[Author’s note for 2022: This essay was presented in March of 2006, at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion, Western Region, at Claremont Graduate University in Claremont, California. I am revisiting my older ideas as based from my thealogical (study of goddess) and birth-based scholarly work. The notion of society moving towards a sacred economy is more pressing than ever.]
I note my ideas on this theme predate the work of Charles Eisenstein and his notion of “Sacred Economics.” I had not heard of him or his work at the time of my own ponderings. Rather, I was immersed in considering the embodied, ecofeminist energetics of freely birthing mothers, alongside my studies of the ancient matrifocal Minoan-Cretan culture, as based in my community-based birth work as a lay midwife, knowing the sacredness of birthing mothers as contiguous to honouring our human interrelationship with Mother Earth as our primary matrix—as I imagine the Minoans may have. I see the Minoans as having lived from a sacred economy in their spiritualized, communal distribution of foods, goods, and resources, towards all citizens through their ancient Goddess architectural complexes. I am mindful of this communal, communing economy as related to what Genevieve Vaughan names the “Maternal Gift Economy,” as I note here in.
Though I see gift economy as key, I would say a “sacred economy” is an activated gift economy that is both practically and spiritually grounded in cosmological Goddess matri-worldviews. In the case of the Minoans, a whole culture ritualized mother-love, social care, and life-based spirituality to honour reciprocity with the land through architecture that ceremonially transmits and distributes the abundance, love, and regenerative, birth-based gifts of Mother Earth. This worldview and way of life honours interconnected human and earth-based cycles of birth, life, death, and regeneration. Archeologist Marija Gimbutus highlighted the life-giving, Mother Earth-based principle of regeneration as the sacred, organizing matri-ethics of the Minoans, along with other Neolithic cultures she unearthed, and named them a “Civilization of the Goddess.”
It is not my intention to offer a fully develop theory/thearia herein. I have extensively written elsewhere on the matri-power of birth-giving and placentas from contemporary mother-centred perspectives (Jordan, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020). I note this brief study below as an intriguing view into understanding the ancient Minoans as a Goddess-template of a sacred economy, so that we may widen understanding of what a matri-culture did and can be.
Sacred Economy:
Previously in 2006, this essay was a slide list with detailed footnotes. I have brought my footnotes forward into the text, to imagine the Goddess-centred, ecological-economic-complexes of Minoan society as a template for a sacred economy through their ancient integrated ritual structures and uses thereof. I posit Minoan culture as a practice nexus for sacred, reciprocal, human-Earth, place-based interconnections as ritualized through matricentric community life. I dive into Minoan sacred architectural space via the scholarly sources cited herein, adding my own interpretations and imagining to that of the noted scholars.
1) Map of – Kefti and surrounds / Ancient Crete (Castledon 1990: fig. 11).
Crete was called Kefti by the ancient Egyptians. Kefti and Egypt enjoyed trade and travel between their Mediterranean sea-connected civilizations.
2) Ritual bowl – made of red stone, found sitting in the antechamber to the Throne Room of the Palace of Knossos – Palatial period, 1600 BC (Alexiou 1968: 67).
I see this as a ritual offering bowl for water libations in ceremony. In my own birthkeeping way, I call it a “placenta” bowl as if it held the sacred form of the after-birth.
3) Eileithyia cave – entrance to the sacred cave of Eileithyia at Amnisos on north coast of Crete.
One of the oldest shrines on the island, its use dates from the Neolithic period (5000 – 2600 BC). In her Greek manifestation, Eileithyia is understood as a Goddess of childbirth, where her chthonic (underground) womb-aspect was worshipped here. A fig tree stands at the entrance (Alexiou 1968: 24).
Caves continued to be utilized as places of worship well into Greek and Roman times. Offerings of libations are noted throughout the cave in the presence of cups, bowls and jugs on flat rocks used as altars. Votive offerings such as seals, bronze figurines depicting worshippers, tools, needles, and double axes, were placed in between rocks or stalagmites, on flat ledges, or thrown down deep chasms. Seasonal agricultural festivity, and visitation through pilgrimage, is noted in some caves through the presence of large pithoi (standing vessels/jars). These storage containers presuppose the collection, redistribution, and feasting on food/produce, as does the presence of dining equipment such as jugs, bowls, and plates (Marinatos 1993: 124).
Pithoi are large womb-like containers, where gestation and birth is suggested in the regenerative matri-principle of life, life-giving, and life-sharing in community.
4) Eileithyia cave
Again, from the Goddess Eileithyia, understood to be a Minoan Goddess connected to birthing, where mothers and others visit for ritual, ceremonial and contemplative connection to the life-giving principle of birth itself, both actual and metaformic—a metaform means beyond “metaphor” through culture practice, aka poet-philosopher Judy Grahn’s metaformic theory.
I have long looked to birth as an activating principle for society and culture at large, to reawaken birth-based cultures of matri-power, love, and care that honour birth as sacred female power, being the undergirding force of our lives on Mother Earth. Not in any reductionist way, but knowing birth itself as wisdom force of life and life-giving, centred in a matri-ethics of care and continuity of life for thriving of all.
5) Mt. Ida – view from the Palace hill at Phaistos.
Mt. Ida is the snow-capped peak on the left, the twin peaks to the right are known as the Digeris Saddle. Under this Saddle lies the Kamares cave whose 100ft wide and 60ft high entrance is visible with the naked eye on a clear day (Alexiou 1968: 48).
Peak sanctuaries were visited by people throughout ancient Crete, even after the ‘official religion’ of the New Palace period was introduced. Votive offerings were deposited, as in an abundance of figurines of worshippers and animals, objects such as seals, alabaster cup, bronze double axes, and gold amulets. Buildings were erected at these sites around the emergence of the palaces. Ash layers within the sanctuary of Juktas suggest that great bonfires were held in which votive offerings were thrown. There is evidence of burning of pieces of animal meat and bones (Marinatos 1986: 36). Miniature models of shrines surmounted by sacred horns have been found at some peak sanctuaries.
Figurines assume variations, with three characteristic gestures standing out:
1) the fist clenched and held to the forehead, a gesture of ‘salute,’
2) mostly male adorants with arms bent and held close to chest,
3) female adorants with arms crossed over, or touching the belly, breast, and hips, as in ‘zones of motherhood,’ sacred sites of embodied, female regenerative birth-power.
Another category of offerings are votive limbs, miniature arms and legs offered to express desire for healing. (Marinatos 1993: 116-117). Only one or twice a year the great bonfires were lit. The sanctuary appears to have been cleared of its votives regularly in this way as they were offered into the fires, perhaps a final act of a ceremony of renewal of life, in which the old is released to make way for new beginnings. There is evidence of large communal meals (Marinatos 1993: 118).
6) Pithoi (storage vessels) – from the West Block of the Palace of Knossos. Within this section, there would have been room for 400 of these vessels, representing a 17,000 gallon capacity, to store oil, wine, grain, honey, and vegetables (Alexiou 1968: 90).
The storage rooms of the west wing were architecturally linked to the palatial pillar crypts of Knossos. There are special entrance passages between the pillar crypts and storage areas. Incised double axe signs are found on the pillars of the crypts and walls of the magazines. The activities within these underground shrines were apparently linked to the agricultural products in the storage vessels. One can postulate a chthonic seasonal ritual involving grain in a birth-life-death-regeneration cycles. Part of these activities may have taken place in total darkness (Marinatos 1993: 94), much as human-beings are gestated in the womb-darkness that gifts life.
Large western courts, open to the town, are situated above the grain storage magazines. The size of the courts indicates design for large public, ceremonial gatherings and dancing. The proximity to the granaries suggest seasonal harvest or agricultural festivals (Marinatos 1993: 46). Marinatos argues for the use of the term cult centres rather then “temple” to define the Minoan palace complexes such as Knossos. Temple denotes the monumental abode of at least one central deity, but Minoan palaces do not have the unity of temple designs found elsewhere. Missing is a focal chapel and a central cult image, found are many small-scale shrines designed for small numbers of participants. The term “palace” is also misleading in this regard (Marinatos 1993: 110). As such, our contemporary patriarchal, hierarchical culture and society cannot adequately imagine what and how the Minoans were actually doing. Many small shrine rooms suggest collective community activity, with multiple women and people working together for the common good, with deity or deities embodied in the work and play of life itself in communion with Mother Earth, like a hive of bees.
7) Antechamber of the Pillar Crypts with gypsum bench – the two crypts behind this now exposed underground area are amongst the holiest of sanctuaries for religious ceremonies within Knossos.
The presence of pillars indicates the room was particularly sacred. Memory of earlier cave shrines may have played a part in this association (Alexiou 1968: 75).
The pillar crypts of Knossos, understood as shrines, belong to the oldest parts of the building. These were dark rooms, always on the ground floor or in the basement and were connected to store rooms or granaries as noted above. Some pillar rooms are connected to tombs in other locations, and thus part of a funerary and burial rites. These crypts were always dark rooms evocative of caves and tomb chambers as sites of womb-rebirth. The discovery of human bones within pillar crypts at others sites suggests a possible secondary burial scenario and a funerary association. The western location of these rooms within the complex at Knossos and other sites locates the west as the realm of the ancestors. There is an upper shrine built in association with these rooms (Marinatos 1993: 88-94). This upper shrine, built in connection to the lower chambers, suggests ritual enactment of offerings directed towards chthonic powers and ancestors (Marinatos 1993: 97).
Movement between these dark underground chambers into the daylight filled upper shrines makes reference to the regenerative powers of birth, life and death cycles, with human and agricultural worlds intimately connected. Thus, a central aspect of what I call a sacred economy, is that human life and our interconnection to the bountiful resources and more-then human life of Mother Earth are not separate and are honoured as such. This is not a culture-economy plundering towards gain for the few against the needs of many. In fact, the Minoans appear to have ritualized sacred, regenerative interconnections of cyclical life in all forms. Honouring the literal bones of ancestors in womb-like chambers echoes regenerative gifts of the grain to nourish bodies for continuing life. This was celebrated by moving grain out of womb-like underground, storage chambers into the daylight of community redistribution, year after year. A ceaseless rebirthing ritual re-enactment.
This would explain the association of grain magazines with womb-tomb structures, where integrative seasonal festivals of earthly and human regeneration were performed, “…chthonic gods of the underworld are also gods of fertility” (Marinatos 1993: 97), or what I would call the Goddesses of regenerative principles and a matri-ethics of birthing and life-giving. The pillars themselves, incised with double axes and other signs, were an important focus for the carrying out such rituals. See Marija Gimbutus and others for meanings of the double axe, and uses of such in Minoan ritual and society. This was not a weapon. There are a variety of interpretations as double axes accompanied Goddesses, and are also known as “labrys,” being connected to the sacred, regenerative, womb-geometry of the Minoan labyrinth as a walking dance path.
8) Throne Room of the New Palace (1600 BC) of Knossos – carved from a single gypsum block but modeled on a wooden throne / chair (Alexiou, 1968: 66).
A ceremonial room. Three types of rooms are adjacent to it, an adyton (shrine room, sunken) with adjacent treasuries, dining shrines, and display rooms. The throne room was highly important to the work of the female leader-priestesses residing in the palace, expressing a special connection to Minoan Goddess(es). This room has been interpreted as the locus of a cult epiphany (deity impersonation). Adorning herself with sacral robes and costume in the adjoining preparation room, the priestess then appeared directly through a special passage (Marinatos 1993: 108-109).
9) “Snake Goddess” – small statuette found at Knossos (Alexiou, 1968: 68).
Considered a representation of a Goddess, I interpret these statuettes as representations of leader-priestesses realizing their epiphanies of Goddess in trance states of the sacred, wisdom energetics of love and insight for community expression. The snakes could have had both literal and symbolic functions in ritual practices. Snakes shed their skin, live underground, and move out into the sun as needed, representing an earth-arising regenerative principle of matri-ethics that the Minoan complexes displayed by mirroring underground and above-ground quarters for community ritual epiphany. Snakes also have what we call now the ‘snake-brain,’ living from an instinct that mirrors our human reptilian brain function that assesses safety and threat, or basic survival instinct.
10) Rhyton – pre-palatial (2600 – 2000 BC) libation vessel. From the island of Mochlos in east Crete. Position of the hands beneath the breasts is a gesture of fertility (Alexiou, 68: 38)
Found at Mochlos, a Pre-palatial cemetery with collective burials. Secondary burial was practiced, where disarticulated skeletons are found within particular tombs. Other tombs are empty of bones and thought of as mortuary chapels. This female-breasted vessel would have been used in ceremonies associated with the ancestors, where liquid offerings flow out from her breasts. Toasting rituals and libations are understood to have been crucially important practices (Marinatos 1993: 30). Found also in association with tombs are areas for the production of both bread and wine, where the connection of grain, wine and death evokes festivals of regeneration and rebirth.
11) Ritual blowl (aka: placental bowl)
12) Home water birth – circa late 1990’s AD.
A friend of the author is giving birth in Vancouver, BC. The father is catching the baby as she is born.
13) Home water birth – emergence of baby, and (re)union with mother.
Grandmother’s hands rest on mother’s shoulders in an intergenerational circle of life and love.
14) Home water birth – resting in the first moments after birth.
15) Placenta – mother side – the mother gives birth to the placenta within after her baby is born.
The placenta is the central organ of nourishment and exchange between mother and baby while baby is growing within mother’s womb-uterus. The placenta is attached to the wall of the mother’s womb-uterus, having both a mother side and baby side. Its veinous and arterial structure are apparent from the baby side, out of which emerges the umbilical cord. The overall structure is as that of a tree, where the umbilical cord has deep roots that fan out in circular formation within the mass of placental tissue attached to the mother. The baby can be thought of as the leaves, fruits and flowers of this placental-tree morphology, and the mother is as in Mother Earth herself.
The placenta facilitates a continual dialogue of blood through its veinous corporeal mass. Blood holding nutrients and oxygen is carried from the mother through the placenta where it meets baby’s side. An exchange of oxygen and nutrients occur at the placental mass, so that baby takes maternally nourished blood into themself by way of the umbilical cord. The baby then sends out circulated blood back through the umbilicus and into the structure of the placenta where it is available for re-oxygenation and nutrition from the mother. Though the baby develops their own organ systems, heart, and blood for circulation, the placenta remains a central feature of nourishing connection from the mother.
16) Placenta – baby side – showing tree-like roots of the placental mass
17) Ritual bowl – a placental cosmology.
A placental cosmology: the placenta is a human organ of great importance and vitality to the regeneration of life. I would offer its form as a cosmological display of inter-being as in the dynamics of sacred economy, based from the gifting, unilateral, inter-fusion of maternal-mother-bodied resources to her baby, where baby is dependent on mother for gestating new life. The Minoans ritualized this gestating, regenerative transfusion of life blood, literally and metaformically, in the grains of the land and the snake-like rebirth of the ancestors towards new life, through their sacred ritual, architectural, community-sharing complexes.
(End of the Essay)
References
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