Saturday, September 22, 2007

Woody: Episode #2

If you recall our friend Woody, the self-proclaimed historian, he recently commented about Vikings having horns on their helmets, which is a myth.  The Vikings never had horns on their headgear as far as we know.  Some pictures portraying, Norse deities, show them with helmets that have wings on them, but never horns.  There are some Celtic (very closely associated with Norse) gods portrayed as having horns on their head, such as Hern/Hern the Hunter/Cernunnos (pictured below holding a traditional Celtic torque in his right hand and a serpent in his left).  It's another motif in mythology for male fertility gods, such as Hern, to have horns on their head.  These are usually rams' horns, but in Hern's case they are the antlers of a stag.

Also pictured below is the Egyptian god of virility known as Amun/Amon (middle), or later as Amun-Ra/Amon-Ra when he and another deity (Ra) were simplified into one god.  Another god, Ares/Aries (bottom, in the constellation format), is the Greek god of war and masculinity.

This fact isn't so commonly known, and I wouldn't dis anyone for not knowing it but this guy, because he actually claims to study history intensely.  I wanted to point it out anyway, so you can look even more cultured at the next cocktail party you go to!  Ha, ha... that's what these random facts are good for - impressing people at parties!  But seriously, the idea of horns represting the male human is a lasting concept that still has an impression on today's society, but it a bit beyond the rating of this blog, and so I won't elaborate on that.

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