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Bragi is the god of music. He is married to Idunna, whose apples keep the gods from aging.
Fireverse-Bragi is probably pretty different than the Bragi of this universe, because the Fireverse needed a character within Asgard society that would actively oppose the teller of the story, who was Loki, and the opposition character became Bragi. Loki is usually cast as the opposition character in most traditional tellings of the mythology, but of course he would not cast himself in that role.
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One aspect of ritual that we don't often think about until we're armpit-deep in actually performing one is music. The ancient Minoans, like other Bronze Age cultures in Europe and the Mediterranean, used music in ritual - we know because we see it in the art. But we don't know what it sounded like. So how can we incorporate music into Minoan ritual? It's not that hard, really.
Like many aspects of Minoan religion, we have to base our choices on two points: what we see in the archaeological record and what evokes the ancient Minoans to us as modern Pagans. In other words, we have to make some educated guesses as to what Minoan music probably sounded like. We know a lot about Minoan music from Minoan art. And we have a pretty good idea about what other types of ancient music from the Mediterranean and the Near East sounded like. So what we tend to go for in Modern Minoan Paganism is music that makes us feel like we're in the ancient world. It's a psychological trigger, in other words.
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Previous essays in this series
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Like every culture, the Minoans had their music. We can see that in their art and artifacts. The image at the top of this post is of a group of terracotta figurines from Palaikastro. There are three women holding hands and dancing in a semicircle around a fourth woman who is playing the lyre. We don't know what the occasion was here: a celebration? A ritual? One of the famous harvest dances on a circular threshing floor? (There was a circular piece found with these figurines that might have been a model threshing floor.)
It could even have been a funeral; there's a lyre-player on the "death" side of the Hagia Triada sarcophagus.
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Three things I'm excited about exploring in 2018:
Elen of the Ways - I discovered this goddess a little over a year ago, and felt instant belonging and surprise that I hadn't heard of her before, and that I hadn't thought to go looking for such a goddess. It felt like remembering I have a mother, or something. :) A horned/antlered goddess and lady of the green... how perfect for me! I've been reading everything I can about her, and I signed up for a now-filled course offered by a priestess of Elen (Walking the Antlered Road) that includes a year of lessons, journaling, movement-meditations, soundings, chants with wrist malas, and an oracle deck. It has been amazingly exciting to get to know Elen, and to start to see how many of the goddesses I've already been drawn to are probably-to-definitely versions of her paleolithic, pan-Indo-European (and perhaps beyond) presence and enduring veneration. The Welsh name, Elen, is but one. You might be as surprised and delighted as I to discover where the others have been all this time! So I recommend Caroline Wise's book, "Finding Elen: The Quest for Elen of the Ways," as well as Elen Sentier's books, and I will be writing more about her in this blog in 2018, and suggesting the connections I have seen.
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Cailleach walks the winter hills: in an old Gaelic song 'Cailleach Beinn a' Bhric' she has 'a great grey grisly paw' and is cold and wet, but cares for her deer. The hunter who sings to her laments her keeping the deer from him. This version is from Songs & Hymns of the Gael:
I'm having my own private Stevie Wonder festival.
When I'm giving clients shamanic treatments (click here for info about them), I might listen to his music. It is so happy that it makes my spirit soar, which feeds my magic.
Or, when I'm doing physical therapy exercises, the sheer joy in Stevie Wonder's music loosens my muscles and joints, so the physical therapy is all the more effective.
