea that: “These pavilions were perhaps the ancestors of the mammisis of the Greco-Roman temples, the birth chapels”.
Sitting on a curved stool equipped with a comfortable cushion, the mother is shown, turned to the right and naked, adorned only with a large necklace. Her body, leaning forward, seems to envelop and protect the infant she is breastfeeding. Unfortunately, the time has partly tarnished and erased its representation…
Her undone, untamed hairstyle —typical of that of women giving birth in ancient Egypt—attracts the eye. The hair raised in a totally anarchic manner on the head probably reflects the fact that during these extraordinary days, all the attention was focused on the child, to the detriment of the care given to his physical appearance…
As if to remind her that her new role as the mother should not make her forget her femininity, the young servant in front of her hands her a mirror and a kohol case. These toiletry accessories are, according to Anne Mimault-Gout, “charged with an erotic connotation linked, through beauty, to rebirth”. Young, his thin, slender body is naked. Her hair is tied in a ponytail on the top of her head, falling in a pretty curl over her shoulder. For J. Vandier d’Abbadie, “this hairstyle and the pronounced elongation of the profile evoke the iconography of Syro-Palestinian divinities – in particular, Anat and Astarte -, that is to say, that these young girls with high heads would be young asian maids”…
In her fascinating study “Postpartum purification and relief rites in ancient Egypt” (all of whose rich analyses, unfortunately, cannot be cited here), Marie-Lys Arnette returns to the rites represented on these figurative ostraca of the Ramesside period representing “gynoecium scenes”, as J. Vandier d’Abbadie calls them… “The actions that these scenes depict are indeed rites since they are very close formally to the representations of offerings made to the dead or the gods and follow the same codes: The beneficiary is seated while the officiant approaches them, standing and holding the objects they are about to offer in their hands. These scenes concern the period following birth, and the rites which appear there must allow the purification and aggregation of the mother. It is a question of representing the reliefs, the sequence we can attempt to restore – in a necessarily incomplete manner because the analysis depends on scant documentation”…
These representations are very precious because they are among the only ones that allow us to understand the intimacy of women… But what was their goal? E. Brunner-Traut, in particular, “suggests seeing ex-votos there. We can indeed consider these objects as having been used, in one way or another, in cults linked to fertility, but it is impossible to specify this use further”…
This ostracon, which comes from Deir el-Medineh, is described by Jacques Vandier d’Abbadie in his “Catalogue of figured ostraca, 1937” under the number 2339. It is indicated as having previously been at the Fouad I Agricultural Museum in Cairo. It was then found in the collection of Moïse Lévy de Benzion, owner of a famous store in Cairo, who then offered it at auction under number 36 of his sale on March 14, 1947, in Zamalek. Robert Streitz, a Belgian architect based in Cairo, then purchased it. He kept it for several years before donating it in 1952 to the Department of Egyptian Antiquities of the Louvre Museum. It was registered there under the inventory number E 25333.
Marie Grillot
*Ostraca (singular: ostracon): Shards, silver or fragments of limestone, or even terracotta, which were, in antiquity, used by artisans to practice. This type of “support”, which they found in abundance on the sides of the mountain, allowed them to make and redo their drawings or writings until they reached excellence and were finally admitted to work “in situ” in the residences of ‘eternity.
They are generally classified into two categories: inscribed (hieroglyph, hieratic, demotic, etc.) or figured (drawing, sculpture).
Sources:
Figured ostracon – E 25333 https://collections.louvre.fr/ark:/53355/cl010004032 Jacques Vandier d’Abbadie, Catalog of figured ostraca of Deir el Médineh II.2, n°2256-2722, IFAO, Cairo, 1937 https://archive.org/details/DFIFAO2.2/page/n1/mode/2up Bernard Bruyère, Report on the excavations of Deir el Médineh (1934-1935). Third part. The village, public dumps, the rest station at the Valley of the Kings pass, Cairo, Printing office of the French Institute of Oriental Archeology (IFAO), (Excavations of the French Institute of Oriental Archeology = FIFAO; 16), p. 131-132, 1939 https://ia600606.us.archive.org/30/items/FIFAO16/FIFAO%2016%20Bruyère%2C%20Bernard%20-%20Le%20village%2C%20les%20discharges%20public%2C%20la%20station%20de %20rest%20du%20col%20de%20la%20valley%20des%20kings%20%281939%29%20LR.pdfEmma Brunner-Traut, Die altägyptischen Scherbenbilder (Bildostraka) der Deutschen Museen und Sammlungen, Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden, 1956 Jeanne Vandier d’Abbadie, Two figured ostraca, Bulletin of the French Institute of Oriental Archeology (BIFAO), 1957, p. 21-34, p. 22-23, fig. 2, IFAO, Cairo, 1957 https://archive.org/details/DFIFAO2.2 https://archive.org/details/DFIFAO2.2/page/n69/mode/2up Emma Brunner-Traut, Egyptian Artists’ Sketches. Figured ostraka from the Gayer-Anderson Collection in the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge, Cambridge, 1979
The donors of the Louvre, Paris, Musée du Louvre, 1989
Perfumes and cosmetics in ancient Egypt, exhibition catalogue, Cairo, Marseille, Paris, 2002, p. 99, 139, ESIG, 2002
Anne Minault-Gout, Stone notebooks: the art of ostraca in ancient Egypt, p. 36-37, Hazan, 2002
Guillemette Andreu, The artists of Pharaon. Deir el-Medina and the Valley of the Kings, exhibition catalog, Paris, Turnhout, RMN, Brepols, p. 113, no. 53, 2002
Guillemette Andreu, The Art of Contour. Drawing in ancient Egypt, exhibition catalog, Somogy éditions d’Art, p. 320, ill. p. 320, no. 168, 2013
Marie-Lys Arnette, Postpartum purification and relief rites in ancient Egypt, Bulletin of the French Institute of Oriental Archeology (BIFAO), 114, 2015, p. 19-72, p. 30-31, fig. 2, IFAO, Cairo 2015
Hanane Gaber, Laure Bazin Rizzo, Frédéric Servajean, At work, we know the craftsman… of Pharaon! A century of French research in Deir el-Medina (1917-2017), exhibition catalogue, Silvana Editoriale, p. 36, 2017
Yes! Let’s take a breath (how I need it these days!!), and look into the island on the Bodensee as the final part; don’t worry and be hippy!!
There are many corners on this fantastic island to enjoy; one is Flower Power, which has so many old vinyls, singles, and LPs.
After facing challenges with the weather in Part 1 and visiting the beautiful butterflies in Part 2, there were still some worthwhile places to see on Mainau Island, including the Flower Power Museum, which was decorated for Flower Children from the nice old hippie time!
And Some by me, first. (I take this advantage!!)
Plus some others by my wife!
I know I would never win, though here are some more by myself.
Just a few more!
And finally, cheers and thank you!!🙏💖✌🙏🥰
I took on another challenging task, even though I didn’t have as much time as I thought! Nevertheless, I managed to translate another part of Nietzsche’s “Thus Spoke Zarathustra,” which I believe closely relates to the current human situation and way of life. Although Nietzsche seems to be a bitter and pessimistic philosopher, I find that he made valid points about the human condition that, in my opinion, he addressed reasonably.
His writing style is poetic and difficult to translate, using old-fashioned German. I did my best to make it more apprehensive. I hope you enjoy it.🙏💖🌹
(The word Hinterweltler literally means Backworlders, but he intends to show the unknown people living behind and around the subjects, unaware of the centre. I couldn’t find any word in English that matched this one, so I didn’t translate it!).
Zarathustra once cast his madness beyond man, like all other Hinterweltlers. The world seemed to me to be the work of a suffering and tormented God.
The world seemed to me a dream, the poetry of god-coloured smoke before the eyes of one who was divinely dissatisfied.
Good and evil and pleasure and pain and I and you – it seemed to me like coloured smoke before creative eyes. The Creator wanted to look away from himself – so he created the world. It is a drunken pleasure for the sufferer to look away from his suffering and lose himself. The world seemed to me to be one and the same: drunken pleasure and losing oneself.
This world… eternally imperfect, an image and an imperfect image of an eternal contradiction – a drunken pleasure of its imperfect Creator – so the world once seemed to me.
So I, too, once cast my madness beyond man, like all Hinterweltlern. Beyond man in truth? Their books, too, this God that I created was the work of man and madness, like all gods!
He was human, and only a poor piece of human and I: This ghost came to me from my own ashes and embers, and honestly! It did not come to me from the beyond!
What happened, my brothers? I overcame myself, the sufferer, I carried my own ashes to the mountain, I invented a brighter flame for myself. And behold! Then the ghost left me!
It would be suffering for me now and torment for those who have recovered to believe in such ghosts: it would be suffering for me now and humiliation. So I speak to the Hinterweltlern.
It was an unfortunate, and inability – that created all the Hinterweltlern: and that brief madness of happiness that only the most suffering experience.
Tiredness that wants to reach the last will with one leap; with a deathly leap, one poor, ignorant tiredness that no longer even wants to want: that created all gods and Hinterwelten.
Believe me, my brothers! It was the body that despaired at the end – it heard the belly of the being speaking to it.
And then it wanted to go through the last walls with its head, and not just with its head – over to “that world”.
But ‘that world’ is well bent before man, that dehumanized, inhuman world which is a heavenly nothingness, and the belly of being does not speak to man at all, unless as a human being.
Truly, all beings are difficult to prove and difficult to make them speak. Tell me, brothers, is it not the most wonderful of all things, the best proven?
Yes, this ego and the ego’s contradiction and confusion still speaks most honestly about its being, this creative, willing, evaluating ego, which is the measure and the world of things.
And this honest being, the ego – that speaks of the body, and it still wants the body, even when it writes poetry and raves and flutters with broken wings.
Constantly learns to speak more and more honestly, the ego: and the more it learns, the more it finds words and honours for body and earth.
My ego taught me a new pride, and I teach it to people: no longer to bury one’s head in the sand of heavenly things but to carry it freely, an earthly head that gives meaning to the earth!
I teach people a new will: to want this path that man has blindly walked, to welcome it, and no longer sneak away from it like the sick and dying.
It was the sick and dying who despised body and earth and found the heavenly and the redeeming blood stopper, but they also took these sweet and dark poisons from body and earth.
They wanted to escape their misery, and the stars were too far away for them. Then they sighed: >Oh if only there were heavenly ways to sneak into another existence and happiness!< – So they invented their tricks and bloody potions! They thought they were now removed from their bodies and this earth, these ungrateful people. But whom did they thank for their rapture, their pain and their bliss? Their bodies and this earth.
Zarathustra is gentle with the sick. Indeed, he is not angry with their forms of consolation and ingratitude. May they recover and conquer and create a higher body for themselves!
Zarathustra is not angry with the recovering people either when he looks tenderly upon their madness and sneaks around the grave of their God at midnight: But illness and a sick body remain for me, and their tears still remain.
There have always been many sick people among those who write poetry and are God-addicted; they furiously hate those who know and that youngest of virtues, which is called honesty.
They always look back to dark times. Of course, madness and faith were two different things then; the madness of reason was godlike, and doubt was a sin.
I know these godlike people all too well: They want people to believe in them, and doubt is a sin. I also know all too well what they themselves believe in best.
Truly not in the Hinterwelten and redeeming drops of blood, but they instead believe best in the body, and their own body is their thing for itself.
But it is a sick matter to them, and they would gladly lose their temper. That is why they listen to the preachers of death and preach about the Hinterwelten.
Listen to me instead, my brothers, to the voice of the healthy body: This is a more honest and purer voice.
The healthy body speaks more honestly and more purely, the perfect and right-angled one: And it speaks of the meaning of the earth.
The image on top by Jay Coby Art
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