Ancient (pre BCE)

  • Deluge Myths

    High water, gully washer, toad strangler, God willing and the creek don’t rise. These are all terms for a universal weather phenomenon- floods. Even in ancient times, floods were a key part of life. The Nile floods were so important to ancient Egypt they had a god for it- Hapi. In that same vein, there are similar stories about a great flood in most known mythologies. There are enough similarities that researchers believe that these stories could come from a single root. The field of geomythology is the intersection between mythology and geology, and scientists have begun drawing parallels to the multiple “deluge myths”. The most commonly known story is…

  • Eclipses- Historical Harbingers

    If you’ve been anywhere near the news, you would have seen that a solar eclipse happened in the continental United States yesterday.  I have to admit it was a pretty amazing experience as I was lucky enough to be in the path of totality.  As the sky went dark and the crickets started chirping, I thought about what it must have been like for those in the past.  They didn’t have the benefit of NASA and other scientists telling us that this was normal, the Sun would come back and to wear protective glasses.  How did people through the ages deal with eclipses? One of the first references we have…

  • Clava Cairns

    The main attraction in the area around Inverness is the site of the Battle of Culloden.  However, there is another site nearby that is also an important part of Scotland’s past.  One mile southeast of the battlefield set on a terrace above the River Nairn are the Clava Cairns also called the Balnuaran of Clava.  These are three cairns and a number of free standing stones which date from the late Neolithic period.  Although it is thought by scholars that there may have been at least two additional structures, the three that are left have been designated the Northeast Cairn, Central Cairn and Southwest Cairn.  These site is thought to…

  • Eostre 

    She is the Germanic Goddess of Spring. She is attested solely by Bede in his 8th-century work The Reckoning of Time, where he states that during Ēosturmōnaþ (the equivalent of April), pagan Anglo-Saxons had held feasts in Ēostre’s honor called Eosturmonath. However, Bede is our only source for the historical Eostre. There are no other mentions of the goddess prior to that. There are theories that Eostre is derived from the same Indo European goddess of the dawn like that of the Greek Goddess Eos. Another theory is Eostre is a local goddess worshiped in Southeastern England. The latest theory by Philip Shaw is that she is linked to a…

  • The Great Serpent Mound

    In a previous post, we discussed the Mississippians and their mound city at Cahokia (http://www.historynaked.com/the-mississippians/)  Another similar system of mounds were made in Ohio, although much earlier than the Cahokia mounds.  The Great Serpent Mound is found in Adams County, Ohio near the town of Peeples.  Millions of years ago, a large meteor crashed into the area creating a five mile wide crater and surrounding plateau.  The mound was built on this plateau in the shape of a large snake with a curled tail.  It is the largest serpent effigy in the world, measuring approximately 1,300 feet in length and one to three feet high.  The head is oriented to…