Madroñeando el otoño, and food-related existential questions

Listening to: 15, Saycet

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Why are there no dry lentils in Belgium? Nor chickpeas, for that matter. And no chard. Why is there no chard? And no more frozen artichokes. Odd. There were artichokes once, but no more. So where’d they go to? Emigrated for the summer and haven’t yet come back?

And why does pecorino (sheep milk cheese) nearly only happen in the southern parts of Europe? (and it’s good, oh my, is it good).

I got the coolest book, though. Alan Davidson’s Oxford’s Companion to Food. FOOD, actually. Capitalized. It deserves the capital letters, hands down.

If I get the oven into working shape, I’ll do this. As I promised this morning, J, I’ll practise my dessert-baking skills for that promised dinner… (D-lass, we’ve decided that we’re storming your house and begging your mom to bake some apfelstrüdel, so be prepared).

The coolest thing I’ve learnt of late in the middle of TMP research is the existence of an iris, Iris graminea, which has “a reddish-purple flower” which smells of plums. Now how cool is that? I must get at least one of those plum-scented flowers…

In the picture: Arbutus unedo, aka corbezzolo, aka madroño, aka strawberry tree. They look more like cherries than strawberries if you ask me, but there you go. Ericaceae. Slightly inebriating fruit when fermented, sweet and tasty (at least I like it). There are so many funny-looking Arbutus unedo lookalikes in some of El Bosco’s paintings that Felipe II used “madroño” as an identificative for El Jardín de las Delicias when he sent it to El Escorial. Btw, its biogeography is kinda crazy: Mediterranean, and a tiny corner of southern Ireland, can’t remember if east or west. And I gotta think up a recipe for cous cous with this xD

Sidenotes to TMP {II}

Listening to: I’m Ready, Bryan Adams

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Light is pearly here, in the north. After a (very, very happy :D) wedding reunion, it’s time to work again (or stroll around Paris, for the lucky ones among us *arches eyebrow*). It’s TMP time, again!

I confess I didn’t know soybean products were used in explosives (Prance and Nesbitt, 2005). Or that Coca-cola and/or Pepsi have been adopted as ceremonial drinks by Tzeltal, Tzotil, and other Maya groups, something which might be partly due to their carbonation, foam being important in the cosmological grand scheme of things in Mayan religion and ritual (Staller and Carrasco, 2010).

But maybe the most blink-inducing bit of information I’ve come across of late is that Masai like to dress their hair with cow dung (because it “gives it an orangey-brown glow and a powerful odor”. I bet it does) (Ackerman, 1990). I knew about cow-dung used for washing in India, if I’m not much mistaken. But, hair-dressing? Wow.

(casi)Todos los caminos llevan… alla Botanica Farmaceutica

Listening to: Running up that hill, Placebo

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Okay, Süsse, this one’s for you. As promised, Cassia angustifolia (also called Cassia senna, and Senna alexandrina). Native from the Arabic peninsula, if I’m not much mistaken.

I was right yesterday—it is a laxative, even used as a purging cure at high doses. Must be taken with moderation and during brief periods of time, as a prolonged use might have undesirable secondary effects such as dependency, abdominal pain, constipation, vomits, and intestinal problems (I’m checking the names in Italian, y no tengo ni flores de cómo traducir “melanosi retto-colica”; am not sure of what it means, exactly, but it sounds bad enough *cough*).

And I did have a picture of it, so here it goes:

Pretty, ne?

Haven’t got the foggiest as to why one should take them at a certain time of the day, but I can check and get back at you on that.

<3

PS. AH! Cola de caballo (picture from wikipedia… I’m afraid I’ve taken no pictures myself of Equisetum of late):

(Hacendado Teas: Always a Reliable Introduction to Medicinal Botany! :D)

Sidenotes to TMP (The Marmalade Project)

Listening to: Schiller feat Moya Brennan, Falling

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I’ve been a bad pirate. I haven’t written anything here for ages, and have had no time to work on more ancient myths and women posts. I know *sighs* alas, je suis une très mauvaise fille!

So I’ve decided to keep posts short and sweet – that’s the idea, at least. Side notes to the big project that’s in the making, with lots of ethnobotany thrown in.

One gets astonishingly bizarre tidbits of random information that usually leave me scrambling for a pen and a piece of paper, so I’ll remember that Marie Antoinette wore potato flowers on her hair¹ (all part of a grand scheme to endear potatoes to the French), or that there was a walrus penis among the items within the first inventory of the contents of Leiden’s botanical garden (its gallery, actually)².

So this is it. The occasionally funny, sometimes interesting, most often useless, yet always random and unexpected pieces of information I come across during my long, long reading hours of research.

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¹That was from Michael Pollan’s The Botany of Desire, chapter 4. Loved that book, really.

²I forgot where I got this one from, but I think it’s from Colonial Botany, edited by Schiebinger and Swan. *sighs* I can’t imagine blokes peeking at a walrus penis stored in a museum. I just, well, feel these uncontrollable giggling urges overcoming me every time I picture the scene.

Women and Myths in Ancient Greece (i). Pandora’s Jar, part I!

Listening to: Children, Robert Miles (*le sigh*)

Shamelessly using this blog again for my own nefarious purposes – that is, passing my English (and Italian) exam in June (… sob sob. I’m flattered that you think I’m not rusty, B, but I can feel my prepositions creaking)… so! Here we are, back to intermittent bouts of intensive, moderately creative writing.

What do I bring you this time, more plants? I should, I really should.

But no, not yet, at least not for a while. I’m bringing you Greek myths and the representation of woman (in general) and (some) women (in particular). Because, you see, I’m attending these cool lectures (VIII Aula d’Humanitats. Les dones i els mites, organized by the Secció Balear de la SEEC), and enjoying them immensely. Besides, it’s a topic I’m very interested in (I mean, Greek myths? Women? Soo my cup of tea, both things)…

(in case anybody is wondering if I’m quotable on this, if the information is reliable, I’ll confess I haven’t studied the classics, but the bloke who imparts the conferences has, is the president of the Secció Balear de la SEEC –that is, Spanish Society of Classical Studies—, has a degree in philosophy, and blah blah. So I’d say, yeah, he knows his stuff. And I’m good at taking notes, so this is a pretty faithful rendition of the factual contents he laid out in his lecture).

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So, where do I begin. Oh, yes. Pandora. Pandora, un càstig dels déus (that is: Pandora, a punishment from the gods).

Nearly everybody has heard her name, usually when referred to a box: Pandora’s box is the box where all the evils of the world are kept, and this Pandora chick, she came along, opened it, and got us all in a mess. In a Pandora-less world, humankind would know no hunger, no suffering, no pain, no poverty. Oddly enough, it’s a woman, again, the instrument of mankind’s fall. Oddly enough… or perhaps not.

But let us go back to the sources; in this case, it’s mostly Hesiod who gives us the canonical version of Pandora’s myth, which can be found in the author’s two remaining complete works: the Theogony, and the Works and Days. There are slight differences between the two renditions of the myth, perhaps due to slight differences in aim and intention: whereas the Theogony is told mostly from the gods’ ‘perspective’, the Works and Days is told from a man’s point of view. It’s written as a collection of useful pieces of advice Hesiod gives his brother, who works in the fields: thus the context is eminently agricultural, the framing entirely rural.

And this would be important, why?

Well, because Pandora’s myth has consequences that greatly affect men –because of her, we shall see, man has to work, oh noes!—, and thus it makes sense to develop the story and the ramifications that ensued in the text that addresses men instead of the mighty gods who know no troubles and no woes.

Man poses himself a fundamental question: if the gods live without worries nor woes, why does man suffer so much, why must he work constantly and in pain for meagre rewards?

In order to answer this question, to give justification to this latent injustice, Hesiod brings us a handful of etiological myths (myths that explain the cause of something), among which Pandora’s: the third myth out of (minimum!) four.

Currently, we know that, men are unhappy.

But they were once very happy, they were like gods themselves. Then something happened (at Mecone, or so Hesiod would have it), and they had to be punished. With what? Well, there you go. Pandora was the punishment; women were the punishment.

Yet in order to understand the punishment, we need to understand the transgression. Enter Prometheus.

Some of you might’ve heard of this bloke, currently having his liver eaten out by some kind of carrion bird, or some such disgustingly yucky thing, according to Greek mythology (well, no; Herakles went and killed the bird, according to the Mythica. But the Mythica wasn’t entirely correct on Pandora’s myth, mm). Because he screwed up with almighty Zeus, big time, and Greek gods aren’t much into the whole ‘forgiveness, mercy and love’ thing.

Who was Prometheus? And what did he do to deserve such a harsh punishment?

Prometheus was the son of a titan called Iapetus (scientists out there, you know that’s also a moon orbiting around Saturn; funny thing, if one realizes Iapetus’ father was actually Uranus and not Saturn/Cronus… anyway). Titans, well, ruled the world before the Olympic gods took over (long story; no time. Sometimes I doubt even my nan could keep them all straight, all those relationships between Greek gods, minor gods, titans, monsters, heroes, blah, blah).

And Prometheus, along with his three brothers, was punished first of all because of his titanic nature, half-divine, half-human (it seems that for Plato, titanic nature was intrinsically tied to evil). He was cocky; he was smart; he was brilliant; so he thought he could get away with tricking the gods, not only once, but twice –and he did trick them. But not without consequences: the gods might (mind, just might) forgive the first time, but pardon is never granted twice.

Hesiod tells us in the Theogony of Prometheus’ first transgression against the gods:

[545] For when the gods and mortal men had a dispute at Mecone, even then Prometheus was forward to cut up a great ox and set portions before them, trying to befool the mind of Zeus. Before the rest he set flesh and inner parts thick with fat upon the hide, covering them with an ox paunch; but for Zeus he put the white bones dressed up with cunning art and covered with shining fat. Then the father of men and of gods said to him: “Son of Iapetus, most glorious of all lords, good sir, how unfairly you have divided the portions!”

[545] So said Zeus whose wisdom is everlasting, rebuking him. But wily Prometheus answered him, smiling softly and not forgetting his cunning trick: “Zeus, most glorious and greatest of the eternal gods, take which ever of these portions your heart within you bids.” So he said, thinking trickery. But Zeus, whose wisdom is everlasting, saw and failed not to perceive the trick, and in his heart he thought mischief against mortal men which also was to be fulfilled. With both hands he took up the white fat and was angry at heart, and wrath came to his spirit when he saw the white ox-bones craftily tricked out: and because of this the tribes of men upon earth burn white bones to the deathless gods upon fragrant altars.

[558] But Zeus who drives the clouds was greatly vexed and said to him: “Son of Iapetus, clever above all! So, sir, you have not yet forgotten your cunning arts!”

Of course it would make sense to burn bones to the gods instead of offering them meat, which was scarce and hard to come by; one sees the point of those men who’d rather eat it instead of burning it to worship the gods, who’d only inhale the smoke, anyway, so does it really make such a big difference, does meat-smoke taste so much better than bones-smoke? Nah. So there you go, instead of starving we’ll let the gods sniff burnt bones.

Yet, etiologically, it’s Prometheus who sets the basis for this, as you can see. Maybe a little silly, mankind emulating a bloke whose trickery angered Zeus to the eventual detriment of his liver, but ah, that’s Greek to me.

Did Zeus forgive and forget Prometheus after this first transgression? No, and no.

[560] So spake Zeus in anger, whose wisdom is everlasting; and from that time he was always mindful of the trick, and would not give the power of unwearying fire to the Melian²¹ race of mortal men who live on the earth.

And what does fire represent here? It might stand in for civilization, that which makes man a civilized creature: he doesn’t eat his food raw anymore, he doesn’t manufacture rough and unrefined tools. Fire is sacred, divine, the access to a whole world of possibilities heretofore unattainable to mankind.

If Zeus keeps the fire from humankind, they shall never be like the gods themselves.

And what does clever Prometheus do? He steals it (either he was indeed very clever, or Zeus a little stupid… hope no lightning will strike me dead for saying so, uh):

But the noble son of Iapetus outwitted him and stole the far-seen gleam of unwearying fire in a hollow fennel stalk. And Zeus who thunders on high was stung in spirit, and his dear heart was angered when he saw amongst men the far-seen ray of fire.

AND! The biologist in me must highlight the fact that this cunning, fire-stealing bloke did it with a fennel stalk! Uhm, well, not really, it wouldn’t have been fennel (Foeniculum vulgare), but Ferula communis, which is from the same family (in Greek, νάρθηξ, ‘nárthēx’). A useful plant, ferula: ancient Greeks used it because its pith kindles quickly yet burns slowly, and so it’s the perfect tool to conceal (I’ll go poetic here) a burning heart without betraying its flames (I guess it puffs some smoke, but it’s not like carrying the Olympic torch –I bet Zeus would’ve noticed that).

Some information in Spanish, here (although I don’t quite agree with the interpretation of the chemical substances being related to the promethean fire: F. communis might be toxic, but it has little relevance as a medicinal plant when compared to others… however, it is true that it was used in Spain as a stick with which boys would be punished at school. I even accidentally found a quote in Quevedo attesting to such a thing, hoh!). For information in English, you may go here.

And *squeals loudly* oh, MY! An online interactive edition of the Dioscórides, and I didn’t know about it? GO SEE. NOW!

Anyway, back to Prometheus and his fire-stealing tendencies. Zeus, as you can imagine, was not happy about it. And he machinates the ultimate revenge: enter Pandora (at last!).

According to the Theogony, Zeus convokes two gods in order to make Pandora: Hephaestus, and Athena; whereas in the Works and Days, he has four gods working on this beautiful artefact: Hephaestus, Athena, Hermes, and Aphrodite (with retinue of helping hands: the Graces).

In both cases, it’s always Hephaestus who models, gives shape to Pandora out of earth and water (that is, uh, mud). The word used in Greek comes from the root plastos, from where words such as plastic (as in, the plastic arts) also came. It’s not the first time the god does such a thing: in fact, the first automats seem to appear in the Iliad, and were created by Hephaestus, yet made out of metal, whereas Pandora is not metal but frail clay.

Once the structure has been finished by Hephaestus, Athena is in charge of embellishing the poisoned gift (ie Pandora, “a beautiful evil”, a καλὸν κακὸν –though, hah, oddly enough Hesiod doesn’t mention her name in the Theogony, just in WaD):

[570] Forthwith he made an evil thing for men as the price of fire; for the very famous Limping God formed of earth the likeness of a shy maiden as the son of Cronos willed. And the goddess bright-eyed Athena girded and clothed her with silvery raiment, and down from her head [575] she spread with her hands an embroidered veil, a wonder to see; and she, Pallas Athena, put about her head lovely garlands, flowers of new-grown herbs. Also she put upon her head a crown of gold which the very famous Limping God made himself [580] and worked with his own hands as a favor to Zeus his father. On it was much curious work, wonderful to see; for of the many creatures which the land and sea rear up, he put most upon it, wonderful things, like living beings with voices: and great beauty shone out from it.

Of course it would be a woman to girdle and beautify a maiden; had cosmetics been left to Hephaestus… ahem. One can just imagine. And once the maiden has been modelled and prettied to the gods’ satisfaction, she is so stumpingly, stunningly beautiful even the gods are left to gape at her in stupefaction (same root for stupid, from stupere, “be stunned, amazed, confounded”): she is thauma (θαῦμα, “wonder, marvel”; same root for, say, thaumaturge in English), she is a wonder to behold, renders anyone who looks upon her rather silly—hah, stupid, actually:

And wonder took hold of the deathless gods and mortal men when they saw that which was sheer guile, not to be withstood by men.

And then, pearls of wisdom:

[590] For from her is the race of women and female kind: of her is the deadly race and tribe of women who live amongst mortal men to their great trouble, no helpmeets in hateful poverty, but only in wealth. And as in thatched hives bees [595] feed the drones whose nature is to do mischief—by day and throughout the day until the sun goes down the bees are busy and lay the white combs, while the drones stay at home in the covered hives and reap the toil of others into their own bellies— [600] even so Zeus who thunders on high made women to be an evil to mortal men, with a nature to do evil.

Active feminist, Hesiod, wasn’t he. See, instead, the Works and Days (where we go directly to Prometheus stealing the fire from the gods, though I’m skipping that part and give you Pandora’s creation right away):

And he [Zeus] bade famous Hephaestus make haste and mix earth with water and to put in it the voice and strength of human kind, and fashion a sweet, lovely maiden-shape, like to the immortal goddesses in face; and Athene to teach her needlework and the weaving of the varied web; and golden Aphrodite to shed grace upon her head and cruel longing and cares that weary the limbs. And he charged Hermes the guide, the Slayer of Argus, to put in her a shameless mind and a deceitful nature.

[69] So he ordered. And they obeyed the lord Zeus the son of Cronos. Forthwith the famous Lame God moulded clay in the likeness of a modest maid, as the son of Cronos purposed. And the goddess bright-eyed Athene girded and clothed her, and the divine Graces and queenly Persuasion put necklaces of gold upon her, and the rich-haired Hours crowned her head with spring flowers. And Pallas Athene bedecked her form with all manners of finery. Also the Guide, the Slayer of Argus, contrived within her lies and crafty words and a deceitful nature at the will of loud thundering Zeus, and the Herald of the gods put speech in her. And he called this woman Pandora (All Endowed), because all they who dwelt on Olympus gave each a gift, a plague to men who eat bread.

Important things to be mentioned:

• “like to the immortal goddesses in face”, this verse, this same verse is used to describe Helen’s godlike beauty in the Iliad; all women, being descendants of Pandora, share to a certain extent her original attributes, among which her beauty – a trait that is underlined especially in Helen’s case.

• Athene here teaches her how to weave, to do needlework. This was the main occupation of women in Antiquity: Helen, Penelope, they were all excellent weavers, and weaving, as we were explained in a later lecture on Penelope, is an activity that makes (well, some, I guess) women crafty, gives them time to plan and machinate. Brute force will get them nowhere, but women strike back from their looms, weaving intrigues in silence.

• Aphrodite, she doesn’t teach Pandora how to love: she turns her into a desire machine – constantly desiring things and constantly kindling desire in men herself.

• Hermes puts speech in her. Speech. Voice. In Greek, φωνή. And why is this relevant? Well, phoné is just voice, whereas logos is reasoned, rational speech. Pandora has the former, but not the later. In his Politics, Aristotle defines man as a rational animal because he’s got logos, whereas animals only have phoné. So, there you go; birds chirping and women singing are one and the same thing, huh.

• Hesiod seems to give us an etymology for the name Pandora, meaning that “all gods gave a gift”, so she was a gift from all the gods. And it’s just a plague to men who eat bread, not to gods who feed on ambrosia. I stress again: mankind as bread-eaters, completely dependent on crops and agriculture.

Okay, so the deed is done, the gift ready to be given away. But, who shall the gods give it to? Surely not Prometheus, he’s too crafty and wary of the gods (I would, too, if I’d done all that. Gods rarely joke with these things). But ah, he’s got a dumb brother, Epimetheus, who did accept the gift despite having been told several times by his cunning brother not to accept, under any circumstance, any gift from the gods. And yet, what does clever Epimetheus do? Read below:

But when he had finished the sheer, hopeless snare, the Father sent glorious Argus-Slayer, the swift messenger of the gods, to take it to Epimetheus as a gift. And Epimetheus did not think on what Prometheus had said to him, bidding him never take a gift of Olympian Zeus, but to send it back for fear it might prove to be something harmful to men. But he took the gift, and afterwards, when the evil thing was already his, he understood.

Of course, when it was too late. Heh, doesn’t it sound familiar, this “ooops” moment after having screwed up, badly.

End of Part I, stay tuned for Part II, uh, in a few days? Weeks? Surely not months, i’A…

So. What do fluxes, witches, bonds and feelings have in common?

Listening to: Mi fai vivere, Valentina Giovagnini

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Howdy, ya ladies, and happy Easter! (merry Easter? Boh) Yep, don’t groan, I’m back. Albeit temporarily, but anyway.

There was a bit in that calendar from which I quoted extensively in my last post, where the following was written:

Because it was held that witches were unable to shed more than three tears –and those only from the left eye – it was considered good luck (and, indeed, simple good sense) for a bride to weep copiously on her wedding day, thus reassuring her husband that she had not previously plighted her troth to the Prince of Darkness.

This brought me back to an article I’d read a long time ago, which I’d found very interesting, and thus after aver messo a soqquadro my room in search of that dratted piece of writing, I found it, re-read it, and enjoyed it as much as I had the first time.

It ties in with the bit I’ve pasted up here, and also with many of my latest reflections on balance in interpersonal relationships, gift-giving, and the fragile/resilient connections between beloveds, family, friends, lovers, acquaintances.

I quote, because I’m busy, and lazy. Sentences underlined by yours truly. From: Rublack, U. Fluxes: the Early Modern Body and the Emotions. History Workshop Journal, Issue 53, 2002.

[S]ince antiquity, the emotions were often experienced as a flow. Being a social creature meant having feelings, such as grief and sorrow, that could easily become unbalanced and therefore place humans in physical danger.

Early modern philosophers agreed on the axiomatic assumption that feelings could not be ignored. To show no emotion was, firstly, ‘barbaric’, and secondly, dangerous. Unexpressed feelings could assume a bodily form. Balance (…) was to be striven for in this world by relativizing and yet also expressing feelings.

This was what made the ideal of friendship so important. (…) It was necessary to maintain the flow of sociable emotion, to avoid psychosomatic blockage. (…) Francis Bacon (1561-1626) wrote that the chief benefit of friendship was ‘the ease and discharge of the fullness and swellings of the heart’, which were the root of all passions.

Bacon was concerned not with a rational control of the emotions but rather with their flow in confiding and trusting verbal transmission. Bacon conceived of mind and body not dualistically, but as interrelated. (…) Openness to exchange was a precondition of human life. As a consequence, a lonely person could neither experience true pleasure nor cope with grief. The price of self-sufficiency, loneliness or the denial of emotion was that one became a cannibal of one’s own heart.

‘Self-sufficiency’ meant inhumanity and death, but man lived by sharing joy and sorrow, by the flow of emotion which, as Bacon describes it, also brought feelings back in an astonishing manner.

Instead of despairing at unexpected events and one’s lack of self-control over them, one had to practise hope, curiosity, and pleasant wonder at the surprisingly rich variety of life.

This makes me wonder a bit, when did society begin to deem tears unmanly? They probably weren’t for Bacon, and they certainly weren’t for Homer; during the last classical conference I attended we were told how Menelaus and Telemachus began crying like ninnies while reminiscing about the old days (war in Troy and all that jazz). Not saying Homer exalted the so-called feminine sensitivity so in vogue now, but still. They cried.

Religious thinkers broadly viewed failure as a part of human existence. For them, people were as obdurate as stones. ‘Opening’ required pious practise, a pious community that ritualized reconciliation, and God’s help. It could not be achieved by human power alone. For that reason, illness was subject to individual responsibility only to a limited extent, as when people deliberately acted in such a way as to unbalance nature (drinking too much wine or engaging in wild dancing, for example).

There was a blurring of functions between medicine and theology.

For Thurneisser (end of sixteenth century) it was clear that all emotions originated in the brain. But one experienced them elsewhere, namely in the heart.

Communal discussions of social blockage and how to resolve it centred thirdly on hatred and envy, as is impressively demonstrated in notions of witchcraft. In early modern society, which was characterized by scarcity, it was generally assumed that envy of other people’s possessions or fertility existed in many relationships and could evoke powerful destructive desires. After 1570, crop failures grew more frequent everywhere, winters were colder, and crises became the norm, as did wars and epidemics after 1618.

The most common nightmare vision of the witch became that of a ‘dry’, cold, sterile woman without any fat on her body. She was perfidious (…), and so obsessed with her own deficiencies and disappointments that only bitterness remained. Her breasts were slack. (…) Witches were old and no longer menstruated. The blood in their bodies was not fresh and red, but black and putrid.

Those who were dry could not weep. In witch-trials (and later in the trials of infanticides), tears, or their absence, were cited as legal evidence.

A medical report prepared for a witch trial at Rothenburg ob der Tauber in 1654 offered a scientific basis for this theory of tears. ‘Proper or natural’ tears came (‘as several highly-knowledgeable present-day philosophers agree’) from the water in which ‘the heart swims, as it were’. The motion of the heart sent the water into an artery leading to the head and from there to the eyes, ‘out of which tears then arise’. The heart of a witch could no longer be moved because it was dried up and the surrounding water with it. Here, too, organ and blood were interdependent, and the heart was not an autonomous muscle. Because the water was absent, the witch was both literally and metaphorically incapable of being moved. Nothing moved inside here, and how could it be otherwise in someone so thoroughly hardened? This implied that any attempt to touch her was in vain, for she and her body were cold and frozen. In keeping with this semiology of temperature, tears of remorse were hot and crocodile tears cold.

Hmm, hmm.

(…) [U]nderstandings of Christianity and community were interrelated first with a symbolic practice such as the Eucharist and second with the organization of material exchange. (…) Just as the health of the physical body depended on the flow of fluids, so too, and analogously, did communal health depend on exchange and reconciliation.

(…) [P]eace, as sixteenth-century people understood it, was largely associated with communal unity, the common good and piety. And the precondition for this was the flow of relational feelings, not their hardening.

(…)

Around 1580, however, these customs were frequently abolished by the church (…). This was a sign of the times: the ostensible reason given for abolition was the risk of epidemics.

(…). Former communal structures were eroded, and illness became a problem primarily for the ill themselves.

Because of the anxiety which ensued, witchcraft fantasies so often revolved around poisonous gifts, generally of food or wine, which were offered, ingested and incorporated, and then proved deadly. (…) Countless laws were introduced prohibiting gift-giving, feasting, drinking and magnanimity.

This brings Snowhite and the seven Dwarves to mind, no? In modern cities we might not be aware of the power of a gift, but in villages it’s a much more conspicuous reality. Communal unity is achieved through the exchange of gifts and favours – minding your neighbour’s kids while she’s gone to the market, lending a scoop of sugar to the couple who lives on the opposite side of the street— and, well, maybe information, too (my nan’s got a wealth of it, heh).

And then, same article… On the Utopian Body, and an exchange in the third book of Rabelais’ Gargantua and Pantagruel, 1546

(…) [E]very sixteenth-century person knew full well [that] (…) gifts and reciprocity were frequently deployed, but they also created ties that were intended to secure advantages and obligations that were impossible or difficult to fulfil. They produced guilty feelings, and were often quite close to corruption.

(…)

In conclusion, we may say both that in the mentality of early modern elites and non-elites, male and female alike, subjectivity was profoundly experienced as interrelated with the physical, and that societal changes or structures influenced the ways in which the body was perceived.

Dryness and hardening were organizing categories of experience. In societies in which the humours were more important than isolated organs, and broad interpersonal exchange was more highly valued than the individual accumulation of resources, there was a tendency to worry about the stagnation or misdirection of bodily fluids.

While writing Poems, I had to choose runes for my characters; Saph’s was gebo, and its meaning involves bonds and gift-giving, which I find particularly fitting in this case:

Gebo is a rune of connection, particularly the connections between people. Up until now, our journey has been a solitary one. This rune represents those places where our path intersects with others, and allows us to begin to form conscious relationships. Such relationships are strengthened and sanctified by the exchange of gifts.

The use of the gift as a symbol of an oath or a bond is an ancient one. When a lord wanted to ensure the loyalty of one of his subjects, he would give that person a gift. The gift would create a debt on the part of the person receiving it, and this debt would ensure his readiness to serve his lord. Similarly, a gift given between lovers, especially that of the ring, symbolizes the bond between them. Originally, only the man gave the ring in a marriage for much the same reason as the lord giving gifts to his vassals, but today the arrangement is usually more equitable. Gifts or offerings given to the Gods often carry the same meaning, representing the giver’s love for or loyalty to their Gods. The giving of a gift implies the acceptance of a debt with the understanding that the debt will not be repaid. It is this imbalance which forms the bond.

Food for thought…

Wedding bells are ringing, mwahahahah!

Listening to: Ritual Fire Dance (Amor Brujo), De Falla (yay!)

I know, I know. Dawn breaks after a looong period of (blog-related) quiescence. Don’t foresee it lasting long, purtroppo, because I might be as busy as you ladies are (le sigh) soon, but let us not cry before the chicken’s actually dead (… yes, I made that one up. Maybe you don’t cry when a chicken of yours dies –you don’t even have chicken, actually. But it’s neither here nor there. Some do, and some would, so. I’m being original. And zoological. Which is always good and positive. More or less).

. I’d actually wanted to post something on V·day, but, ah, you understand why in the end I didn’t… So I’m posting it now :). All unreferenced material taken from my old Page-a-Day Calendar: Schott’s Almanac 2008 (by Ben Schott, Workman Publishing, NY) (thus info as reliable as the aforementioned source might be).

S’all dedicated to J… obviouslich *winks*

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So, you wanna get married. Are getting married, in fact.

Would’ve saved you some money a few years back in Italy, I suppose, as Mussolini introduced a tax on bachelors on the 6^th December 1926.

In any case, there’s a few good things you should know before you do. Because being a wife ain’t easy, nah. There’s DUTY, and OBLIGATIONS that come with wifehood, y’know.

According to the fourteenth-century Le Menagier de Paris, the key to being a good wife included these edifying directives: “be obedient…to your husband and to his commandments, whatever they be, whether they be made in earnest or in jest” (104); “choose rather to please your husband than yourself, because his happiness must come before yours” (104); “it is through good obeisance that a wise woman obtains her husband’s love and, in the end, receives from him what she desires” (119); “protect [your future husband] from holes in the roof and smoky fires, and do not quarrel with him, but be sweet, pleasant, and peaceful with him”(139); “steer clear of swaggering and idle young men who live beyond their means and who, possessing no land or lineage, become dancers” (94). While perhaps shocking to modern sensibilities, or comical in turn, this fascinating and relatively understudied text overflows with suggestions for a woman’s obedience, attention to reputation, proper piety, and correct conduct. The anonymous author also advises his audience, presumably his young wife, on the practicalities household management: when to transplant cabbage (212), how to delegate tasks to servants (section 2.3), in what ways to tend to ropy, musty, and moldy wine (221), and how to care for horses (223-228).

(from Muhlberger’s Early History)

If you think you’ll be up to the task, and are really decided to go through the whole thing, receptions and churches and dresses and all that madness, then heed this useful piece of advice (Anonymous advice for wives, 1905):

Not the least useful piece of advice, homely though it be, that we can offer newly-married ladies, is to remind them that husbands are men, and men must eat. We can tell them, moreover, that men attach no small importance to this very essential operation, and that a very effectual way to keep them in good humour, as well as good condition, is for wives to study their husband’s peculiar likes and dislikes in this matter. Let the wife try, therefore, if she have not already done so, to get up a little knowledge in the art of ordering dinner, to say the least of it. This task if she be disposed to learn it, will in time be easy enough; moreover, if in addition she should acquire some practical knowledge of cookery, she will find ample reward in the gratification it will be the means of affording her husband.

Because, well, men must eat (bet you didn’t know that, huh). Knowing how to order dinner is always useful, I agree. It would be a good idea to have a few pizzeria phone numbers at hand, I say. If not, the internet is an endlessly amazing source of recipes, such as those found here, here and here, just to name a few.

Now, the big day’s approaching. And you must have everything under control, of course, and be careful you follow tradition, and wear something old (a symbol for the bride’s family and her past), new (the future), borrowed (passing on of good luck), blue (purity and innocence), and a silver sixpence in her shoe (wealth).

(I don’t know if the kind of money you slip into your shoe is related to the amount of wealth it’ll purportedly bring you. I’d go for a 2€ coin, just to be on the safe side).

Got the dress? Got the shoes? (don’t forget the money!) So the day dawns bright and beautiful (really hope it doesn’t rain. And did you know Il Bosco was supposedly born on that day, ya sis? :D), and the hour is approaching, and it’s time to go but there’s an etiquette to be followed in these cases (bon ton, as you know). So you cannot just run willy-nilly to church, one must respect the correct Order of wedding carriages:

By tradition, the parties being assembled on the wedding morning in the drawing-room of the residence of the bride’s father, the happy cortège should proceed to the church in the following order: In the first carriage, the bride’s mother and the parents of the bridegroom; in the second and third carriages, bridesmaids; other carriages with the bride’s friends; in the last carriage, the bride and her father.

(apparently, the groom trots after the carriages. Interesting image, that. Actually, before the carriages, if he’s supposed to receive the bride already in church. Maybe he could hitchhike, would that be allowed? Otherwise I foresee a very sweaty groom…).

Once all such petty obstacles have been saved, and the vows have been exchanged, it’s Ring Time! Ah, but what shall be written inside the wedding bands? Many ring posies are acceptable, among which the following traditional ones:

• All for All
• Beyond this life love me, dear wife (I assume this one was for the guy, unless lesbian marriages are being taken into account)
• Till death us do depart
• Truth Trieth Troth
• Love conquers all (all you need is love! The Beatles could make excellent ring posies…)
• Though apart, our love shall bind us
• From a distance, all love true (it’s closeness that might screw it up, then?)
• In unity we live and die (… sounds a little ominous, no?)
• Our love travels herewith
• Love overcomes distance
• A reminder of our constant love
• God tend to keep me well
• Heart and hand at thy command
• Bear and forbear (we’re all for optimism, oh yeah)
• Endless as my love
• En bon foye
• A E I (Greek for ‘always’)
• For ever and for aye
• Mutual forbearance (if one takes into account forbearance means “good-natured tolerance  of delay or incompetence”, it paints a lovely picture of married life, doesn’t it)
• In thee, my choice, I do rejoice
• Let love increase
• True love will ne’er remove
• May God above increase our love
• Not two but one, Till life is gone
• My heart and I, Until I die
• When this you see, Then think of me
• Love is heaven, and heaven is love
• Wedlock, ‘tis said, In heaven is made
• God did decree this unity
• Let reason rule (this one’s for romantics)
• De bon cor
• A union of souls
• By God alone, joined as one
• You to me are everything
• Live happy (don’t worry! Be happy! This one’s for hippies)
• Where this you see, remember me
• In love abide, ‘til death divide
• Death shall not part such loving hearts

Now, I think I gave you quite a few things to consider before the deed (… maaarriage. I’m referring to marriage, obviouslich) is done. You let me know about that dress, btw… :p