I had things to post before the end of this month and time has not been on my side! I wanted to write about Tailtiu, and Lammas, and Celtic Queens and the "queen" phase in each woman's life and in the Wheel of the Year, and perhaps even about the lunar cross-quarters, but alas. Other things have demanded my computer time.
Let me just say that the "queen" phase or face or aspect of woman and Goddess has been too long hidden. Let's get over it!
Queen? you might be asking.
What the heck is she talking about? Is this for real? A reasonable reaction. The whole concept of royalty contradicts my feminist and egalitarian values, but isn't that how life is, when you dig your hands into it? No easy divisions, no true blacks and whites? Paradox, all paradox, and our job -- to learn to live with ambivalence. And facing one set of facts, I see the queen in history, in mythology, and even in our pagan Wheel of the Year. So why pretend she isn't there?
I've made myself more comfortable with the queen concept by thinking she represents the archetype of female personal authority. She captures who women and Goddesses are and can be apart from blood mysteries and socially-gendered limitations. Women are, after all,
captains of industry,
senators,
ministers and
prime ministers. So, let's allow our paganisms to catch up with modern (and ancient) womanhood and praise her for bringing home the bacon and setting public debate. It really is possible to do that while continuing to
praise women for child-rearing and hearth-tending. (Is there a more critically important job than child-rearing?) And woman=passive? woman=receptive? Oh, puh-lease. Sometimes, some women, sure; but the same can be said for some men, sometimes, so let's get over that, too. We just don't fit in those tight male-female polarity boxes any more, so why keep pretending that we do?
As for me? I'm in my queen phase. I won't be a "young crone" for another five or six years, and I'm well beyond any possibility of birthing babies. And as for feeling pouty about not having time to blog, well, I just need to get over that, too. I've managed to find this time to write about queenhood, after a long day of finishing all the bits and pieces of my most recent work project: the redesigned, updated, and shopping-carted website of two amazing women,
Prema Dasara and Anahata Iradah, who teach sacred dance all over the world. The new site is launched today, and I'm the web magistra who made it happen. So, woohoo for Prema and Anahata, and woohoo for me! I'm self-employed and loving it! I'm the Queen of Myself.
But enough of that!
On queens in history, mythology, the Wheel of the Year, and elsewhere -- for your browsing pleasure:
- Tailtiu, Last Queen of the Fir Bolg
Lugh dedicated this festival to his foster-mother, Tailtiu, the last queen of the Fir Bolg, who died from exhaustion after clearing a great forest so that the land could be cultivated. When the men of Ireland gathered at her death-bed, she told them to hold funeral games in her honor. As long as they were held, she prophesied Ireland would not be without song. Tailtiu’s name is from Old Celtic Talantiu, "The Great One of the Earth," suggesting she may originally have been a personification of the land itself, like so many Irish goddesses. In fact, Lughnasadh has an older name, Brón Trogain, which refers to the painful labor of childbirth. For at this time of year, the earth gives birth to her first fruits so that her children might live.
(Lughnasadh, from Mara Freeman's Celtic Spirituality & Western Inner Traditions Site)
- Empress of the Universe
Xi Wang Mu, the Great Goddess of the West, is not well known in modern times, but she has been a beloved and compassionate figure in Taoist and Chinese literature, history, and mythology from the beginning. Moreover, the early Taoists clearly regarded her as the Empress of the Universe.... The earliest references to her are from the time of the Shang Dynasty (1500 - 1000 BC) which highlight her as a creator goddess who reigned alone, complete and without a consort, the source of yin and yang, prior to yin and yang, the Mother of all, a personification of the Tao -- a Creatrix.
(Xi Wang Mu, Taoist Immortals)
- The Last Reigning Monarch of the Hawaiian Islands
In 1893, Queen Liliuokalani sought to empower herself and Hawaiians through a new constitution which she herself had drawn up and now desired to promulgate as the new law of the land. It was Queen Liliuokalani's right as a sovereign to issue a new constitution through an edict from the throne. A group led by Sanford B. Dole sought to overthrow the institution of the monarchy. The American minister in Hawaii, John L. Stevens, called for troops to take control of Iolani Palace and various other governmental buildings. In 1894, the Queen, was deposed, the monarchy abrogated, and a provisional government was established which later became the Republic of Hawaii.
(Queen Lydia Liliuokalani)
- Ruling in Dual Queenship
The double female figures discussed in this book have never before been collected altogether and viewed coherently in terms of their sheer numbers, geographic distribution, and historical written references. Since many of them were originally referred to as “Double Goddess” figures in the scholarly literature, I have kept that title, believing that it dignifies and acknowledges their sacred authority. But I am also linking earlier Double Goddess figures with much later references to Amazons “ruling in dual Queenship,” and seeing their division of labor (“priestess” and “warrior”) as the functions of twin priestesses who served as religious and temporal leaders of ancient societies. I have used the words “Goddesses” and “Priestesses” and “Queens” more or less interchangeably in this book, in order to call attention to their stature, and to overcome the consistent bias that regards every high-ranking female burial as housing a “noblewoman” or the wife of a “chieftain” or “king.”
(Preface to The Double Goddess)
- Royal Power
The Queen is a mature woman who has conquered the challenges in Her life and claimed Her own royal power....Now that She is firmly rooted in Her best Self and acting for Her own benefit, She is free to reach out in ever increasing concentric circles and offer Her compassion, expertise, time, and money to people and causes that call to Her sense of response-ability.
(On The Queen of Myself)
- Something in the Way She Moves
It was one of the oddest coups d'etat in history, and nobody knows exactly how, or when, or why it happened. For centuries, the king was dominant. Then the queen surpassed him and has ruled the field ever since.
(Something in the Way She Moves)
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