After last week’s festival, M. launched into a mini-rant about Pagans’ fondness for some form of re-created archaic dress. For instance, the priest at the solstice sunrise ritual was attired in sort of Dark Ages style: loose trousers gathered at the ankle, loose-fitting shirt, cloak, and sword and spear. How is that more Pagan than jeans and sneakers?<\/p>\n
It’s not just us though. Recently I drove past a Protestant church in the small town where we get our mail, and they had set up tents and two-dimensional plywood camels, and people were lounging around in their own form of ancient Judaean costume. I assume it was some sort of Vacation Bible School event.<\/p>\n
M., however, objects to the glorification of the Middle Ages, which she sees as repressive in almost all regards. It’s true that since the 1970s, when I first encountered the Craft, there has been an unfortunate bleed-through from the Society for Creative Anachronism<\/a>, which glorifies the Middle Ages and Renaissance as somehow more vital and creative than Now. Of course, the SCA still enjoys plumbing and electricity; and everyone gets to be an aristocrat, or aspires to be. Even that is fine with me–the bad part is when SCA status influences status in the Pagan community. One is a baroness in the SCA; therefore, one’s fellow Pagans should treat one with more regard. I have seen this phenomenon more than once.<\/p>\n Homo religiosus<\/em>, the religious person, seems to hold the past in higher regard than the present. The older the text or teaching, the more authoritative it is. Past practice, even if impractible today, has a normative effect–it tells us what we might do. For example, where would the contemporary Heathen practice of sei\u00f0r<\/em> be without that one passage from the Elder Edda about the volva<\/em><\/a> with her catskin gloves? How could I be working on my flying ointment paper without the 14th-century story of Lady Alice Kytler<\/a>, who beat the rap but let her maid be executed–thus demonstrating the true aristocratic temperment, as opposed to the SCA variety.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" After last week’s festival, M. launched into a mini-rant about Pagans’ fondness for some form of re-created archaic dress. For instance, the priest at the solstice sunrise ritual was attired in sort of Dark Ages style: loose trousers gathered at the ankle, loose-fitting shirt, cloak, and sword and spear. How is that more Pagan than […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[204,127],"class_list":["post-461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-ancestors","tag-festivals"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s6xQTg-461","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":12034,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12034","url_meta":{"origin":461,"position":0},"title":"Your Ancestors May Not Be What You Think They Were","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"February 1, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"A lot of us contemporary Pagans have a problem with our ancestors. We feel like there is a huge chasm of separation between them and us. I mean, look at Stan (as I think he was known) Clifton here. He was one of my great-great-grandfathers Born in North Carolina, he\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"ancestors\"","block_context":{"text":"ancestors","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=ancestors"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/Bartholomew-Stanhope-Clifton-1828-1884-R-707x1024.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/Bartholomew-Stanhope-Clifton-1828-1884-R-707x1024.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/Bartholomew-Stanhope-Clifton-1828-1884-R-707x1024.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":605,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=605","url_meta":{"origin":461,"position":1},"title":"Ancestral facesCompared to their 14th-16th\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"January 30, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Ancestral facesCompared to their 14th-16th century ancestors, today's English have slightly different faces, reports the BBC, in one of those short pieces that raises more questions than it answers.Modern people possess less prominent features but higher foreheads than our medieval ancestors.Is it because back then they were rolling out of\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8134,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8134","url_meta":{"origin":461,"position":2},"title":"Can You Help Your Ancestors Instead of Rejecting Them?","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 22, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"A few weeks ago I was asked to write a cover blurb for a Llewellyn book, something that does not happen very often. It was a pretty good book. Some people might have found the title obscure, but that was not my decision. But one thing stopped me in my\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"ancestors\"","block_context":{"text":"ancestors","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=ancestors"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1181,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1181","url_meta":{"origin":461,"position":3},"title":"Gallimaufry with Ancestors","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 28, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"\u2022 From Svartes\u00f3l, five ways of communicating with the gods.\u2022 Paula Jean West has a round-up of posts on Pagan festival etiquette. But needing a wi-fi hotspot? I thought some people went to festivals to get away from all that. Write some columns in advance--that's the traditional way of dealing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"blogging\"","block_context":{"text":"blogging","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=blogging"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12269,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12269","url_meta":{"origin":461,"position":4},"title":"How the Ancestors Danced","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"June 5, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"I feel obligated for my North American readers to note that in Scandinavia \"elk\" means \"moose\" (Alces alces).((Like a Norwegian elkhound is a dog you take moose-hunting, just to locate the moose is all.)) I suppose the Finns use that word \"elk\"\u00a0 in English because Finland was ruled by Sweden\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/rainio_fig20_002-edit-1024x438.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/rainio_fig20_002-edit-1024x438.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/rainio_fig20_002-edit-1024x438.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":8491,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8491","url_meta":{"origin":461,"position":5},"title":"The Old Ones Built Wisely","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"March 20, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"My house comes with its own solar calendar, sort of. I discovered when M. and I moved here in the 1990s that the equinoctial sunset occurs in a notch formed by the ridge to the west, as viewed from the front porch. Surely the ancient builders planned this! Actually, the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"American religion\"","block_context":{"text":"American religion","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=american-religion"},"img":{"alt_text":"equinox sunset","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/equinox-sunset.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/equinox-sunset.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/equinox-sunset.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=461"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10290,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461\/revisions\/10290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}