Icons on golden bracts

Icon, bullhorns, Oxen, Pegasus, Hare, New Moon Mare, Hekate, Freya, Mother Earth, Frigga, Kim, Frau, Archer

This file should be about unique bract that does not belong to the mainstream and they are a little different. We can compare the bracts below with this nearly normal bract with horned horse, head with Celtic hair and the swastika. We see that it is a separate head the goldsmith fitted into the composition. So as icon we should talk about "the Head" and search for the meaning that was "head of society" and the use goes back to Bronze Age.

There are nearly 200 motifs in this category of "Horse and Head". The style of hair is Roman, but the long hair with the Swebian Knot is Celtic. This knot that could be a diadem is much like on sitting Leader at Vàrpalota Poland. In front of the Head is maybe victory symbol. The tribes of Auland and Poland belonged surely to the 54 tribes in the Swebian League.

There were three similar bracts in the find but with different border and size. In an "Unknown find place" there is a similar horse. From Holstein and Nebenstedt, Niedersachsen there is an abstract image much like this. At the later place there is the find of the walking man with beaming eyes, surely meant to be the Sun / Time.

In another "Unknown" there is a similar Horse but with the bullhorns over the back. That gives us the sure link to astronomical icons. The icon bullhorns = spring equinox in translation to our language. It is heritage from when the spring equinox was in asterism "Oxen" more than 5000 years ago, as we see in the symbolism in the Old World of Egypt, Sumer and Indus. But by precession the view at the stars has changed so spring equinox was in Pegasus = Horse and we see the same symbolism for instance in Greece and Rome.

Even the asterism Hare below the Oxen and Aurigae fits in the calendar symbolism and in this case it has the bullhorns as signs of its use. Naturally at every occasion such as spring equinox, midsummer and other time of year they can look in different direction. The normal convention is to look in east at sunrise for conjunction. In this case maybe they looked in south at sunrise for instance. I am not quite sure of the joke-symbol below that symbolises connection between two things.

There are several more horses with different shape and bullhorns. Others are in dissolution. On the other hand we have to remember that they symbolised abstract concept with no physic clear form. The motifs on bracts and other surface are like icons for certain times, space-time or processes.

Hard to know is it humour or distance to the topic that places this in the normal place of the Sun-Eagle. When we look closely on the round images in centre of the bract we can find some funny or odd details.

My presentation technique is to firstly present the proportion of the main stream style and complete with a look on special detail that maybe tells more about the time than the mainstream. We have to keep track of the proportion to avoid making the special case general since that would give the wrong impression and image of the whole culture.

Since we know how expensive horses were in all times we must associate to nobility when we see the rider bracts. That is even when it is symbol of spring equinox and beginning of the fertile season. For the "farmen" it meant that they were setting the ship into the sea.

On later calendar stick that was done in beginning of May since the climate was colder than in Bronze Age when they invented the symbolism. Farmen and nobility had their own farms with people doing the job and special buildings for handicrafters making things for sale. We see some of this even in medieval times when the nobility was free to whatever enterprises they wished.

The woman is somewhere behind the motifs that mostly are male. We know it from earlier ages in our rock-carvings where a lot of the cupmarks symbolise the female Earth Mother with many names depending on local tradition. The Anglo-Saxon tradition tells about Eostre and her star Venus and perhaps the star of Nordic Freya. It is difficult to use as it seems but many cultures in ancient times knew about the periodicity of the star.

Observe in their language there was only stars and no planets as it appears in reality. Some rune text mentions the New Moon Mare. The later word Mare is because they synchronised the New Moon with the Horse. The triads seem to be relatively late male symbolism and originally even the Eagle was used in that symbolism as we see in neo-Hittitian temples.

The style of the Horse's head seems have been fashions among goldsmiths for a while, but here the horse is very abstract. There are four bracts in the style and the text from Skonager Ribe is ALU NIUJIL and three from Darum has the text LATHU NIUWILA

ALU means "begin", LATHU means "load" and NIU is "new" understood also as new moon so we get the meaning "begin or load the moon flow". Then we have to know that they meant the rain as fertiliser. That symbolism is as old as the Naked Lady with the Moon Horn in the Lascaux caves France.

The Sunrider with Suneagle in hair naturally dominates the picture. Here the two snakes on each side of his head symbolise the two seasons. The Girl is maybe Freya and she is the growing season with a stick in hand and a "pearl or grain" in hand. On some other bract we se that same arm with the grain as icon. The double spiral symbolise IN - OUT

There is a similar bract also from Welschingen, Baden-Wurttemberg. I think Frigga is a name from Germany imported to Scandinavia in the same way as Odin and Thor. It seems that model is originally Isis and the asterism Aurigae that is Lady of House. But in folklore they call Orion the Coat of Frigga but still the image of the mature woman.

There is both swastika and tri-point symbols. The two crosses are in a style we also se on some Roman coins. The other four symbols do not give any association at the moment.

In jewellery and such thing occurs a motif like this and like a frog. It could be icon for Danish Kim or Frau ... observe not German Frau but this means "germ" that of course was "the Little One". In Danish is also Frau = frog. The association goes also to the Indian symbolism in which frogs were forerunners of the monsoon and period of fertility. In Sweden we dance the "frog dance" at midsummer a little earlier than in India.

The text at left could be read KIR I NIU that is. "give in new (moon)". The symbolism begins at the snakehead in the other end of the loop that is asterism Water-snake. There are time marks until the "twig" that indicates growth and the symbol is known from Sumer and Egypt and of course from our rock-carvings.

The male figure has a symbol on his leg that probably symbolises perhaps growth in the soil. But the symbol seems also to mean the asterism Gemini. In many figures with head they show speech coming form the mouth and means maybe growth

The text is not intelligible LTHDLLU : ULDAUL or maybe we can read "lathu" in the first word and ULL in the other, but still it does not say much. At right we have possibly dogs and the little animal at left is maybe a deer. But what kind of animal is the big one. Do you know what gods and abstract ideas look like?

When we see that abstract animal we have to think about cultural symbolism. The Archer is as old in symbolism as Sumerian Archer, in Egypt and later Greece the archer was female. At some stage it became the Bearwatcher and more practically watching the fields and maybe the forests. Since there is the little one we should maybe think about guarding the "young" but still also the Hunter. Night frost was on enemy besides those on two or four legs.

This bract belongs to a category with a little more than a dozen bracts with "sticky" figures. Most of them are with the Balder motifs

This was found in an untouched female grave together with 61 glass pearls, 7 amber pearls, 2 plated buckles with niello and remains from a bone comb.

There are more than a dozen bracts with dissoluted figures and the style we see also in other jewellery, buckles and such things. This could have been for the composition but also the symbolising technique that let parts of a bigger figure symbolise details/ icons and the whole figure was the wholeness. We know this also from the Edda.