RCG-I Seasonal Salon

Gorgonic Reconstruction

PART II

This article continues insights and research about the Gorgon Goddesses – Medousa, Stheno and Euryale. This trinity of potent ancient deities has aspects of overwhelming power relevant and attainable today. It is important to recognize that each Gorgon Goddess was in and of Herself a triple Goddess with immense power in each aspect.

A towering statue of these Goddesses constructed at the Parthenon represented three aspects of each. (See Pic E) If size gives any credence to the amount of strength and power an image represents, consider that this statue is said to have been over forty feet tall. Each Goddess aspect was represented with a) a free standing image, b) an image incorporated in the shield and c) an image incorporated in the clothing. Copies of this chryselephantine statue can be found at the National Museum of Athens labeled as Athena.

This enormous statue depicts - Medousa as the beautiful feminine mortal form ‘Athena’, the protective aegis which She wears and as the transformative Gorgonic head depicted on the shield, Euryale as the round dome-shape of the shield and headdress, the images of Earthly beings which circle the shield and crown the head and the winged Earth-mother image holding a sheaf of wheat standing upon the pillar, and Stheno as the supporting pillar, the protective shield itself and as the numerous snakes upon the image. There are 13 snakes depicted on this particular statue.

Aspects and attributes of Gorgo Goddesses reconstructed here were compiled from a dizzying amount of resources noted at the end of this article.

Medousa (Medusa) represented the virtue of wisdom. Her name refers to the Sanskrit concept of medha or female wisdom. Her widely worshiped triple form encompassed the commonly known forms of Her as Medousa the Libyan serpent Goddess of wisdom, the Destroyer aspect of the Egyptian Goddess Neith, and the maiden north African Goddess Ath-Enna. She was called “mother of all the gods whom she bore before childbirth existed… All that has been, that is, and that will be.” She is quoted in ancient texts as saying, "No mortal has yet been able to lift that which covers me.” Because She was the grim face of Death, any mortal who saw Her face would die (or turn to stone). Her blood both created and destroyed life. She could restore the dead to life in Her ‘magic cauldron’ or womb of regeneration. As an embodiment of Future, She was always veiled.

Medousa had the intense and powerful ability to focus mind energy in a way that would hypnotize and transfix others. She was definitely a woman of psychic potency and this was Her protection. Like Her serpent sister Stheno, She used this incredible power to harness ambient energies around Her and trance any aggressor, stopping them in their tracks once they looked into Her eyes.

Gorgonic tribes of Libya were noted to wear ritual masks, scaring away any who disrespected their rites. These masks displayed Goddess Medousa’s destroyer aspect, including well tended snakelike locks of hair, full lips and wide nose of African heritage. The boar-like tusks and lolling tongue of courageous strength is still used today handed down for generations in tribal depictions as far away as the South Pacific Maori. Gorgons were one of greater Libya’s last tribes to be overthrown by patriarchal religious worship. Common concepts of Perseus beheading Goddess Medousa in later myth denoted both Hellenic removal of Medousa’s shrines from power and stripping of Gorgonic masks permanently from Her priestesses. The aegis, which Medousa/Athena wears in depictions and which was worn on tribal wartime girdles, was also a symbol of chastity. Anyone so bold as to remove it without expressed permission of the wearer were doomed to instant death.

Euryale represented the virtue of universality. (Her name means Action of True Practice or Characterized by the Process of True Art from eu- true; -ry or –ery art, practice or condition; -al, –alia or -ale – of, relating to, characterized by action or process. Webster Old World Dictionary)

She was Mother of Fate, Creatrix of the World from Chaos. Oddly represented by the letter M, She was the oldest deity referenced in Greece. She became universal parent, Mother Earth, Rhea, the all ruling deity to whom all else was subject and obedient. As such She was the Goddess of Time, Grim Reaper and Great Mother within whom all were encompassed in death, the devourer of all gods and offspring. Possibly as a way to diffuse Her awesome power, She was later presented as three individual Goddesses: Eurynome - the Universal One, Eurybia - Mother Arabia, and Euridice - the Universal Dike.

She was the Universal Mother ruling earth, sea and underworld. She was Gaea Olympia, the Deep Breasted One and Goddess as Aegea the foundress of civilization (however this may have been Her sister Medousa who was more involved with mortals and was depicted in imagery as the aegis). Through the travels of Her worshippers She became, in India, Mother of All that Moves, Goddess of the Earth and sometimes bore the title of Serpent Queen (again this possibly may have been Her sister Stheno as their attributes seem intertwined).

Euryale controlled several mountain shrines including the Delphic Oracle. As Earth Goddess, She inspired the original Pythonesses or divinatory serpent-priestesses (again this possibly was Her sister Stheno as Guardian of the Way). Her universal breast milk, the fountain of all waters, flowed down the mountain peaks of Her breasts to nourish the land. Euryale was Earth Eternal.

Stheno (Stheino) represented the virtue of strength. As the letter S, She was one of the oldest symbols of serpenthood, the serpent being one of the oldest symbols of female power.

She also had the ability to transfix or turn men into stone. A great pillar of strength, Her name gave rise to Sthanu ‘The Pillar’, a title usurped by Shiva. She was represented by pillars of ancient temples as the Caryatid, seven pillars of wisdom, connecting Her to many other sevenfold Goddess depictions worldwide. As female serpent, Ananta the Infinite, She enveloped all gods during their death-sleep between incarnations. She was all temples, the stony enveloper of Her peoples. In ancient Memphis, the whole temple structure was called the Mistress of Life. In some areas She was ‘Progenitress of the Peoples’ and ‘Goddess of the Rock’. In honor of Stheno’s Stony Strength, ancient foundation trenches (and eventually walls, pillars or cornerstones) of sacred temples, were filled with sacrificial blood as a means of ensuring the buildings stability.

As Anat, the Strength of Life, She represented a twin of the Goddess of Birth (life) and Death. She was mistress of all gods and Queen of heaven (or perhaps that was Her sister Euryale as Great Mother). Later through travel and accent interpretation of worshippers She became Anu, Ana or eventually Anna. With this dropping of the powerful serpentous S, She became just the Grandmother-Goddess and Grandmother Time. She was (Sth)ianus, Time Itself, the beginning and end, Alpha and Omega, the celestial gatekeeper with an ability to simultaneously look into the past, present and future. Depicted as two headed, looking forward and back, the face of this Gorgon in the present was ever hidden, cloaked or invisible. She ruled the Celestial Hinge at the back of the North Wind.

Often depicted as protective watcher or guard dog at major thresholds, She became Cerberus, dogs at the gate of the afterworld, Hag of the Iron Wood, Holy One and Death-goddess. As Grandmother-goddess She could also be the destroying Crone. A War Goddess, in victory, armies would pile up shields in offering to Her. A rather violent Goddess, She was fertilized by the blood of men and often wore shorn penises of Her victims on Her goatskin apron or aegis which were most likely mistaken for snakes in later aegis images. Guardian at the dimensional Gates, Container that was every Temple and stone-like Pillar of Transformation, Stheno was Goddess as Guardian of the Rite.

Each Gorgon Goddess was a power to be reckoned with in ancient times. So much so, they were diffused, debased and dissolved. May this collected knowledge present a means for all to tap into the indestructible abilities of these Goddesses and provide revival in this Age of the Daughter.

Sources in Date Order: (most are mythic stories unless otherwise notes)

• Hesiod, Theogony - Greek C8th-7th BC
  
• Homerica, The Cypria - Greek ?BC
  
• Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound – Greek C6th-5th BC
  
• Aristophanes, Frogs - Greek C5th BC
  
• Euhemerus - Greek C3rd BC
  
• Apollonius Rhodius, The Argonautica - Greek C3rd BC
  
• Apollodorus, The Library - Greek Mythography C2nd BC
  
• Diodorus Siculus, Library of History - Greek C1st BC
  
• Propertius, Elegies – Latin C1st BC
  
• Ovid, Metamorphoses - Latin C1st BC - C1st AD
  
• Pausanias, Guide to Greece - Greek Geography C2nd AD
  
• Hyginus, Fabulae - Latin Mythography C2nd AD
  
• Nonnos, Dionysiaca - Greek C5th AD
  
• Suidas - Byzantine Greek Lexicography C10th AD
  
• Walker, Encyclopedia of Myths and Legends – American Mythography 19th AD
  
• Walker, Book of Symbols and Secrets – American Mythography 19th AD
  
• WWW.Ancient.gr - Greek C19th AD
  
• WWW.Theoi.com – Greco-Roman C19th AD
  
• WWW.AncientGreece.com- Greek C19th AD
  
• Regelioso, North African Travels – American Research Speech 20th AD