Great to see this painstaking work being presented so clearly at last after what I know has been years of work. Really fascinating to think about what could be going on behind this ordering.
And this is the single strongest argument I know *against* names. For them to be X child of Y names, the parent/child roles would have to be implicit by order. If the order is set, they really can't be personal names.
I had thought for a while they might be times of year, and the mirror still made sense with this (instead of saying Feb to March, a one month span, you might need to indicate March to Feb, an 11 month span) but with the most frequent symbols clustered at the bottom, this too makes less sense as important dates in the year would be spread through the calendar.
If they relate to features in the landscape, as you've alluded to elsewhere, then I'm not sure why they'd _need_ an order, but perhaps that's looking at it backwards. Perhaps there having already been established a proper order to key elements of the world, it is only proper when referring to them, to refer to them in order except when reversals "need" to be made and indicated.
thanks Erica. Good to see how 'order' really does change our perceptions of the symbols as a body, and what this order may then implicate. I agree that it rules out names. And I've tried hard to fit dates into this, with no luck. Also dates on stones tend not to be used anywhere until relatively recently. I think the main problem we have understanding 'order', is that the symbols probably predate the symbol stones, and therefore the symbols weren't designed to be used just on symbol stones, so the 'order' may have a significance to the symbols at a more fundamental level.
Fantastic work here, Helen. The "symbols tend to prefer to pair with other symbols in their own part of the list" aspect sounds interesting and promising. I presume with the animals and birds it's not as simple as birds above animals above fish to represent sky, earth and water?
thanks Fiona! I thought at first it might be sky, earth and water, and it still may be for the bulk of animals, but the salmon seems to not cooperate in that scheme. It may stand on its own somehow, just not sure at the moment. I suspect there may be some sort of systematic organising of the main part of the list into something similar, it's definitely worth keeping in mind, trying things out.
Could the salmon be both sky and water because it leaps? I saw a fantastic paper by Luke Fidler at a conference a couple of years ago where he showed that the placement of the Craw Stane can make the salmon appear to the viewer to leap across the sky.
I've often read that the salmon could be considered a special animal as it lives in both fresh and salt water and leaps through the air. I can't say for sure whether that is right or wrong. But, this is where it's critical to ascertain 'context' for the Picts. I've not come across anything that suggests people living in their Celtic worldview thought like this, this sort of idea comes more from modern reconstructionists who are trying to rebuild a full worldview to live by, which is perfectly valid within that context, but possibly not that of the Picts. In ancient texts, the importance of the salmon is primarily connected to a certain type of wisdom that is associated with the power of speech, a wisdom that it accumulates from eating hazels falling into a special pool of the water god Nectan.
Yes, true - iirc this particular paper came more from a point of view of naturalistic representation in art and the phenomenology of the stones, rather than a consideration of the Pictish worldview. It was just quite striking to see the Craw Stane presented in that way. When you say 'ancient texts', which texts are you thinking of? Irish/Welsh texts, or continental European ones? I wouldn't want people to have the impression that we have surviving texts from Pictland.
The Irish and Welsh texts are what has survived, but it doesn't mean this mythology only 'belongs' to them as isolates, they are part of the greater Celtic worldview, supported by linguistics, culture, archaeology. All cultures over the world who have experienced a period of stability have a worldview. And everything we are told by insiders and outsiders tells us that Celtic philosophy and science was way up there with the rest. As for Pictish texts, apart from copies of the kinglist, no, but there is lots of Pictish references within the texts of their neighbours so it's not entirely a blank slate. And the stories belong to the culture of which they are a part.
No, I wasn't suggesting the Picts didn't share the same mythology - I was just interested in which texts you meant. Does the salmon of wisdom appear in Welsh mythology as well as Irish? I don't know either body of work very well.
Great to see this painstaking work being presented so clearly at last after what I know has been years of work. Really fascinating to think about what could be going on behind this ordering.
And this is the single strongest argument I know *against* names. For them to be X child of Y names, the parent/child roles would have to be implicit by order. If the order is set, they really can't be personal names.
I had thought for a while they might be times of year, and the mirror still made sense with this (instead of saying Feb to March, a one month span, you might need to indicate March to Feb, an 11 month span) but with the most frequent symbols clustered at the bottom, this too makes less sense as important dates in the year would be spread through the calendar.
If they relate to features in the landscape, as you've alluded to elsewhere, then I'm not sure why they'd _need_ an order, but perhaps that's looking at it backwards. Perhaps there having already been established a proper order to key elements of the world, it is only proper when referring to them, to refer to them in order except when reversals "need" to be made and indicated.
I look forward to seeing more!
thanks Erica. Good to see how 'order' really does change our perceptions of the symbols as a body, and what this order may then implicate. I agree that it rules out names. And I've tried hard to fit dates into this, with no luck. Also dates on stones tend not to be used anywhere until relatively recently. I think the main problem we have understanding 'order', is that the symbols probably predate the symbol stones, and therefore the symbols weren't designed to be used just on symbol stones, so the 'order' may have a significance to the symbols at a more fundamental level.
Fantastic work here, Helen. The "symbols tend to prefer to pair with other symbols in their own part of the list" aspect sounds interesting and promising. I presume with the animals and birds it's not as simple as birds above animals above fish to represent sky, earth and water?
thanks Fiona! I thought at first it might be sky, earth and water, and it still may be for the bulk of animals, but the salmon seems to not cooperate in that scheme. It may stand on its own somehow, just not sure at the moment. I suspect there may be some sort of systematic organising of the main part of the list into something similar, it's definitely worth keeping in mind, trying things out.
Could the salmon be both sky and water because it leaps? I saw a fantastic paper by Luke Fidler at a conference a couple of years ago where he showed that the placement of the Craw Stane can make the salmon appear to the viewer to leap across the sky.
I've often read that the salmon could be considered a special animal as it lives in both fresh and salt water and leaps through the air. I can't say for sure whether that is right or wrong. But, this is where it's critical to ascertain 'context' for the Picts. I've not come across anything that suggests people living in their Celtic worldview thought like this, this sort of idea comes more from modern reconstructionists who are trying to rebuild a full worldview to live by, which is perfectly valid within that context, but possibly not that of the Picts. In ancient texts, the importance of the salmon is primarily connected to a certain type of wisdom that is associated with the power of speech, a wisdom that it accumulates from eating hazels falling into a special pool of the water god Nectan.
Yes, true - iirc this particular paper came more from a point of view of naturalistic representation in art and the phenomenology of the stones, rather than a consideration of the Pictish worldview. It was just quite striking to see the Craw Stane presented in that way. When you say 'ancient texts', which texts are you thinking of? Irish/Welsh texts, or continental European ones? I wouldn't want people to have the impression that we have surviving texts from Pictland.
The Irish and Welsh texts are what has survived, but it doesn't mean this mythology only 'belongs' to them as isolates, they are part of the greater Celtic worldview, supported by linguistics, culture, archaeology. All cultures over the world who have experienced a period of stability have a worldview. And everything we are told by insiders and outsiders tells us that Celtic philosophy and science was way up there with the rest. As for Pictish texts, apart from copies of the kinglist, no, but there is lots of Pictish references within the texts of their neighbours so it's not entirely a blank slate. And the stories belong to the culture of which they are a part.
No, I wasn't suggesting the Picts didn't share the same mythology - I was just interested in which texts you meant. Does the salmon of wisdom appear in Welsh mythology as well as Irish? I don't know either body of work very well.
phenomenology for who? the author, other modern people, the Picts?
For the Picts - although all I can remember of the paper is that image of the salmon leaping, which has stuck with me.