Secret Garden of the Feminine

          The Goddess Underground

If, indeed, our original cultural evolution took place within a partnership paradigm, what was the social shift that moved us toward a dominator society? In one of her many important papers, “The Three Waves of the Steppe People into Old Europe,” Gimbutas explains that the dissolution of this society, known as the Old European, was brought about by invaders she termed Kurgans (based on a word meaning “barrow,” a reference to the graves they were buried in), seminomadic horse-riding pastoralists from the Russian Steppes, who migrated into Old Europe beginning about five thousand years ago. She describes the archaeological changes found after the appearance of the Kurgans, “the towns and villages disintegrated, the magnificent painted pottery vanished; so did the shrines, frescoes, sculptures, symbols, and script. The taste for beauty and the sophistication of style and execution withered. The drastic upheaval of Old Europe is evident in the archeological record not only by the abrupt absence of the magnificent painted pottery and figurines . . . but by the equally abrupt appearance of thrusting weapons, horses–and subsequently vehicles.” [The arrival of the invaders] “initiated a dramatic shift in the prehistory of Europe–a change in social structure, in residence patterns, in art, and in religion–and was a decisive factor in the formation of the Europe of the last five thousand years.”[1]

Gimbutas contrasts the ideologies that evolved from these two vastly different cultures and compares the symbols and deities they produced. The Kurgans were nomadic, patriarchal, ranked, and warlike, and their symbology and ideology were “centered on the virile male, heroic warrior gods of the shining and thunderous sky.”[2]  On the other hand, the Old Europeans, differing dramatically, were sedentary, peaceful, egalitarian, and matrilinear, and their spiritual ideology was manifested in the “eternal aspects of birth, death and regeneration, symbolized by the feminine principle, a Mother Creatrix.”[3]

Unlike the North American continent, which was vanquished–through conquest, migration, and assimilation–over a period of only a few hundred years, the invasion of Old Europe took approximately two thousand years. This process, which began in east-central Europe and continued throughout all of central Europe, is estimated to have taken place between 4300 B.C.E. and 2800 B.C.E. The central and western Mediterranean regions, Crete and the Aegean islands did not see the process of invasion that their European neighbors endured until more than a thousand years later, about 1500 B.C.E.

The Kurgans are often referred to as Indo-European, a term that reflects the geographic area ranging from India to Europe that was conquered by the invaders. But Gimbutas more accurately refers to these invaders as Proto-Indo-European, reserving Indo-European to describe the hybridization of cultures–the preexisting Indic and European peoples with the nomadic invaders. Included among these nomadic invaders, who were ruled by warriors and priests, are the ancestors of “the Semitic people we call the Hebrews, who came from the deserts of the south and invaded Canaan.”[4]  Eisler categorizes the Semites with the Kurgans, based not so much on cultural contacts and bloodlines as on the social system they had in common–the dominator model, whose attributes include hierarchy, violence, authoritarianism, and male dominance.

At this point in history (2000 to 1500 B.C.E.), we usually find an assimilation of cultures, rather than a complete replacement of the old by the new. But as Gimbutas points out in The Language of the Goddess, “Because the androcentric (male-centered) ideology of the Indo-Europeans was that of the new ruling class, it has come down to us as the ‘official’ belief system of ancient Europe.”[5]  Instead, the religion of the indigenous people, the worship of the Goddess and her sacred rites, went underground. Officially, the Goddess was no longer viewed as the primary source of life, but was assimilated into the conquerors’ pantheon of deities as a wife or daughter, subservient to the whims of the ruling male deity. From earliest times, the Goddess was worshiped as the supreme life-giving force, until she was dethroned, assimilated, and assigned a place of lesser power as seen in the Greek and Roman pantheon of deities.

So, the Old European societies experienced an almost total cultural devolution. Those who “worshiped the life-generating and nurturing powers of the universe–in our time still symbolized by the ancient chalice or grail” were conquered and assimilated by “those who worshiped ‘the lethal power of the blade’–the power to take rather than give life that is the ultimate power to establish and enforce domination.”[6]

The centuries that mark the beginning of this current era found religion and politics becoming intimate bed-mates. In 312 C.E. the Roman Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity at the Battle of Milan. Shortly thereafter he issued a proclamation known as the Edict of Milan in 313 C.E. which promised tolerance to all religions including the fledgling but didactic cult of Christianity. Though tolerant of other religions Constantine favored the Christian sect called Catholic, meaning “universal,” above all other religions. The growth and prominence of the newly sanctioned Catholic church provided his recently united empire with much needed stability.

In an effort to achieve unity in ecclesiastical affairs of the many Christian sects, Constantine convened  the Council of Nicea in 325 C.E. to reconcile disputed points of faith. Unfortunately, codifying the many divergent branches of Christianity was the beginning of the end of religious toleration which was soon abandoned entirely when the Catholic bishops were given the power to define a body of beliefs, tenets, and dogmas which would be accepted as “orthodox.”  The church continued to grow and be favored by Constantine’s successors but it was in the reign of Theodosius (379-395 C.E.) that Christianity was made the official religion of the Roman Empire and destruction of Pagan temples was legalized. In 381 C.E. another council was held in Constantinople to further define orthodoxy and the Catholic Church was given the mandate to suppress all other religions (Theodosian Code XVI.1.2).

In the wake of this active mandate of religious suppression, the new state religion grew at a phenomenal rate over the coming centuries as the mission to convert “the heathens” to the one true religion was pursued with a radical and destructive fanaticism. Superstition became prolific as the image of evil grew in the form of the Christian devil who was seen everywhere. Numerous papal bulls, laws, were created to deal with heretics (unbelievers) and witches–those who were accused of worshiping the newly created Satan.

The supposed “devil-worshipers” were purported to call on him to cause even the most mundane mishaps of daily life such as drying up the cow’s milk of a troublesome neighbor. A manic fear erupted throughout the now Christianized Europe which lasted for centuries. This fear eventually found potent form when the church sanctioned and legitimized a papal bull called The Malleus Maleficarum,[7] “The Hammer of Witches,” a handbook for witch hunters. According to the Malleus, the three major crimes of witchcraft were the use and advocacy of birth control, performing abortions, and most absurdly, robbing a man of his virility. In Witches: A Psychoanalytical Exploration of the Killing of Women, author Evelyn Heinemann says, “The fact that the witch theory increasingly assumed that witches belonged to the female sex must definitely be seen as being grounded in an ecclesiastical tradition which had always proclaimed the inferiority of women. The explanation of why women became the major victims of witch persecutions can be seen in the Church’s misogynistic attitude.”[8] 

Over the course of several hundred years, the fear-based hysteria directed at women who were disparagingly called “witches” became known as the Inquisition and more recently called the Burning Times. During the several hundred years known as the Burning Times there are estimated to be between 900,000 to one million, mostly women, murdered throughout Europe. The Inquisition used many methods of torture and death that included, but were not limited to, burning at the stake. There were also many recorded deaths by stoning, hanging, and deliberate drowning that accounted for the numbers of murdered women. While most of these executions were conducted under civil authority, they were nonetheless sanctioned and frequently directed by the church. However, Heinemann goes on to say, “it is not sufficient to see witch persecutions exclusively as a result of the church’s misogyny.” We must ask, “In what way did the population support the authorities in the campaign against women? A possible explanation seems to be the fear of women.”[9]

Literacy, during this time, was the exclusive domain of the church. The aristocrats were educated but were, of course, taught by the church. Consequently, outside the church and civil authority there is little documentation left from this mostly illiterate time but there is enough to complete a horrific picture of the fear of women that led to this ugly period of our human history.

In the last decade controversies have arisen about the actual number of women murdered with the low end being 150,000 and the high end being nine million. The truth probably lies in the more moderate estimate of one million. This little-known but important part of world history has taken on mythological proportions because of the impact that so many millennia of female hatred and oppression has consciously and unconsciously bred into women.

What we have left is little documentation and a powerful but fact-based myth about the Burning Times that resonates with countless women worldwide, even inciting the often repeated mantra of “never again” among many women. Joseph Campbell says that mythology is truer than history because history is a just a kind of journalism. Mythology captures the imagination, the dreams, the aspirations, the longings, the yearnings, and most importantly, the beliefs of civilizations and cultures.

Beyond the controversy of numbers; whether 150,000 died or one million or more; whether by burning or hanging or stoning; no matter the time span over which it took place, it can undoubtedly be concluded that this was indeed a female holocaust[10], as defined by Webster, “any reckless destruction of life.”

The most specific change in the status of the goddess in Europe came about with the new Christian religion. The goddess took on the face of the Virgin Mary as the Church of Rome sought to convert the goddess-worshiping Pagans. Pagan holy days, such as Easter, were usurped by the ruling religious body in order to lure the heathens away from their days of worship of the goddess and her springtime fertility rites. During this time a Pagan was simply anyone who was not a Christian or Jew. It usually referred to someone who observed a polytheistic religion, such as the ancient Romans and Greeks. Even today Webster defines Pagan[11] as “a person who is not a Christian, Jew or Muslim; a heathen.”  When the political rulers of the largest empire in the then known world made their newly chosen religion the official state religion, they opened the door for condemnation and extermination of all other religions and belief systems.

This prejudice against the spiritual beliefs of indigenous cultures spread globally as the ruling monarchies of Europe devoted their resources to world-wide imperialism and colonialism. More often than not the conquering soldiers traveled the “new world” in tandem with priests in order to convert the “savages.” Most indigenous cultures held beliefs which generally included at least reverence, if not worship, of the goddess or the divine feminine represented as the earth mother.

For many decades knowledge of the Goddess has been emerging from the underground into the light. Numerous books (see the Bibliography) in the fields of history, mythology, anthropology, archaeology, and women’s studies recount the millennia-old story of the Goddess. To find out more in-depth information about the worship of the divine feminine and how her worship has been suppressed and forced to go underground you can avail yourself of the plethora of material that has come out in the last fifty years as well as new  material being published every year. As the sophistication of conducting archeological digs evolves and the methods for interpreting previous sites and ancient materials continues to develop, more and more of humanity’s past is being uncovered. No doubt what will continue to be revealed is the extent of the roles of women in cultures around the world and how the divine feminine, or lack of the divine feminine, deeply influenced the world and humanity.