Vesica Piscis: Mother Earth and the Creative Force

Waylands Smithy Vesica Piscis crop circle, August 4th, 2011 -- sacred geometric co-radial circles where circumference of each shares the center of the other -- its central axis symbolizing the Cosmic Birth Canal to which, according to the Maya, all life returns in December 2012

The symbol of an ovoid –an egg– expresses the the primordial form of everything manifest, from atom to globe, from man to angel. The spheroid is with all nations the emblem of eternity and infinity —- a serpent swallowing its own tail. To realize the meaning, however, the sphere must be thought of as seen from its centre
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine

The Vesica Piscis in sacred tradition — from Kabbalist to Vedic to Zen — is considered to represent the female organ of creation. Its circular shape invokes an intertwining of feminine energies, Mother Earth’s womb, a mingling of Nature and primeval cultural reverence: it is a symbol seen in all ancient graphical traditions, from pagan Sun Wheel, Celtic cross, architectural ‘golden mean‘ to sacred windows in cathedrals, mosques, tabernacles and pagodas.

The Vesica Piscis also represented to the Maya the summer and winter solstices in any time cycle. To them the Vesica Piscis shape held the Cycle of the Ages — the Precession of the Equinoxes, less of a calculation of Time; more as a symbol of evolution of consciousness. We are experiencing this change now as we move from one World Age (Christian Age of Pisces, 0BC-AD2000) to another (‘New Age’ of Aquarius).

Its Latin meaning, lit. bladder of the fish, may seem to lessen its sacred quality to the prosaic, but it remains connected in a bodily way and in the geometric sense in all cultures — East and West.

Antediluvian Meaning
In earliest traditions, the supreme being was represented by a sphere, the symbol of a Creator with no beginning and no end, continually existing, perfectly formed and profoundly symmetrical. The addition of a second sphere represented the expansion of unity into the duality of female and male. By overlapping, both spheres — goddess and god — created a divine offspring. The Vesica Piscis with its derivatives, the Flower of Life, Tree of Life, and fundamentals of geometry, has a history of thousands of years, easily predating all major religions of the current era.

A theme running through several recent crop circle seasons — most striking from 2007 on — has been the suggestion by the ‘Circlemakers’ that we return to the wisdom of our roots: roots in our native Earth, roots of our tradition, our sacred beginnings. Since it is presently clear to almost anyone in the Western World that in pursuing our headlong drive for power, riches and exploitation over balance, human warmth and respect for the earth, we have gone seriously awry. It might seem that our combined consciousness — that deep level of awareness we share beneath the cultural façade; what Terence McKenna called Humanity’s Oversoul — has chosen to ‘wake us up’ by bringing us (those genuine electromagnetically-produced) crop circles each year, to educate us and lead us gently towards a more loving future.

Perhaps, therefore, we should not be surprised by the ingenuity and wry sense of humor of the Circlemakers.

West Kennet Crop circle central tuft with 'spiderweb' filaments. Sacred earth pyramid Silbury Hill in distance, largest manmade mound in Europe,
photo Mariusz Szymaszek

For instance, this year in May — while we were all looking forward rather than looking at the miracles of the season — a quiet little ring appeared in green barley at East Kennet. It lay within one field’s breadth (roughly 10 acres) of one of Wiltshire’s most ancient shrines — the Neolithic tomb (long barrow) of West Kennet. Several 5,000-year old monuments lie — inter-visible — in this densely-built Neolithic landscape within two miles of Avebury’s Great Stone Circles.

Stonehenge and its magical meridian (51ºN) aside, the modern British are not particularly drawn to ancient shrines for their sacred quality, but crop circles — appearing within the same landscape and overlying the same limestone aquifer that produces measurable electromagnetic resonance (likened to human meditational alpha waves) — have been drawing them in. Nobody who has spent time in a pristine formation can deny it holds an ‘atmosphere’, an energy which can be uplifting, almost surreal. There is a growing body of evidence that crop circles are indeed produced through the medium of light and sound.

When the East Kennet circle first appeared, Stuart Dike, one of the long-time stalwarts of CropCircleConnector, crop circle ‘bible’, said at the time:

East Kennet crop design, May 17th, was ringed by extra circles June 22. If seen as the 'negative', it acquired a mirror-image 'positive' at West Kennet, July 25th 2011,
photo Olivier Morel

It certainly takes me back to over twenty years ago, from the 1990 days in Wiltshire. This is what we were all used to seeing back then, very simple designs, with a sense of excitement of what they could become. It’s a great indication that the earlier designs are very much part of what’s occurring today: the precursor of what was to be an evolutionary road in geometry and complexity. Perhaps the phenomenon is telling us not to ignore the purity of what was occurring at the very beginning.

Little did we know that the Circlemakers had further plans for that small field. One month later, during excitement of solstice and a profusion of appearances (2 at Stonehenge + 4 more in the vicinity over a 2-day period), nobody seemed to notice that East Kennet had acquired three concentric rings (June 22).

West Kennet Longbarrow, July 25th 'mirror image' of East Kennet phases 1 & 2, photo courtesy Bert Janssen

Then exactly a month after that, on July 22, attention focused on the intricate and superb ‘spider-web’ headdress formation which appeared in an adjoining field (East Kennet-2). There followed in quick succession two exceptionally graphic ‘suggestive’ crop designs at Roundway (1 & 2, July 23 & 25) –appearing to advocate humanity’s opening its third eye, releasing the body’s natural happiness hormone, melatonin— so, once again a little mirror appearance the same day — at West Kennet Long Barrow itself this time, next to the passage grave — seemed less than significant.

Working behind the scenes are a multitude of local altruistic researchers (CCC, above, is one of many). Their common bond is that they believe that ‘genuine’ crop circles are phenomena somehow produced through an electromagnetic or dimensional medium, either by light, sound or other variants within that vast spectrum. Sometimes, when local conditions are just right, a substance colloquially known as ‘angel hair’ (documented as being found after UFO sightings) has been deposited and can be measured, if collected within the first few hours after a formation has been laid down. Researchers in this field include the Massachusetts-based BLT, the British Harmony Blue group, and the CircularSite in the Netherlands,. They are consequently disappointed and nonplussed by world media efforts to persevere in ‘replicating’ crop circles, as has been tried on several occasions. Research on the dimensional/spiritual nature of real crop circles continues. On the morning the West Kennet circle motif appeared, the HarmonyBlue team found angel hair in the West Kennet formation (‘spiderweb’ photo, above).

There is even the suggestion — by the much more charismatic ‘spider-web’ crop appearance at East Kennet on July 22 — that the Circlemakers were telling them where to look!

Two Cherhill crop circles in the same week: Cherhill Down, July 20th, left; Cherhill 'smoking alien' July 27th, right

Sacred geometry
The Vesica Piscis is the root principle in sacred geometry, interlocking circles which share radii, cosmically and intrinsically entwined. In precise mathematical measurement, where the circumference of each shares the center of the other, the ratio between the width of the vesica piscis to its height is the square root of 3, or approximately 1.7320508…

A mathematical sub-note: if straight lines are drawn between the centers of both circles with each other and with the two points where their circumferences intersect, two equilateral triangles can be formed, joining along an edge.

Eye of consciousness, complete with eyelashes! Crop circle at Silbury Hill, Avebury August 2, 2011

Archimedes of Syracuse, 287-212BC, Greek mathematician, physicist, engineer, inventor and astronomer, in his On the Measurement of the Circle, used these ratios:

In Christian tradition this sacred number –153– appears miraculously in the Gospel of John [21:11] as the number of fishes which Jesus of Nazareth caused to be manifested in the Feeding of the Multitude story. Since all Judaic written (Biblical) tradition centered on sacred number, numerological sequence and coded word combinations/number of letters used, this coincidence has a deeper meaning. The Fish — Lat. Piscis — is well-known as the secret symbol used by the Early Christians in Rome. By enumerating the total catch on the Sea of Gallilee, specific use of that sacred geometric ratio would have had meaning to early followers, aware of the significance of number.

Interlocking circles, Water & the Sacred Feminine: Vesica Piscis's sacred shape which seals the cover of the Sacred Chalice Well at Glastonbury, Somerset

Probably the best known example in England of the Vesica Piscis is the design on the wellcover of the Sacred Chalice Well at Glastonbury. While we are now culturally ignorant of number, this design resonates with us on a subliminal level (internal balance) and, seen there in a New Age context, represents the Universal symbol of the Feminine, Mother Earth, in contrast with the nearby masculine emblem of Glastonbury Tor. The Glastonbury example on the lid of the Chalice well — like the crop circle at Wayland’s Smithy (top) — contains the meridian line that runs through the centers of both circles.

Even though this archaic symbolism may not seem relevant to some after so many aeons of time, it is not unrealistic to suppose that our cultural unconscious, even blurred and insensitized by modern inconsequential minutiae in massive overdose, does at some deep level sense peace, harmony and beauty when we behold this sacred design.

Egyptian Celestial and Sacred Measure
We owe the Egyptians for the application of Sacred Geometry on the surface of the Earth.

Cosmic serpent-of-Life returning to its birth canal at the center of the Galaxy in 2012 -- West Woodhay Down, Inkpen crop circle July 29th, arrived as a prelude to the August 4th glyph (top), the Cosmic birth canal itself

Geo-metry means ‘measure of the earth’. In ancient Egypt, from which Greece and eventually the West inherited the study, the Nile would flood its banks each year, obliterating orderly demarcation of plot and farm areas. This annual inundation symbolized to the Egyptian the cyclic return of primal watery chaos, and when the waters receded the work began of redefining and re-establishing boundaries. The temple astronomer might announce that celestial configurations had changed so the orientation or location of a temple had to be adjusted. It was seen as regaining law and order, dominion over the earth. The laying of squares upon the earth had, for the Egyptian, a metaphysical as well as a physical and social dimension. This activity of measuring the earth – ‘geo-meter’- became the basis for a science of natural law embodied in the archetypal forms of circle, triangle and square.

Plato at his Academia required the study of mathematics as a prerequisite for philosophia, a term signifying “the love of wisdom” and “to lift the soul to truth.” To him, symbolic mathematics provided a map of our own inner psychological and sacred spiritual structure. Through the study of recurring harmonious patterns inherent in mathematics, music, and nature, ancient mathematical philosophers recognized that consistent correspondences occur inside the human mind and simultaneously throughout the universe.

Sacred geometric shapes: circle, triangle, square

This Zen calligraphic drawing shows Creation through the simple progression from the unity of the circle, through the triangle, to the manifest form of the square.

The circle –one– and the vesica piscis –two– were considered by ancient mathematical philosophers to be the parents of Number. Their firstborn, the triangle –three– was the ‘first’ and eldest number. Its geometric expression, the equilateral triangle, is the initial shape to emerge through the portal of the vesica piscis, the First of the Many. The square –four– was the second born.

Alpha and Omega
Mathematics and sacred geometry can take us beyond our ordinary limits to cosmic depths.

Furze or Morgan Hill, Bishops Cannings, August 6th dimensional progression on the Vesica Piscis: two cosmic parents produce a dimensional child

Man –from the Sanskrit root manas, meaning ‘Mind’, Consciousness, is a creature who can reflect upon himself. Man is not a mere constituent part –a cog– in this Universal Cycle, but he is both the final complete product of evolution and the original seed potential out of which the Universe germinated. The Alpha as well as the Omega. Both the seed and the tree: the tree of the universe is the actualization of the seed potential, which is Cosmic Man.

The World Tree of the Maya now begins to make sense. Mayan cosmology saw the Rift in the Milky Way as the the female birth canal (Yoni, Vesica Piscis) to which the Serpent of Life returns in December 2012.

Spiraling towards Source

CCC denizen Dike may have had a premonition when he said (above) that ‘the (CC) phenomenon is telling us not to ignore the purity of what was occurring at the very beginning’. Without realizing it, he may have been referring to the very beginning of Time. As we spiral onwards through the Galaxy towards our 2012 rendezvous with that primeval birth canal, we are indeed completing a cycle, coming to our ending, but also returning to our beginning.

Final call from the Ionosphere: Lighten UP!

Alien face crowned by feathered headdress, with collar and surrounding field of exquisite reflective crop lay like a spider's web, East Kennet July 2011

“All is Number. God is Number. God is in All.”
Pacal Votan, Last Great King of the Maya, AD603-683, Palenque Chiapas Mexico
“The mathematics of Space cannot be used to measure Time. Only the mathematics of Time can fulfill this. This is the fourth dimensional mathematics of the Maya”
Valum Votan, José Argüelles, AD1952-2011

Daniel Pinchbeck said as much. In his acclaimed book ‘2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl‘, (Tarcher hardcover U.S. 2006, released in GB paperback under title ‘Year of the Mayan Prophecy‘, Piatkus 2008) he sums up the quandary posed by our society’s headlong pursuit of Science to the detriment of all our naturally-acquired wisdom, leaving our instincts, our psychic connection with our intuition, our ‘still, small voice within’ lagging and dragging behind and falling by the wayside — where it languishes without love.

Amesbury, Stonehenge: twelvefold crop motif July 13th-- trompe l'oeil effect of sacred geometry, to which the passing crowd seems indifferent

“Science likes to work in paradigms. Because we don’t have explanatory grids for (UFOs, aliens, and) crop circles, they tend to be dismissed automatically and ridiculed. They are events that cross the boundary between the psychic and physical. I like the Jungian perspective that these phenomena are aspects of archetypes that are presently constellating in the collective psyche”
Daniel Pinchbeck, 2012:The Return of Quetzalcoatl

James Clerk Maxwell, (1831-1879) Scots physicist and graduate of Universities of Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Cambridge, realized that light, electricity, and magnetism were all aspects of the same phenomenon: one of the great unifications of physics. His mathematical ‘equations’, formulated in 1861, are still considered the basis of much continuing research in the electromagnetic field, and more currently in the field of biomagnetics.

Overton Down, July 18th, 2011 above the Ridgeway. Avebury sacred stone circle lies below, just over the ridge.
Photo Stuart Dike

But Science is struggling to explain the diversity and regularity with which crop circle imprints are created electromagnetically usually at night, but sometimes in daylight in a matter of minutes, leaving an unbruised crop bent but still growing; often with masterful and exquisite layering, and tufted central designs. The July 22nd crop formation at East Kennet (top) is an example. Not only are its ten pyramids symbolic of completion, full cycle, returning to source, but the background motif of a spider’s web implies perfection: that humanity is (perhaps) still on course for a change –a unification– in consciousness. The design has more symbols: enough to satisfy multiple doubting disbelievers. The central head can either be seen as Lord of the Dawn, Quetzalcoatl, the Great God of Central American belief in Number — crowned by his feathered-serpent headdress — or as the almond-shaped ‘Seat of the Soul’,’third eye’of the human body, the pineal gland, located in the middle of the head and source of bodily happiness, whose secretions of the hormone seratonin/melatonin (see below) produce altered states of consciousness.

Crop circle Reprise: crop design at East Kennet, July 22 this year (right) within ten-pointed ziggurat star design; compare Quetzalcoatl headdress within 20-pointed star at Wayland's Smithy, 2005 (left)

Back to the Garden

‘…We are stardust
Billion year old carbon
We are golden
Caught in the devil’s bargain…and we’ve got to get ourselves back to the Garden…’
Joni Mitchell, 1969

While our ancestors schooled us through millennia of handed-down wisdom –even in the West we had teachers, to whom we gradually turned a deaf ear — with the exploration of America, the Indies, the ‘Colonies’, we became conquerors, achievers, the epitome of current male-oriented culture where science and domination and ‘success’ are valued, with peace, balance and tender care for the Earth seen as weakness. Indigenous cultures were suppressed, EarthFirst beliefs and traditions devalued. They and their ancestral lands were marginalized.

Michael Lindfield, author of The Dance of Change, formerly a 14-year resident of the Intentional Community of Findhorn in NE Scotland, puts this anomalous situation in context:

Etchilhampton, Wiltshire July 25th --one of 3 appearing same day: hexagonal design with higher dimensional central cube motif, reminiscent of last year's Metatron's cube. Farmer David White is giving all visitor donations to charity

“I believe, that in the West, we have worked to hone and perfect the analytical mind. In our scientific research into the meaning of life, we’ve been looking mostly at objects. What we haven’t really paid attention to is the relationships in between. We see that as empty space. The prevailing world-view is it’s just empty space populated by objects.

“I believe space is a living field. Space as an entity in its own right –through its energetic field– makes conscious relationship possible. It’s a ‘vibrant field of conscious connection’ because it allows relationship between objects to exist. As a ‘being’ in its own right, it’s more like a wave than a particle. You have to have both waves and particles to have the whole picture. And I think we’ve just been looking at the particles, trying to put the particles together, and forgetting about the wave.”

July 20th yin-yang symbol at Louth, Lincolnshire, 3rd this season. Louth lies at 0ºW 53ºN, symbolic of zero point in human consciousness, 53 the sacred number for Garden of Eden

Astrophysicist Alan Holt, a NASA space engineer who spends half his life on-planet and half his life off — in orbit on ISS — has the benefit of God’s eye view of the progress of civilization. One of his on-planet obsessions is crop circles. He visited the Wiltshire hub in the summer of 2000 and again this year.

“On the way back to Glastonbury we stopped at the Barge Inn. The Barge Inn is located along one of the many canals (Kennet and Avon, Ed.) crisscrossing England, and is a meeting place and informal headquarters for crop circle researchers and visitors. Photos of the latest crop circles are tacked up on a bulletin board.”
Alan Holt M.S., ISS astronaut

“Since I have for many years used enhanced intuitive capabilities to pick up additional information, I did sit in the crop circle near the Barge Inn (in 2000) and picked up some interesting impressions pertaining to the future. In addition, I put out the thought, somewhat as a test but really a request, that I would like to see a crop pictogram appear which could provide me some insight into the direction I should pursue in my advanced transport/field physics research activities.” Alan Holt July 2000

Space Utilization and Exploration Projects

Crabwood 2002 message in ASCII code: 'beware the bearers of false gifts and broken promises'

“The complexity and form of the crop pictograms continue to be very amazing and insightful. There is a growing focus on, and concern for, the decline of the Earth’s environment; and a growing awareness of the upcoming shifts in the calendars of the Maya, Hopi, and other native groups; and what these shifts (in consciousness?) could mean for human civilization. It would be interesting if any trends in the crop pictograms begin to occur, which more directly and more often address steps to help us avoid the decline in the Earth’s environment, and enhance potential shifts in human consciousness.

Alien oval face Hinton Parva, Wiltshire July 20th, 2011

Alan Holt, astrophysicist

While the space engineer is careful to specify that his opinion is his alone (not associated in any way with his employer, NASA), he also speaks in a forthright manner about space exploration and human consciousness — his two main interests.

‘There is truly an astounding phenomenon unfolding in England and elsewhere in the world. It’s very unfortunate that unscientific thinking, and perhaps deliberate disinformation, of a few individuals have been picked up and accepted by a naïve press worldwide. As a result, millions of people have been deprived of the opportunity to experience a consciousness-expanding phenomenon. It is our civilization’s loss; but fortunately the apparently successful attempt to ridicule or “debunk” crop circles will do nothing to stop what may be a major transformation ahead for humanity.’

‘From my perspective, there is also a warning or “be prepared” message coming through the crop pictograms as well. We have not been very good stewards of the planet on which we are living. We have recklessly depleted resources; contaminated water, air and Earth; threatened the foundation of Earth’s viability with the use and testing of nuclear weapons (and perhaps other exotic technology), and continue to waste at least one-half of what we produce –especially here in the U.S. The Earth can compensate for some of our mistakes, but it too goes through transformations. If our care of our planet is not dramatically improved soon, we may not have many more years to enjoy the beauty and nurturing environment which even now the Earth still provides.’

One might imagine his regular visits to ISS –in addition to his terrestrial work with NASA– give him an ET-eye-view of our blue planet. In May this year he was interviewed by Suzanne Taylor, producer-director of the 2010 movie: What on Earth? He recalled his request eleven years earlier (the intuitively-voiced prayer while in the Barge Inn crop formation) and says:

“It was made clear to me in my first visit to a crop pictogram in 2000, that we may not have many years left to enjoy the verdant Earth as we do now. Hopefully, we have made progress since 2000 to reverse that trend, and we will take additional steps to minimize the Earth’s environmental decline.” Alan Holt update, May 2011

Eleven years ago: Magnetic field in a Wiltshire crop field, July 22, 2000 at Knoll Down, Avebury Trusloe

“The bar magnet crop pattern which appeared during my visit in 2000, did seem to be an answer to the question/request (which I mentally proposed) about the best research approach, in my breakthrough space transport interests. I am now convinced that humanity’s destiny path will lead us to become a very successful, evolved consciousness — a space-exploration species. The crop pictograms may be helping us to take a few key steps down that path.” Alan Holt, Project Manager, NASA Space Exploration, International Space Station (ISS) (personal view).

Roundway (2) July 25th, hard on the heels of its melatonin molecular companion, suggestive of the human 'third eye'-- the pineal ('pine-cone') gland. This glyph was harvested immediately by the farmer

As we know, the Earth acts as a giant magnet, with terminals of the magnetosphere entering, penetrating and exiting through the torus of the north and south poles. Every living creature is affected –from birth until death– by electromagnetic fluctuations generated by this huge dynamo. Most dramatic illustration is the way bees and bats use it. Other higher animals (homing pigeons, gestating whales, migrating turtles and geese) adjust their frequency to home in on their geographical place of birth via genetic/intuitive tuning into Earth’s magnetic field. On a day-to-day level, this magnetic shield — the magnetosphere — is protecting and shielding living beings from (excessive) solar radiation, CMEs and stray emissions from deep space. It is known to affect brain function and therefore can –in some humans– have an influence on health and behavior. It is the invisible energy that drives the Universe.

Windmill Hill-2, Avebury, July 26th: culmination of several consecutive days of crop images, courtesy CircleChasers

Pinchbeck says: ‘We may be at the same place with psychic phenomena and psychic energy today as we were in the mid-18th Century with electricity. We may find that we can tap into psychic energy for purposes of planetary transformation, in the way that we once used to tap into electricity.’

‘Our future as a species may depend upon us developing a more sophisticated awareness of the activities of other forms of intelligent life in the cosmos. We may find that there is a multidimensional multitude of other beings with different agendas and intentions, and we will have to learn to discriminate between psychic realms that are spiritually beneficial for us and others that are dangerous and potentially destructive for us.’

The Spirit Molecule

Roundway crop circle-1 (left) appeared July 23rd: compare it with the 5-MeO-DMT molecule (right), the chemical structure of melatonin or the 'spirit molecule'

ET, having sent a couple of ‘serious’ messages — some feel the alien ‘Gray’ head at Charlbury Hill, Hinton Parva-2 (July 20th) is being ‘scalped’ by one field tramline and its mouth muzzled by the other — two of July’s most recent communications give a clear suggestion to look at the chemical structure of hormone melatonin. The curvacious equation appeared last weekend (July 23rd) next to the ancient Roundway Mound below the Millennium White Horse. Melatonin occurs naturally in the body, is produced by the pineal gland (above) and its chemical constituents (DMT = C12N2H16, melatonin = C13H18N2O) are similar to the family grouping of human DNA, with which it combines easily. Two days later another (Roundway-2) crop design appeared, suggesting the remarkably aesthetic structure of the human ‘third-eye’, the pineal gland which secretes the treasured hormone — ‘spirit-molecule’, DMT in natural form.

Are our off-planet/higher dimensional colleagues/audience encouraging us? Egging us on to access our own natural hormones to create greater bliss? Or merely suggesting we don’t take ourselves quite so seriously, i.e. LIGHTEN UP?

While bigtime media may not recognize this (‘always the last to find out’), there is a growing awareness in the crop circle community and its followers that much new information is being transmitted for our delectation by a ‘multi-dimensional’ source –call it what you will. One focus for this interest in the paranormal, higher dimension perspective –the connection between the waves– is CircleChasers’ annual gathering and discussion at the Coronation Hall, Alton Barnes, Wiltshire, which will be held this year on Wednesday, July 27th –in two days’ time. The speaker will be Andrew Collins. His theme: UFOs, Plasma and the Multidimensional Experience. If you are anywhere near the vicinity, it should be an evening worth your while.

The Wiltshire community, converging on Alton Barnes-Barge Inn-Honey Street-Avebury are, like some of its farmers, a real mix of emotional extremes. There are those who would remove all evidence before it percolates; others who want to share the bounty. It’s an individual thing. But, as our supporters say –astronauts to combine harvester-drivers to microlite photographers– it’s not going to go away. Catch it while you can.

…and the beat goes on…
©2011 Marian Youngblood

Harvest or Virgin Consciousness

Harvesting a crop circle in Wiltshire

In the ancient world, long before Man’s civilized overlay and 5,000-year male-dominion, there were the Sun, the Moon and the Earth and the Earth was the Mother.

Seasons guided formative cultures who measured time by movement of the moon, sun and constellations, creating permanent power places at energetic nodes in the landscape. In ancient Britain neolithic farmers, most remarkably within the Wiltshire magnetic basin, rolled and erected giant monoliths in difficult terrain to mark changes in the calendar (and solar energy) with a series of fire festivals: hinges of the seasons were celebrated with fire like doorways into dying or rebirth.

When farming was in its infancy, Harvest time – ancient Lammas, Lughnasad, August’s festival-of-Light (Lugh) – went on for weeks, celebrating the Mother’s generous provision of food, sustaining and nurturing vulnerable embryo farming communities. The Sun’s power was waning, but the Earth was at her peak, her most abundant. Harvest was a sacred rite of bounty: first sheaf cut, the Maiden or Virgin, was blessed, honored, paraded in the fields and then kept over winter indoors until planted – again ritually – in the first tilled furrow of spring.

Along with harvest and farming generally, the Maiden sheaf has been trivialized: she is now the ‘Corn Dolly’. Scythes have become combine harvesters, man-made behemoths which decimate hectares in half an hour; spewing grain into giant dryers whose contents turn up on Tesco shelves a week later as bin-end ‘specials’.

Gone are the female earth-mothering images: Halstatt figurines of pregnant femininity now reside in museums, carved stone balls inspired by the spiral of creation gather dust in archives along with Man’s ancient knowledge.

Return of Saturnia Regna

Carved stone ball Aberdeenshire 3000BC

Celebrations reenacted in our digital age for tourists and late-summer ‘revenue’, are pale shadows of a time when community meant working together to bring in the harvest and throwing a party afterwards. Harvest thanksgiving has now no meaning.

All, however, is not lost.

Virgil, the Roman poet (70-19BC) wrote of a time when ‘the Virgin and the Golden Age (age of Saturn) will return’ (iam redit et Virgo redeunt Saturnia Regna). We may now live in those ‘End Times’ on a planet ravaged by war, famine and pestilence; a male-manipulated pendulum of food mountains and shortages, of deadlines and death-defying daily forays on the freeway; but the feminine may yet have ways of filtering through consciousness into the most hardened of masculine endeavors. The right hemisphere of the brain is rising again, demanding we look in places long hidden.

In one corner of our consciousness we are seeing signs in the heavens which astrologers predict as a coming together of the Virgin and Saturn; the sun and ringed giant are presently in the zodiac sign of Virgo: with upheaval and change seen as major factors. But it can also be seen as archetypal male and female convergence. In another corner we are receiving reminders to appreciate the earth; from matriarchal cultures, like the Maya who have not forgotten their past, shaman leaders are speaking again. In a recent message, breaking a silence of 10 generations, their Elders, keepers of the Mayan ‘word’, suggest a melding of hemispheres – both mental and worldly – as a way forward for the human race.

And in an unexpected corner, from within the sacred precinct of England’s most famous prehistoric stones, harvest has taken on a deeper meaning. Since June this year a staggering 70 new crop-circles have appeared in fields of ripening wheat and barley in Wiltshire and Oxfordshire near neolithic sacred sites like Avebury and Sillbury Hill, renowned for ancient goddess worship. Once the domain of fringe UFOlogists, increasingly complex designs forming within a highly erratic magnetic area have triggered discussion from some of the world’s greatest scientific and mathematical minds. A code sequence emerges alternately suggesting an imminent human epiphany or activation of planetary DNA. And they and the fields where they lie are getting a lot more attention.

Numerologists were minimal when an ‘Om’ design appeared in a crop in July 7, 2007 – 07-07-07; by 2008, sophisticated symbols were increasing and by August 8 – 08-08-08 – an infinity symbol caused a stir. Whether subliminal or actual, crop circle messages were beginning to trigger a change in human consciousness. People flocked to the sacred sites of Wiltshire and Hampshire as soon as summer began.

Crop-circles, writing in the corn, back to the earth: human awakening; Native American belief that the way forward is in the melding of ancient knowledge with modern capabilities: All point toward a vision of the New Age: that through respect for the Earth as giver of life and by cherishing our own female intuitive powers (both men and women), we regain insight into our purpose here and simultaneously arrive at the long-awaited Golden Age.

The year 2009 brings mounting excitement, instant coverage from aerial photography, world media attention. Designs appear in June more complicated and beautiful than the world’s greatest minds might devise. A plethora of new crop circles throughout July have followers on the edge of their seats, waiting for what will happen next. August starts well: designs and embedded code more complex than ever.

Thing is: there have been no new crop circles since August 16th. Nothing. Nada. Zero. Major disappointment in croppiedom; huge let-down for consciousness collectives. Harvest is well advanced in the fields of Wiltshire. What are we waiting for?

The answer may lie in our collective unconscious: the New Age unfolds; Saturn returns to stand with the Sun in Virgo. Around about September 9th this year – 09-09-09 – if there are any fields left unharvested in the countryside around Avebury, Sillbury Hill or West Kennet Long Barrow we may be witness to something none of us can remotely imagine.

We shall have to wait and see.