Saturday 20 March 2010
Thursday 18 March 2010
Wednesday 17 March 2010
Tuesday 16 March 2010
books thoughts and companions
tuesday 16 march 2010
Patricia Fara’s book really is very good. She takes a thoroughly worldwide view of the past – which is all in accord with contemporary practice – and her writing is so fine and clear, delightful to read. Today I’ve passed through the [1453!] Renaissance with her. She sets out the trained occultist versus black magician scenario in just a few words which explain the picture better than I have seen before. She encourages me, at some convenient time in the future, to go back to her chapters on Alchemy and on Magic, re-read them and follow up with an inspection of whatever original books are in the Bodleian. And always, lurking comfortably somewhere at the back of my mind, are thoughts of how much of our present practice depends on strands which go back far further than any of us have imagined. Mind you, Patricia Fara doesn’t always have approving things to say about some of them. Fascinating just the same.
She makes a good point when she observes that monastic and abbey clocks calling the monks to the daily offices gradually imposed a schedule determined by a clockwork mechanism rather than by the old ways depending on the rising and setting of the sun. Then the twelve equal hours of a summer’s day were each longer then the twelve equal hours of the winter’s day. I’d not come across this explanation before. We have a parallel. Nowadays in towns and cities Imbolc Beltane Lammas and Samhain tend to be celebrated on or soon after the beginning of their relative months rather than, as in theory they used to be, when they related to actual events in the fields and on the farm.
Not many young people lounging in Members’ today though there were a fair few sitting at the tables out in the garden. We older ones tend to gather at the same table indoors and chat. Inconsequentially.
I can pick up on the reviews for Marion next week, then they’ll be stacking up for the Lammas number of Pentacle. If I reserve one half-day each week for actually typing the reviews, that should give a reasonable contribution for each quarterly issue.
This year we can clearly see how the ‘rules’ for Easter are clear on the calendar. The Vernal Equinox is on March 20th. The full moon follows on the 30th. Easter Sunday is the 4th of April. Apparently Dionysus Exiguus did very well in his forecasts but not every year shows the pattern as clearly as this one. Alan A. Mosshammer [2008] The Easter Computus, sets out the whole question in exquisite detail.
francis cameron, oxford, 16 march 2010
