The Cult of Ankou

 

Introduction
In Scythian Warfare the mounted warriors had one or several amongst their number who rode backwards and naked, painted black from head to foot. He or they would carry a pigs bladder on a pole. These men would ride headlong, so to speak, into the opposing ranks and select individuals whom they would beat across the head with the bladder.

As they rode back to their own ranks they grimaced at the enemy and poked out their tongues. The enemy often viewed this behavior with a degree of considerable alarm, borne in response to a belief system which was commonly held by both sides, even when one side was Roman. This practice has been named "counting the Kou" (possibly also related to the Persian kuh: Mountain, perhaps as a sacred hill, place of the gods and hence ka; the spirit, double etc.) and was a method employed to select the most useful spirits for captivation after death, which must have been a terrifying prospect.

Not only was it likely that one would die horribly anyway, that being the nature of classical warfare, especially against the Lords of Death, the vampiric, cannibalistic Scythians, but if one were selected (Valkyrie comes from the word ’to select’) ones soul, post mortem, was destined to become either the food of savage gods or the slave of foreign chieftains.

The poking of the tongue, also seen in medieval pictures of demons (probably inspired by these Dragon Warriors) who select capture and condemn the souls of the damned, is related directly to the symbol of the tongue as the lingham, the utterer of the Word of Law, Fate and the Pneuma or Spirit, the Ka.

These black warriors were probably the counterparts of the black Morrighans or Bruidhinas, the female judge-bards whose word was law, whose "spells’ were ’Fatal’ in the proper sense. To be struck by one of these meant certain damnation after life with no chance of avoiding the inevitable.

In a sense these warriors were male Valkyries, the dark Repha’im who, like the Morganas, did a bit of moonlighting (literally!) and doubled up as Swan Knights on their days off. The tongue pointed at one intimated that the act of ones selection was inevitable and irreversible, and meant also that your enemy, by doing this and thus "revealing his spirit" his Kou or Ka, after taking your own, considered you to be no threat at all. Is it any wonder that the church drew upon such images to populate their demonologies?

It seems entirely appropriate to model the fiends of the pit (OFr. Kou) of Hell upon such terrifying characters who claimed to be able to take the fallen warrior’s very soul, having first tortured the body briefly but nevertheless unspeakably in life, on a field of battle that must have seemed to the observer to be the opening up of Hades itself.

It was in such battle conditions that the entire Roman Ninth Legion, after crossing the Antonine Wall were utterly defeated, eaten and one suspects, spiritually enslaved by the Pictish Scythians of Caledonia. Not one Roman escaped the carnage.

Related to the word Ankh are; Anjou, Angouleme, Anschau, Ankou. The cult of the Ankou or Ankh: Consonant migration - This can take place with the change in phonetic accentuation, regional pronunciation, changes in fashion, the vocalization of the words by non-native speakers and the copying of manuscripts by foreign scholars or the scribes of subsequent generation.

In this case it appears that the original word Ankh has developed into Anjou via a linguistic path influenced by Goidelic. Spelt ’Ankh’ the H in Gaelic would have become aspirant which would have been pronounced Ank-Huh or Ankuh. Verbally the K became mistaken for a hard G, giving Anguh. In due course the G became non-Goidelic and soft, as in ’germ’ and, with the emergence of the letter J as a softer variant of the soft G, the Word Ankh, via Ankhu, Ankou and Angou (as in Angouleme) became Anjou.

The cult of the Ankou in Brittany and Anjou, the cult of the Spirit of the An, derivatively therefore the cult of the Dragon’s Breath, prior to its introduction to the continent, is asserted to have been of immediate British origin, although it was strongly represented in the Island now known as Ireland in pre-christian times, where it was probably originally introduced first by the Egyptian Princess Scota, the wife of the governor (or king) of the Red Sea nome, Niall of Scythia (see charts).

It is said that it was introduced into Brittany during one of the migrations from Albany in the first millennium AD. Described as a cult of the dead, the rites and symbols associated with the characters who were claimed or appear to be its royal priests and priestesses reveal that it was also a cult of blood and death, as well as ancestor veneration. In lowland Scotland the spoken tongue was Northern Cymric and in this language ’angev’, it is said, is one of the words used to describe death, possibly suggesting ’going to the Dragon’, the Church’s ’Devil’.

It is significant linguistically because the later house of Plantagenet were called the Angevin Kings, emphasizing, along with the name Angouleme, the consonant migration described above and adding some veracity to the Angevin claim that they were descended from the Devil.

"We who came from the devil must needs go back to the Devil. Do not deprive us of our heritage, we cannot help acting like devils"

- Richard Coeur de Lyon.

Or, as the Monkish sponsor of the Knight Templars, St. Bernard of Clairvaux put it when describing the Angevins - "De Diabolo Venit Et Ad Diabolum Ibit".

The syllable Ang in Angev is also to be found in Angel and derives from the Greek aggelos - aggelos which is reminiscent of Agg or Ygg, the Odin priest as an angel, a Repha’im or priest of Nergal. Freja, as a goddess of the Earth and the underworld, was the proud owner of a Heron or Crane-skin bag and a Merlin feathered cloak which Odin was oft wont to cadge from her from time to time, making him a Merlin figure and linking her to the sacred and sinister bird of the druids. One of the explanations for the name of the Fir Bolg was "Bag Men". Related to the Crane-Skin Bag, the Fir Bolg are Merlins or Druids and thus Fir ’Bog’, "Men of God"

The Merlin itself was described as a "bird without a nest", a solitary wanderer in exactly the same sense as was the magical boar, "Le Solitaire". The boar as the ’The Hermit’, the solitary archdruid, the lonely wanderer, is the Merlin who likewise ranges alone, thus indicating that Merlins, Odins and Archdruids were synonymous.

On the island of Delos the dance of the labyrinth was called Geranos, the "dance of the Crane" and is suggestive of the druidic ritual of ’Crane pointing’ as a form of related magical observance. The Crane dance, known in Britain as the "Dance of Troy", was also performed by the Ostiak peoples of Siberia up until the 18th century and was so-called because they wore Crane skin clothing for the occasion.

Principally the Ankh or Ankou in Brittany was described as being a collateral cult of the Morrighan which was particularly prominent in the Breton coastal regions. As such this would suggest that the Ankou had some influence upon the Armorican cult of the Ferryman of the Dead, particularly as Morgana herself is associated with the Swan Barge of Avallon, which transported the dead Mordred to his final resting place in the sacred grove.

In Eire the Cult of Ankou was associated with Sidhe mounds, Raths, hills and Barrows, and hence labyrinths. Known as Mari in the Basque region and associated with the Morias or fates, Ankou was the original model for the Black Madonnas there. The goddess Ankou, Black Annis, was derived from the Greek ’Anku-Kis’ who was a form of the earlier Egyptian Goddess of the underworld - Anu Ket. In the Semitic-Ugaritic texts found in Ras Shamra in 1928, Ankou is called Anat, a witch goddess and regeneratrix who shape-shifted into the form of the Morrighan or Morgana, a black predatory bird.

We are here in the presence of ’An’ the ancient Dragon Mother who is both a sustainer and a reaper, a phoenix figure whose Raven like attributes link her to the Kershalyi and Locolico of the first dragon homeland of Transylvania. In Breton churches her priestess Morgana is portrayed as a wouivre or double-tailed mermaid or dragoness and in this respect she is identical with another Priestess, Ygraine.

The Cult of the Ankh or Ankou was the Court of the Dragon of Ankh-fn-Khonsu and his successor Sobekhnefru, whose most sacred inner symbol, historically, was the winged Orobouros with a pendant Greek cross; the Ankh of Nin-Kursag or Hathor, and her daughter Innana or Venus. In tracing the history of one, via Egypt to its ancient Sumerian roots, we inevitably therefore recount the story of the other. They are, therefore, the same thing and represent The realm of the Dead (or more pertinently, precisely and poetically "The Undead"):

• Tir N’an Og

• Elysium

• Drakenberg

• Lothlorien

• The Court of the Kingdom of Elphame

• The Grove of the Swan Maidens

• Hall of the Dragon Lords of the Rings,

• Repha’im or Rapha Elohim, named after Raphael who, in the Koran is the reaper and summoner of the dead and corresponds to Waite’s Tarot card ’Judgement’

Later on, following Ygraine, the fairy Melusine of Anjou who descended from her, was also portrayed in this manner as a wouivre, especially and also in medieval religious architecture. Related to this theme, in the cathedral of Le Mans on the Anjou-Maine border near Rennes, there is a carving of two serpent tailed doves, called Serpilions and derived from the Persian ’Smenda’. Another representation of the Dragon is the serpent necked Swan.

The dove is sacred to Venus and is particularly associated with the Virgin Mary Magdalene, whose name ’Magdala’ means the place of doves, e.g. the temple of the cult of Hathor or Venus - Ishtar. In Albany the ’place of doves’ was Camlann or Camelot and the association with Morgana and Melusine and the Ladies of Avallon, and thus the priestesses of the cult of the Ankh (of Hathor or Venus), is apparent.

The Ankh of Hathor, according to Gettings, is generally believed to be the source for the astrological symbol of her daughter Inanna or Venus, whose magical colour is that of Elphame. Further to which, Emma Jung reminds us that when the Grail appears as a ’stone’, it is presented on a green silk cloth, which reasserts the link between the stone and the emerald of Venus.

The colour green in alchemy is the Benedicta Viriditas, the colour of the Holy Spirit or Sophia, the wisdom gained by the hero who, on completing the "quest for the Holy Grail", is awarded the Green Cloak or Greenmantle. Green Stags (The Robin Hoods) are one of the Grail badges or totems of the lords of the forest which entered heraldry in the armorial achivements of some families. The Green Stag amongst other things represents the transcendent king, the fairy lord of the forest, blessed of a fairy queen. Stags drinking from Grail Chalices are quite common subjects for bas relief sculpture.

The links to Green as the Elven Colour are obvious and indicate

a)   that the Holy Spirit is immanent within Nature or the Cosmos, i.e that the universe and god are One Being and

b)   that the Fairies already possess the Holy Spirit of God by virtue of blood and birth, not through the consent of some priest.

Therefore they are naturally eternal beings and in no need of forgiveness of sin, because they, the sons of the Repha’im as the true Children of God, don’t and can’t commit any sin.

The Key of Life
It can be asserted that the fairy or dragon cult of the Goddess Ankou, although not originating there was, in any event, maintained in Albany, where Morgana was born and was ritually active. Having established this it is likely that the later kingdom of Anjou, formerly known as Pictavia, derived its name from a priest or priestess or court of the Ankh which settled there from the Breton coast.

If this was Melusine, the founder of the Pictavian House of Anjou, then Melusine would have been known as ’Melusine d’Ankou’ or ’Melusine of the cult of the Ankh’ prior to moving to there. That in itself is almost certain, as it would be for the other Avallonian princesses, but the idea that she actually founded the kingdom itself is not, as the realm of the Anjou, as stated, was passed down by inheritance it seems, from the reigning Vere Tigherna ’Vortigern’ to the grandson of Merlin Emrys III; Guy de Marys, who was already a prominent figure in Breton legend.

Guy de Marys, reputedly a Vere ancestor, was also know as Kai, Cai or Kay, the latter spelling meaning both Quay and Key, in relation to which the Ankh was called both the Key of the Nile and the Key of Life. Guy was a merlin and a druid or magus, specifically a bard of the golden bough who descended to Hades, by classical Greek description and definition, and as stated, he would have been a revealer (anschau) and binder of mysteries. As a "spell" master, a binder and loosener of lives, a male Fata or Mori, one of the Fairy Race.

The presence of the cult in Brittany, suggests that the Anjou or Ankou, as the otherworld kingdom of the dead, was moved as a rite, from northern Pictavia to southern Pictavia in Gaul where it gave its name to a region which then became its cultic kingdom, years before either Morgana or Melusine were born.

It is more likely therefore that Emrys II - Ambrosius Aurelius - introduced the cult to the region when he decamped to Brittany sometime after the defeat of Rhydderch, which would then help to explain Melusine’s later presence there.

She is said to have fled to Gaul from Northumbria with her Dragon Court, after the ritual killing of her father in the same manner that Morgana killed Merlin. (Elinus’ spirit was later deified, it would seem, and given symbolic gift offerings of milk, after a manner associated with the live "dragons" who were given the semen or "milk", and the blood of maidens; and were thought to inhabit caves, or labyrinths, throughout Europe).

However it was unthinkable that a royal pictish princess would flee and wander through someone else’s kingdom unannounced, as this could be construed as an act of invasion and war. Such a story seems to be a later justification of her presence there.

But as a priestess of the Ankou in Scottish Pictavia she would have been welcome in the other land known as Pictavia, where her cousin Rainfroi, the third great grandson of Ambrosius, reigned as the Archdruid of the Golden Bough, the hereditary, ritual king of the dead. As it is they, both patricides, were destined to marry, which would strengthen the dynasty, and thus the migration was a planned event. In any case the cult, with its ancient Irish associations predates Vortigern, and we should be looking farther back still for its origins.

Essentially the British-Gallic Cult of the Ankou, is related to a symbol sacred to Horus’ supposed wife: Hathor-Venus, and to Isis and Nephthys - the Ankh. These deities appear to be related to each other in the same triple goddess configuration found in the rest of Europe and the Levant. The draconian Ankou cult is a regional variant therefore, perhaps the origin, of the Greek cult of Persephone as described in the foregoing essay on the labyrinth. (Isis and Nephthys are also both, amongst other things, goddesses of the dead).

In the Funerary Cult of Egypt, the nobility employed Ka-Priests to tend the dead. This is linked to a strong thread of ancestor veneration which is also found in Scythian culture. Though the Faiyum Labyrinth has long since been reclaimed by the sands, the massive labyrinth complex of funerary palaces in the 25-26th dynasty necropolis standing next to the temple of Hatshepsut in Deir el-Bahari is still in existence. At the centre of the complex is situated the sacred sanctuary which has an adjoining cell which is commonly recognized as the utmost Holy of Holies, the singular feature of which is the carved Ankh Cross which dominates its facing wall.

In the ’Papyrus of Ani’ dated 1300bc, Isis and Nephthys are depicted as standing either side of the Ankh and holding aloft, above its loop, the solar disc which relates to the Sephiroth of Kether, also called the Ajna Chakra, symbolized by the ’thousand petalled lotus’. This lotus in Egypt was associated with the psychotropic Nile Lily; and the generic symbol of the lily in all its national variations, was associated with the Grail and Dragon Families. The subject of the lily will be studied in some detail later on.

In pre-christian Gaul it appears on the carved heads of chieftains whose effigies were incorporated into architectural columns and at a very early period Prior to its adoption by the committee of Paris, the lily or ’Fleur de Lys’ (Fleur de Luce or Flower of Light; Flavia Anderson) was the badge of the early Kingdom of Anjou. The shape of the fleur de lys seems to have been influenced, in its present form, by a very important Gallic magical rune which was within a group of symbols derived from, or related to, the prototype of the Ankh.

The lines of the fleur de lys’ basic structure pass through two planes and two angles to form a St Andrews Cross overlaid upon a Greek Cross in the manner employed to create the Norse binding runes. From the evolution of this figure it is thought that the Chirho was developed as a later form of the Ankh.

This eight armed cross appears in the Canary islands cut into the bottom of the bowl recesses which were carved into the top of stones outside sacred caves, duplicating the concept of the cup and ring stones one can find throughout Britain.

As was the case in the offerings made to Melusine’s father outside the cave in Northumbria, in the Canary Islands milk was also poured into these depressions and left to trickle away down the side of the monolith. The eight armed figure was believed by the islanders to be sacred to Isis, the virginal High Priestess of Waite’s alchemical Tarot, and it was said to be her "milk", the dew of the fleur de lys or rosicrucis, that flowed from the eight armed cross to form the milky way, the spiral vortex or labyrinth of the "cosmic" dragon, the Orouborus which features in the cross of the Dragon Court.

The fleur de lys itself is so configured as to contain within it both the Ankh and the Chi Rho. The figure of the fleur de lys, as a Gallic rune, comprises in the Norse of Nyd as +, an equal armed cross meaning both need and death, Gifu as X meaning union and Wyn as a loopless P meaning victory.

Translated, this forms the ritual process encapsulated in the rite of the labyrinth. The P lost its loop during symbol migration, a phenomenon documented by the Count d’Alviella in his book ’The Migration of Symbols’, some components of which I will draw upon later and reproduce the figures for.

In essence there are several related crosses that, although thought to have developed from each other serially, belong to a very ancient group of symbols employed within the royal Dragon culture within which the rites associated with central mortuary theme of the cult of the Ankou form an integral and timeless component which is well known.

The Sacred An
The Chi Rho, is the symbol for the symbol for the Swan Knights, is developed from the Ankh itself which in turn forms the basis for the fleur de lys. In Melusine’s time the field of lilies, the arms of Anjou, represented the Pictish virgin princesses coveted by other dynasties, which are the lilies featured in the earlier Song of Solomon.

These lilies or Anjous/Ankhous/Ankh maidens, sacred to the various Goddesses mentioned herein, are the Bruidhinas, the Morrigan/Valkyries and Swan princesses of the Dragon Dynasty which the Swan Knights were sworn to protect. Their symbol IS the Chi Rho Ankh which, instead of just representing the XP, the first letters of the name of Christ the Man, latterly conceals the true nature and gender of the Christos itself, which is of the rtu of the Ankh, the Goddess.

Consequently the Chi Rho itself is a female Dragon symbol related to both Morgana and Melusine, as well as all the other Ladies of the Lake, mermaids, naiads, nixes, virgin priestesses and so forth. The earlier history of the Chi Rho, the Ankh and the Haegl rune which forms the fleur de lys can be found in the development of Mesopotamian cuneiform from earlier Sumerian pictograms.

In Sumerian the symbol represents ’An’ : The Star. The star pictogram later became cuneiform with the wedges forming the ends of the top branch or ray, and the subsequent three rays going down the left hand flank of the glyph. At this stage the symbol came to represent the ’Heavens’ and its final cuneiform representation was as an equal armed cross with a wedge at the end of the top ray and two wedges on the left arm which represented the gods. This figure is close to variant representations of the Ankh in medieval black magic where the top arm is an enlarged triangle whilst the other arms have smaller wedge ends.

The common translation of the word Christ is "anointed one". Libatio, from the root libare, meaning ’to taste’, ’to pour’ (as Mary of Bethany is said to have anointed Christ) is however, closely related to this concept. Libare is related to the Greek leibein, to pour, drop by drop, translated as ’to pour out (wine etc.) in honour of a god’ OED.

Wine is not uniquely specified, but any liquid; meaning that Libare and Libatio are not solely confined to the act of the libation of wine to a god. It has been suggested that some Greeks would argue that ’Christos’ meant gold and that would then intimate that the idea of anointing, in relation to the Grail, was derivative and attributive.

In the Greek Orthodox Bible Christ is described as the ’Golden One’ from crusos - Crusos - Gold; rather than cristos Cristos - To anoint. Here we are back to Christ as the ’red-gold’ flow, an anointing or libation of virgin blood of the Labrus or Labia. Libare is also related to Liber or Bacchus the god of "wine" and here we are reminded of the later christian doctrine of transubstantiation and their substitute of wine for blood.

In Mithraism the blood of the bull was poured from above onto the supplicants as an anointing chrism and a libatory eucharist drink, and so the idea of libation solely being TO a god is incorrect, as often the gods, or indeed the goddesses’ blood, was shed as both an anointing and libation for their flock. Further on we will encounter ’anointing’ not as Christos, but as murizein - murizein which has its own surprises.

Jesus’ surname is ben Panther, meaning the Leopard, which is the totem steed of both Bacchus and Diana and is repeated in the arms of the House of Plantagenet as three (originally one) heraldic leopards ’Or’ on a field ’Gules’ or three golden leopards on a field of blood. The archaic spelling for Leopard is Libard and this night stalking animal is renowned for drinking the blood of its victims prior to eviscerating and consuming the carcass. Here again is a variant of the word Libare and quite a pertinent one at that, as again blood becomes a Libation associated with Christ the son of the Libard, as the anointed anointer, the libater, the initiator.

Christianity is substantively a prime example of the reversal of libation and in this it attempts to mimic earlier Bacchanalian ritual. Royal anointing in post Carolingian christian ritual, where the oil of the chrism (representing the Holy Spirit) and the vatican’s right to use it to create kings from peasants and merchants, also by transubstantiation one assumes, is treated as though it were delivered in obedience to the will of God by proxy through his chosen priesthood, who intended it to take the place of royal blood in the veins.

It is suspected that the etymology of the name Christ was tampered with in order to accommodate this anointing ritual and to derive the usurped social power that attends upon it. Along with the service of communion this is another catholic version of reverse libation with blessings being showered upon the grateful by a beneficent priesthood.

Libare is related, via ’to taste’, to labia - lips and libant means ’tasting’ or ’touching lightly’, obviously with the lips. Related to Libare we will remember Bacchus and Liber; as the tree to which he was crucified and which gave blood red wine that liberated the spirit and taught it dark knowledge and ancient law. Lake or Del Acqs, sometimes written as Lac represents the lily and the rose: The Roman dye "Lac": The crimson flow, and Lac or Lactose: The white "milk" of the maidens. Within the cellular and genetic fabric of these substances was retained the Ankh’a or Ka of the An, the Holy Spirit and power of the Dragon Gods - the ka of the An: The soul of the Heavens.

The crimson flow and the ’milk and honey’ (Nectar or Ambrosia; cf. the name of three generations of Merlins above) of the priestesses can be adequately and correctly described as their sacrificial libation, the "blood of the Christos" shed for the remission of sins (Hebrew: ’Sin’ - "falling short of the mark"; perceptual blindness, the living death).

The spurting of "milk" relates to La Fontaine de Soif, so called because it "sprays out", like a fountain, from the cubic stone. This symbolism is derived from the ejaculatory propensity of the Graffenberg gland which ejects its seminal fluid, the sacred ’milk and honey’ or nectar, like a jet.

Poured onto the Ankh figure in the cup stone by the sacred cave or labyrinth, the substitute milk of Isis is not symbolic breast milk but an allegory for her seminal fluid, inundating the symbolic vulva, the Ankh, from whence it originates. It should also be noted, however, that breast milk itself contains Telomerase, a sort of bicycle puncture repair kit for infant DNA. One is supposed to see a connection here, I think.

The Ankou cult and the ancient form of the Ankh is therefore associated with caves and thus labyrinths and with the holy female essence. Both Morgana and Melusine of Anjou or Ankhou are closely associated with such elements, as High Priestesses and ritual representatives, in a line of succession which goes back through the Pictish Fairy Princesses or swan Maidens, beyond Sobekhnefru and the Egyptian Ankh Goddesses to the Sumerians and Babylonians, whose goddesses Ast (Isis) Nebt-Hat (Nephthys), Nin-Kursag (Hat-Hor) and Lilith, from whom Melusine, Morgana and the Ladies of the Lake are descended, all bear the W symbol which forms the loop of the Ankh, which was first entrusted to the god Thoth, who was the Sumerian Nin.Gish.Zi.Da: The Lord of the Artifact of Life, son of Enki and Eresh Kigal (Persephone-Demeter).

Likewise Magdalene, the daughter of the Jireh Priest of the Temple of Jerusalem was a Priestess of this lineage and the matriarch of the Ankh Priestesses in Albany. Known as a Scarlet woman, she was so-called because of the colour of the Lac-dyed ceremonial robes she wore as a senior officiate, the blood tincture indicating her ritual obligation.

The term Scarlet Woman became associated with prostitutes because Magdalene, as a temple priestess, in her relationship to Jesus as a Pharaonic, Dragon Messiah or God-King, fulfilled the role of the goddess Hathor or the Judaic Astaroth, the Sabbath or Matronit in the esoteric, Kabalistic aspects of Jewish spiritual philosophy.

This role involved her in forms of ritual "congress" or Enthea, of the type specified in the Song of Solomon, which are also found in the Tantric Kaula Vama Marg and repeated later by the Avallonese Virgins of the Holy Blood.

Astaroth was the Goddess of the Shekinah, the divine presence of The Eternal within the Solomonic Temple of Jerusalem. To the early Gnostics she was recorded as representing the Sophia or Holy Spirit, the (feminine) principle of Divine Wisdom. Later Astaroth (a denizen of the Devil in the medieval demonologies) continued to be recognized by the Cathar christians as a symbol of the Holy Spirit and during Jesus’ life, Astaroth was therefore manifest in the person of Magdalene as Christ’s consort in accordance with Apocryphal doctrines, in much the same way that Ishtar, Matronit and Lilith, as early priestesses of the Shekinah began as the consorts of Enki, Enlil, the Dragon God-Kings and later Jehovah.

In this Mary too, fulfilled the role of the Anunnaki blood mothers who fed the Dragon God-Kings. As the physical embodiment of Astaroth, the Sophia or Shekinah, within the Egyptian Therapeutate she was Hathor-Venus, whose cross derived from the Ankh, and as Ishtar, the morning and evening star, she personified "war" in the mornings (Seratonin) and "love" in the evenings (Melatonin).

After Ishtar’s example the progeny of the Anunnaki dynasty, the Rephaim or Angels, who became the Elven, Dragon Maidens and Knights of Albany, Eire and Gaul, fulfilled two roles, that of destroyers and reapers, and that of divine lovers and healers.

Under the patronage of Ishtar or her mother - Hathor (Nin-Kursag) of the Ankh or Ankhou, (and later, under two of the principal Astaroth matriarchs, Magdalene of the Green Dress and Anna, her grand daughter, who migrated to Albany and married into the collateral Pendragon dynasty), the Rephaim of Pictavia and Eire, were both the Swan Princesses; vessels of the benedicta viriditas, and the Morganas and Valkyries, the Priestesses of the Ankou and the Guardians of the cult of Blood and Death.

In this way the Cult of the Ankhou gained a collateral line which descended through the posterity of the Druidic families to the Mistletoe Bards and Priestesses. From the ’Letter to Ceretius’ we know that Jesus performed a sacred role as the central figure within the circle dances that, in conjunction with his secret teachings and his rituals of initiation (Morton Smith), he conducted at night.

In the ’Letter’ Jesus is recorded as saying at one nighttime gathering "The Eight Are With Us". These are the Egyptian Ogdoad or eight Great Spirits of Gnosticism which are also found in Taoism. The Eight Spirits are the second wave of creators (after the Cosmic Twins) that appeared tilling on the sacred mountain of the "rising land" that emerged after the flood.

They appear in an illustration in the ’Book of the Dead’ of Khensumose: Third Intermediate Period, 21st dynasty circa 1075 - 945 bce. Evidence for the existence of this belief prior to the pre-Ptolomeic period is derived from its worship site at Hermopolis whose ’Eight Town’ quarter existed at the time of the Fifth Dynasty: 2498 - 2345 bce.

’The Eight’ when reflected upon in relation to Ubaid or Sumerian tradition represent the Anunnaki, the original gods of Egypt salvaging the remains of their civilization after the Black Sea inundation. The story has been transposed to Egypt, like so many stories travel with their tribes, and becomes the creation myth of the pharaohs.

The Ogdoad, also found in China as we have noted, are some of the sons and daughters of Enki-Samael (Ptah) and Ninkhursag (Hat-Hor). Enki sired Ningal from Ninkhursag, and Eresh Kigal from Ningal, it would appear. Eresh Kigal, mother of Lilith, gave birth to eight deities - Abu, Nintulla, Ninsutu, Ninkashi, Nazi, Azimua, Nintu and Enshag; (Sitchin). That Jesus, as an initiate, invokes them, suggests that he had a firm Egyptian, gnostic ritual background which has its origins in Dragon kingship, manifesting itself later in medieval witchcraft.

This reinforces and supports an argument for the role of Jesus’ wife as his Priestess of Hathor-Astaroth and points to her lineage becoming a contributive bloodline to the pre-existent cult of the Ankou in Albany and Pictavia.

It is significant that the Ogdoad are also known in Scandinavia, where they are called the Aia. The Norse have a diagram of the sacred mound as a square which also shows the compass points and the migration of the eight tribes of the Gods from the Holy Mountain. Professor Douglas Adams of Idaho University has demonstrated that the i or y may be substituted by an s as in Arsi-Cantu becoming Aryi-Cantu, which would give us Aia as Asa and thus Aesir and Aes Dan or Aes d’An (Arya of Anu).

This is of some interest because people are used to having the Anunnaki presented as a small council of deities, when in fact they were a race of people who were still known as the Anukim in Canaan in 1200 bce, 760 years after Enlil’s Anunnaki court had apparently fled Babylon in 1960 bce. Corroborating the Migration myths of the Danaan in the Irish Liebhar Gabhala, the Aia migration glyph suggests that eventually at least one of the tribes of the Anunnaki settled in the north, whilst another, the Danaan, headed west following "a flood".

The location of the sacred mound would then seem not necessarily to have been Egypt but, given the broad dispersal of the Ogdoad story, it would probably have been a site from where the gods originally migrated, the most obvious location of which is Aryan Scythia, near the Black Sea region. It is quite possible that the time frame for this migration was 4000 bce, when the Bosphorus collapsed and the Ubaid fled south to Sumeria. Later they became the gods of Egypt and it is feasible that the story of the "tilling of the sacred mound" migrated there with the Anunnaki - Ubaid deities.

Venal or Venal?
The druids welcomed the Culdee into Britain as brothers in spirit and fellow druids. Columba called Jesus a Druid ( of the order of Magi) and the links between primal christianity and druidism are quite apparent. Jesus, (a harrower of hell like Orpheus-Bacchus) Odin and Theseus were born in caves and, like Merlin and Elinus, Jesus was buried in one, in a garden which was arguably a Necromaniton, or druidic sacred grove with a funerary cell. Mary Magdalene was initiated into the Egyptian Therapeutate by Jesus.

She was twelve at the time and he was, according to the Bible, about thirty years old. The ritual employed was similar to that in which Lazarus partook, in that it involved symbolic death and resurrection. See Luke 8: vs 41- 56. Following her initiation and during the period of her early adolescence, as was common practice, Mary would have acted as Jesus’ handmaiden or grail priestess.

Botticelli’s ’Birth of Venus’ is described by Graham-Dixon as an analogy of the Virgin Mary. In the depiction of the red-haired Venus however, there is a supposed sexual analogy represented in the various folds of fabric and hair which are arranged by the painter to suggest the vulva which remains covered by her modesty. It isn’t likely that the darling of the Roman Church would have been depicted in this manner. Botticelli wouldn’t have got away with it in a period when Gallileo was being threatened with death for suggesting that the earth was an orbiting sphere. One could do virtually anything with the Magdalene however.

Common sense would, in any case, suggest that the Mary depicted was in fact the Magdalene and that the painting was a deliberate though esoteric attempt to record what was commonly known about her race, her position and her function, amongst alchemists and Rosicrucians during the Renaissance period. The suggestive folds were made in red cloth festooned with flowers and here we might have an intimation of the spiritual fertility of the vulva in menstruus.

Inasmuch as commentators have stated that Magdalene was a sacred prostitute or priestess of Ishtar (daughter of Hathor), this can be explained by this particular phase of her spiritual life where a certain type of congress, a secret outside the Cult, would have led to her being suspected of being a prostitute in some orthodox Jewish opinion, not being at the time married. It is very probable however, that the so-called rites of Venus she ritually engaged in with the Messiah have been confused with other definitions of the word venal, which pertains not only to sex, but to payment for any service or goods.

The confusion between the words Venus and Venal has led to the error where it was thought that Magdalene was a prostitute, who was "paid" for "Venal" services. In the Egyptian tradition of Jesus’ ancestor Solomon however, Mary - a priestess of the rites of Hathor within the Egyptian Therapeutate - would, like Sheba, have been a young Shunnamite, a donor of womb blood and the ’Water of Life’, a Lily of the Valley and a Rose of Sharon.

After Jesus death, Magdalene went to the cell and found it open. Rather, I would argue that in accordance with the traditional ritual that accompanied her station, she was expected to stay in the cell and commune with the Ka of Jesus in the underworld.

Few people actually knew the real reason why she went and the reason people might have assumed would have been expected of a Priestess of an Egyptian Cult. In Celtic countries and in Egypt this was common practice, as in the cases where it has been demonstrated that tombs had living quarters in them.

That she went to heal him of his non fatal wounds was a secret known only to an initiated few, in whose number the apostles, it seems, were not counted. In any case she was the first to "see" him, and in this she fulfils precisely the role of the Sibyl or shamanka, the druidess of Cumae, Medea of the Golden Fleece, Ariadne, and numerous other females, including the witch of Endor.

In Revelation 22: v.16

Jesus, clothed as a Repha’im proclaims himself the Root and Branch of David, the Bright and Morning Star.

Amongst other things, including being the Priest-King of Lucifer, Jesus also proclaims himself as a High Priest of Hathor, who is the mother of Ishtar, Astaroth, Shekinah, Sophia and Venus, the Star of the Morning. It becomes increasingly difficult to see Mary Magdalene therefore as anything less than a central character in a collateral druidic cult of the dead, a priestess of the Ankou of Ishtar.

In such a capacity, as with the various cave dwelling shamankas in mythology, she would have acted in a twofold role both as a visionary and also as a guide and companion, a facilitator whose blood allowed access to the underworld or Cosmic Consciousness.

Her essence and elan was the Dergflaith of sovereignty, the pomegranate wine of Persephone that gained the Bard of the Golden Bough, the Hero of Mythology, entrance to the land of Elphame, the Kingdom of Ankou. In this ritual capacity, Morgana, Melusine and La Filles du Lac et la Fonteine; followed her example and demonstrated a lineal descent as living goddesses, from at least one of the Ankh cults of antiquity.

In the bible the narrator says that a sword will separate the quick from the dead. The sword is the Spirit and the spirit, as we have seen, is also symbolized by the tongue, and by fire. In Latin a sword sheath is called a vaginum. It is the use of the "sword" which separates the quick, the living spirits; (the Elves), from the dead or the dead in life. In other words it is the rite of the Maiden, the "christos of salvation" that gives life.

References to the Sword as the Holy Spirit in the bible include Revelations 1: v.16

"Out of his mouth went a sharp, two edged sword....in his hand he held Seven Stars", said to represent the seven churches of Asia

(It is interesting to note the association here between Bacchus and the Pleiades).

In John of Patmos’ vision, the Alpha and Omega figure: Jesus, is dressed in the garb of an Angel or Repha’im.

Hebrews 4: v.12 "The ’word’ (pneuma/spirit) of God is a two edged sword".

Ephesians 6: v.17 "Take the helmet of salvation and the Sword of the Spirit".

The story of the pentecost relates that the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples like "tongues of fire" and this is a symbol which, connected to the foregoing, is especially relevant in relation to the Dragon, whose fiery breath is a symbol of the Holy Spirit, the "Word" of God, the Torah; or the Law of Destiny determining the progress of mankind’s fate.

The sword is an Ankh symbol with the blade representing the tongue, the guard represents the grail dish or womb, the spiraled grip symbolizes the spinal column and the pommel (from Fr. la Pomme, the little apple) represents the pineal and its chakra.

In the medieval Grimoire ’The Clavicula Salomanis’ the guard of the magical sword is constructed of two crescent moons back to back. The sheathed sword symbolizing Peace, represents hierogamy and balance, oneness and union.

The story of Arthur and the Sword in the Stone is translated by some to mean that Arthur became king because he knew how to extract iron from stone. As smithing was a part of alchemy and thus a kings science, it followed for some scholars that in order to become king, Arthur would need to convince people that he knew where iron came from.

The iron age had been extant for over a thousand years before the druids thought this story up. In a pre-industrialized society that depended on iron for everything and where nearly every moderately sized village had a smithy, Arthur would have already known how to extract iron from rocks and other people would have known that Arthur knew. The age of secret metal magic had long since passed by his time.

The Sword-Stone tale operates on two levels of organic, not metallurgic, alchemy and refers to the enthea resulting in transcendence, resulting in sovereignty. The stone is both the cubic stone of the Ankh Goddess- Priestess and the Lia Fail, the stone of destiny, a representative symbol of the macrocosmic cubic stone of the Earth as the anthropomorphized Goddess of Sovereignty.

The sword is both the tongue in the first instance and the Sword symbol of derivative integrity, cosmic consciousness and resultant personal sovereignty in the second. From such personal sovereignty comes the wisdom and creativity to administer the sovereignty of the nation, thus qualifying Arthur to be a king.

That he fluffed the job in the end is another matter. Even Goddesses have off days. They’re only human after all. The sword in the stone says that sovereignty rises from the womb of the Grail Maiden, the virgin Dragon Princess.

The Sword as Tongue implies the method by which sovereignty is obtained. Elsewhere the pendant T bar of the Ankh glyph corresponds to Tau, the Law and more precisely, the utterer of the Law, the Hindu Lingham or in Hebrew, the tongue of the Repha’im, the fairy Bruidhe Bard in Gaelic, whose spells, or words of cosmic law, bound men’s fate and, like the Morrighan warrior or valkyrie, represented the Holy Spirit.

In the foregoing examples the symbolism sometimes tends to overlap because of the adaptation of the glyphs over the passing centuries. Pure symbols like the ankh naturally evolve to become more complex with the addition of other components, whilst still retaining the originals, which can double up sometimes, as in the case of the addition of the T to the W. On its own the T is already the lingham and yoni combined. Add this to the W as the womb, and the symbol becomes reinforced, as in the following breakdown.

To qualify the T component we have to separate this symbol into two parts. Being specific, the upright corresponds to the tongue as utterer whilst the crossbar, anciently dish-shaped like the new moon, represents the womb or uterus, also the utterer.

The Tau was given to the priest-king by the womb. He passed it on as spells or laws, with the tongue which drank the wisdom of the cosmic law from that womb. The cup/dish and stone, the moon or womb and pineal in this instance; being held by a statue of Melchizadec, is situated outside the door of Chartres Cathedral, along with a figure of the Magdalene, which comes as no surprise.

The Tau symbol can be found in Scandinavia associated with Tir, the God of Law and Judgment whose rune became in this century, the familiar crow’s foot or upright arrow. The Tir mark was specifically the property of the king whose word was binding on all and so the Tau or Tir element of the Ankh is, like the Omega from which it feeds, a royal symbol, intimating again the holy- sacral nature of the Grail ritual.

The symbol of the Chi Rho of these swan princesses, as a derivative, later form of the Ankh, was known before Christ Jesus’ lifetime, as was the IHS of Bacchus, whose story is connected here via the Ankh Cross as a crucifix.
 

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