Nyami Nyami, the Zambezi river god of the Tonga people, started off as beneficent but became wrathful after the construction of Kariba dam that blocked the river and displaced the local Tonga inhabitants.
I just appreciate this level of scholarship and being able to look at objects while hearing about them. The British Museum has especially been a life-saver for me during the pandemic. Thank you!!! ❤️❤️
From New Mexico: Avanyu, Kolowisi. If you've ever seen the first tongue of water explore the sand of a months-dry irrigation ditch, you understand the snake metaphor.
Chaoskampf: • John 3:14 - Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, • John 19:34 - Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water.
3:45 I don't buy it. Gods/heroes slaying serpents/dragons was common throughout pagan myths as well, not just christianity. Not just on Europe but throughout the world.
Was thinking the same thing and wondering how Marduk vs Tiamat, Baal vs Lotan, Horus vs Set, Apollo vs Python and Thor vs Jormungandr fit in the theory that serpents represent spiritual beliefs and nature worship that conflict with monotheistic religion.
The motif of dragon-slaying is present in almost all Indo-European and Semitic cultures: Apollo slays Python Indra slays Vritra Thraetona defeats Azi Dahaka Ninurta slays Ushmu, Bashmu, and Mushmahhu Marduk slays Tiamat Ba'al defeats Lotan Ra defeats Apep Tarhunz slays Illuyanka Sigurd slays Fafnir etc, etc, etc... The idea that medieval tales of dragon-slaying are based on the Christian desire to "repress" paganism has no basis in fact. They are cultural tales that PRE-DATE Christianity.
Dragonslaying is very indo European... St George is how they tried to convert the dragonslaying people with native dragonslaying beliefs. Like Thor slaying the dragon is a big one. Thunder gods in general later on. But it's the 'warrior' who releases the cattle (the water) by saying the serpent
I recall the first dragon slayers were not Christian. They were Norse, they were Greek, they were Mesopotamian etc... Very beautiful theory but not quite right.
I have often wondered where does the myth of dragons come from and why is it that the myth or ethos of dragons last so many centuries in European literature?
Are you certain that primitive water Gods are beneficent? So many of the gods were forces that needed to be appeased. For example, one of the oldest Daoist temples in America is in an area of traditional destructive floods.
This kind of universalistic linearity in development of religious thaught doesn't work for half of the world. East and Southasia developed very highly developed hierarchical and in part centralized bureaucratic societies and neither adopted patriarchal monotheism nor ever fully abandoned animism, all without any kind of demonization of the serpent figure.
So in conclusion I would say, It may be that monotheistic thaught may have been instrumental in the development of more stratified and organized society in western Eurasia, but if you look at the Roman Empire or East and South Asia, it is clear that this is nothing necessary or crucial to such a development. Im not sure what role monotheism has actually played in political development. As soon as Western Europe started growing beyond Feudalism all Monotheist Institutions started to loose power. So maybe Monotheism is especially beneficial to Feudal Societies in a way. I don't see much beyond that
3:10 “… that period in the Medieval world when Christianity was aggressive and oppressive …”. Christian oppression continued well beyond the Medieval period.
Religion is an idea and all ideas are subject to fashion, tastes of the rulers and chronological change. It isn't exactly evolution in the scientific sense but gradual adaptation that is sometimes poetically referred to as evolution.
Also, yeah there are lots of examples of complex and hierarchical societies that didn't demonized serpent in their beliefs, such as the meso-american. This linear progression notion is just wrong.
I just saw in another video that a re cast for a soap opera had 300k+ views in lees than one hour, and this that is history, knowledge, are, etc etc and has les than 16k in almost 1 year....................yea thats why the people are getting stupid now Thanks for the video
Nothing on the fact that after Naram-Sin's metrological reformation that all units were based on a cube of water ? Nothing about priests and water clocks ? Nothing about how " serpent / dragon " is a common sobriquet for a ruler / priest in Mesopotamian literature ? I love these videos, but they hardly scratch the surface of the topic, tbh
Having seen these, UA-cam Mekong River fireballs and Marfa lights Texas, One will doubt until you see them, Nagas /balls of conscious beings "Light" . The ancient Egyptians called them KA. jesus goes to Mt Tabor and starts glowing like a sun, the thing is, did he return from the mountain, ?
The turquoise object is not Maya, it's Aztec. It is not necessarily a water spirit, but a manifestation of the sky (among other things). It is also a double headed snake, not a jaguar. I expect better from you British Museum.
Relax. The British Museum DOES know that the serpent mosaic was created in Aztec Mexico. In fact, they have several similar pieces, and this particular object has been featured before by the British Museum (and prominently displayed on its website). Prof Strang was speaking extemporaneously, and misattributed the piece (and some of its characteristics) in her otherwise excellent presentation.
I would like to cite this article for my upcoming book, Magic Jesus, And The Wizards Of God. John The Baptist represents the demonized river god Yahweh cursed in the garden.
Professor Veronica Strang - With all due respect, you have missed the whole concept. The atmosphere and space are the waters and dragons are super bolides and comets that bring conflagration and deluge. God said, "Let there be a Firmament in the midst of the Waters, and let it Separate the Water from the Waters. Then God made the Firmament, and Separated the Waters, which were Under the Firmament, from the Waters which were Above the Firmament and it was so". Genesis 1 : 6,7. Tiamat brought chaos to our genial Paleolithic climate and cast us into the Holocene. This was the last mega-fauna extinction and the genesis of the global fire from the sky and flood mythologies. These are still commemorated as the Bon Festival, Ancestor Worship, The Day of the Dead, The Festival of the Dead, and Halloween when we cross the night approaching Taurid Stream. This is why there were bovine and human sacrifices to the Pleiades in which the remnants of the progenitor seem to radiate from on the five days without name via sympathetic magic as to advert the next age of Man. It is stunning that in the information age, mankind is so afraid to lift the veil and see why we worship the Sun. The dragon and serpent are not benevolent H2O bringers they are malevolent metaphors of destruction from above that make nuclear weapons feeble in comparison. See : FROM THE DEEP OCEAN ABOVE
Yes, it is everywhere and for some reason it is ignored. Through the millennia the bolide got watered down into lightning and storm. Thor has an iron hammer and battles a huge serpent in the ocean (sky), Horus, Osiris, and Ra have confrontations with Set who has meteoric iron bones, and India has many stories of bright weapons fighting the dragon. There is the feathered serpent in Egypt and Mesoamerica, the Druids talk of serpents in the air, there is the rainbow serpent in Australia, Thunder Birds in North America, the list goes on and on globally. In China they carry a standard with a bright ball that is followed by a dragon, watch footage of the super bolide in Russia and tell me there is not a connection. I found another just the other day, look up Shumala Archeology Research and look at the title image. Virtually every time I bring the subject up everyone goes silent... Denial is ubiquitous, I feel like I live in a Twilight Zone episode. Mankind around the world repeatedly point directly to the Pleiades and the snake that came from there and fell through the sky and brought destruction. It is taught from an early age in the story of the knight in shining armor (the Sun) battling the dragon (the comet) and saves the maiden (mother nature) and yet no one gets it.
While some versions vary, In the Indian one Vrtra is technically Indras brother, so while releasing the waters is necessary it also constitutes Brahminicide when Indra slays him.
I consider it Theory/Fact. If one reads a boat load of Mythology the picture becomes evident along with the physical evidentiary papers it fits perfectly, way beyond other hypotheses. Your Welcome
As someone who works in watermanagement, I can only say this put some really interesting dots together! Awesome!
Thanks Veronica!! And the entire British Museum, actually. These videos are really nice. Learning every day! A++
Nyami Nyami, the Zambezi river god of the Tonga people, started off as beneficent but became wrathful after the construction of Kariba dam that blocked the river and displaced the local Tonga inhabitants.
Really enjoyed this, it was very interesting and beautifully explained.
I just appreciate this level of scholarship and being able to look at objects while hearing about them. The British Museum has especially been a life-saver for me during the pandemic. Thank you!!! ❤️❤️
I could listen to her all day
From New Mexico: Avanyu, Kolowisi. If you've ever seen the first tongue of water explore the sand of a months-dry irrigation ditch, you understand the snake metaphor.
What a wonderful presentation. I could listen to Professor Strang for hours.
In the Philippines, we have the Bakunawa, a water serpent God that believed to cause eclipses.
Do your people dance for the dragons at sacred sites?
What an unpretentious woman... absolutely bloody fascinating. It’s the sort of things that stops me ditching bloody UA-cam & it’s adverts.
Shout out to all the taniwhas in Aotearoa....keep on being mischievous and unpredictable
This is so informative! Thanks for uploading! I love all the videos :D ♡
Chaoskampf:
• John 3:14 - Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,
• John 19:34 - Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water.
You could say the subject of water is... Deep
I caught that too
Great job lady! Amazing!
thank you. we shall be visiting the british museum from america and these videos will make our visit so much richer. very connective thinking.
Hope you enjoy your visit. Its big place and with the Science and Natural History museums in walking distance, you will need a lot of time.
Absolutely brilliant - thank you for this spiritual history!
Very interesting!
Simply amazing! It’s like getting a whole new perspective history nature man religion e.t.c.
3:45 I don't buy it. Gods/heroes slaying serpents/dragons was common throughout pagan myths as well, not just christianity. Not just on Europe but throughout the world.
Was thinking the same thing and wondering how Marduk vs Tiamat, Baal vs Lotan, Horus vs Set, Apollo vs Python and Thor vs Jormungandr fit in the theory that serpents represent spiritual beliefs and nature worship that conflict with monotheistic religion.
There is even a word for that: Chaoskampf
I’d love a secular take on the cultish “pre-flood” obsession with genesis 6, and these demon hybrid creatures.
The motif of dragon-slaying is present in almost all Indo-European and Semitic cultures:
Apollo slays Python
Indra slays Vritra
Thraetona defeats Azi Dahaka
Ninurta slays Ushmu, Bashmu, and Mushmahhu
Marduk slays Tiamat
Ba'al defeats Lotan
Ra defeats Apep
Tarhunz slays Illuyanka
Sigurd slays Fafnir
etc, etc, etc...
The idea that medieval tales of dragon-slaying are based on the Christian desire to "repress" paganism has no basis in fact. They are cultural tales that PRE-DATE Christianity.
Excellent video, I learn't a lot from it.
Interesting; but I’m now wondering what Joseph Campbell had to say about dragons & snakes.
Dragonslaying is very indo European... St George is how they tried to convert the dragonslaying people with native dragonslaying beliefs. Like Thor slaying the dragon is a big one. Thunder gods in general later on. But it's the 'warrior' who releases the cattle (the water) by saying the serpent
Excellent. Thank you. :)
I recall the first dragon slayers were not Christian. They were Norse, they were Greek, they were Mesopotamian etc... Very beautiful theory but not quite right.
Dear BM, please send those items you show back to countries they came from.
Does Leviathan count as a water serpent?
definitely! this most ancient mythical being can be linked to Tiamet of Mesopotamia, Vrita of Vedic India, etc.
People should return to their natural views. We should respect Erce.
I have often wondered where does the myth of dragons come from and why is it that the myth or ethos of dragons last so many centuries in European literature?
Are you certain that primitive water Gods are beneficent? So many of the gods were forces that needed to be appeased.
For example, one of the oldest Daoist temples in America is in an area of traditional destructive floods.
Good news for me and you know that I'm not sure if you don't want to
Awesome
This kind of universalistic linearity in development of religious thaught doesn't work for half of the world. East and Southasia developed very highly developed hierarchical and in part centralized bureaucratic societies and neither adopted patriarchal monotheism nor ever fully abandoned animism, all without any kind of demonization of the serpent figure.
So in conclusion I would say, It may be that monotheistic thaught may have been instrumental in the development of more stratified and organized society in western Eurasia, but if you look at the Roman Empire or East and South Asia, it is clear that this is nothing necessary or crucial to such a development. Im not sure what role monotheism has actually played in political development. As soon as Western Europe started growing beyond Feudalism all Monotheist Institutions started to loose power. So maybe Monotheism is especially beneficial to Feudal Societies in a way. I don't see much beyond that
Yeah this linear progression of religions and mythology seem completely outdated.
Have you ever asked why the serpent portrays itself in this way? Anyone? ... Veronica i like your video if only to open eyes.
Its a description
Leviathan, the king of the children of pride.
Is it just me or does this presentation seem unfocused and vague?
I that one of the creatures name is leviathan one of Almighty God pets that he made for his self. Shalom
3:10 “… that period in the Medieval world when Christianity was aggressive and oppressive …”. Christian oppression continued well beyond the Medieval period.
Did she say "parrotty"?
2004 Summer Olympics
Ring back Gandalf. Or else!
Someone has to fight the Sumerian Balrog. Even with eagles he can't be everywhere at all times.
I’m the legend of the sea
The chinese dragon on menus have been found alive.
I thought the evolution of religion, as you've implied here, was an outdated notion. Has this changed?
Religion is an idea and all ideas are subject to fashion, tastes of the rulers and chronological change. It isn't exactly evolution in the scientific sense but gradual adaptation that is sometimes poetically referred to as evolution.
Modern religion is just mind control. Seems like most peeps in past meditated at sacred sites like hindus
@@recklessroges "tastes of the rulers"
That's postmodernism pseudo talk.
Also, yeah there are lots of examples of complex and hierarchical societies that didn't demonized serpent in their beliefs, such as the meso-american. This linear progression notion is just wrong.
I just saw in another video that a re cast for a soap opera had 300k+ views in lees than one hour, and this that is history, knowledge, are, etc etc and has les than 16k in almost 1 year....................yea thats why the people are getting stupid now
Thanks for the video
how did you make a video about sea serpents political
Because the antichrist is a serpent
Nothing on the fact that after Naram-Sin's metrological reformation that all units were based on a cube of water ?
Nothing about priests and water clocks ?
Nothing about how " serpent / dragon " is a common sobriquet for a ruler / priest in Mesopotamian literature ?
I love these videos, but they hardly scratch the surface of the topic, tbh
Got to save something for the next video. She has many years of material, which is hard to cram into a short video.
Indeed, better to save that for an hour long lecture so she can take an actual dive.
Hell, every one of your points could be a lecture on its own.
Having seen these, UA-cam Mekong River fireballs and Marfa lights Texas, One will doubt until you see them, Nagas /balls of conscious beings "Light" . The ancient Egyptians called them KA. jesus goes to Mt Tabor and starts glowing like a sun, the thing is, did he return from the mountain, ?
#unintentionalASMR
The turquoise object is not Maya, it's Aztec. It is not necessarily a water spirit, but a manifestation of the sky (among other things). It is also a double headed snake, not a jaguar. I expect better from you British Museum.
Relax. The British Museum DOES know that the serpent mosaic was created in Aztec Mexico. In fact, they have several similar pieces, and this particular object has been featured before by the British Museum (and prominently displayed on its website). Prof Strang was speaking extemporaneously, and misattributed the piece (and some of its characteristics) in her otherwise excellent presentation.
I would like to cite this article for my upcoming book, Magic Jesus, And The Wizards Of God. John The Baptist represents the demonized river god Yahweh cursed in the garden.
Professor Veronica Strang - With all due respect, you have missed the whole concept. The atmosphere and space are the waters and dragons are super bolides and comets that bring conflagration and deluge. God said, "Let there be a Firmament in the midst of the Waters, and let it Separate the Water from the Waters. Then God made the Firmament, and Separated the Waters, which were Under the Firmament, from the Waters which were Above the Firmament and it was so". Genesis 1 : 6,7.
Tiamat brought chaos to our genial Paleolithic climate and cast us into the Holocene. This was the last mega-fauna extinction and the genesis of the global fire from the sky and flood mythologies. These are still commemorated as the Bon Festival, Ancestor Worship, The Day of the Dead, The Festival of the Dead, and Halloween when we cross the night approaching Taurid Stream. This is why there were bovine and human sacrifices to the Pleiades in which the remnants of the progenitor seem to radiate from on the five days without name via sympathetic magic as to advert the next age of Man.
It is stunning that in the information age, mankind is so afraid to lift the veil and see why we worship the Sun. The dragon and serpent are not benevolent H2O bringers they are malevolent metaphors of destruction from above that make nuclear weapons feeble in comparison. See : FROM THE DEEP OCEAN ABOVE
Bard Madsen I have noticed a similarity between Thor and Indra, Tiamat and Vrtra
Yes, it is everywhere and for some reason it is ignored. Through the millennia the bolide got watered down into lightning and storm. Thor has an iron hammer and battles a huge serpent in the ocean (sky), Horus, Osiris, and Ra have confrontations with Set who has meteoric iron bones, and India has many stories of bright weapons fighting the dragon. There is the feathered serpent in Egypt and Mesoamerica, the Druids talk of serpents in the air, there is the rainbow serpent in Australia, Thunder Birds in North America, the list goes on and on globally. In China they carry a standard with a bright ball that is followed by a dragon, watch footage of the super bolide in Russia and tell me there is not a connection.
I found another just the other day, look up Shumala Archeology Research and look at the title image. Virtually every time I bring the subject up everyone goes silent... Denial is ubiquitous, I feel like I live in a Twilight Zone episode. Mankind around the world repeatedly point directly to the Pleiades and the snake that came from there and fell through the sky and brought destruction. It is taught from an early age in the story of the knight in shining armor (the Sun) battling the dragon (the comet) and saves the maiden (mother nature) and yet no one gets it.
While some versions vary, In the Indian one Vrtra is technically Indras brother, so while releasing the waters is necessary it also constitutes Brahminicide when Indra slays him.
Bard Madsen - a very interesting theory. Thank you for sharing.
I consider it Theory/Fact. If one reads a boat load of Mythology the picture becomes evident along with the physical evidentiary papers it fits perfectly, way beyond other hypotheses. Your Welcome
Very intereting video!
Thank You!