Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, the production of
Speaker 1: My Heart Radio. Hey are welcome to Stuff to Blow
Speaker 1: your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb, and I'm Joe McCormick.
Speaker 1: In today. I wanted to start off with a kind
Speaker 1: of thought experiment that I think we've actually used on
Speaker 1: the show before, but we'll use it again because I
Speaker 1: think it is useful. It's it's the Martian archaeologist thought experiment. Uh,
Speaker 1: and so h imagine an exo archaeologist from another planet
Speaker 1: is coming to study the physical remains of human civilizations
Speaker 1: long after humanity has gone. Who knows what we did.
Speaker 1: We we screwed up somehow, and there are none of
Speaker 1: us around here anymore, but the physical remains of our
Speaker 1: cities and institutions are still hanging about the Earth. I've
Speaker 1: seen enough episodes of Out Our Limits to to make
Speaker 1: a few guesses as to how it could have happened. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the neutron bombs of the Facebook wars, they did the job.
Speaker 1: Or hey, maybe maybe there's a better option. Though, maybe
Speaker 1: we we warped ourselves into the seventeenth dimension and escaped
Speaker 1: this world. You know, not a bad end. So this
Speaker 1: alien archaeologist is trying to understand lost cultures of humankind
Speaker 1: through the works of art that they created and preserved.
Speaker 1: And at some point she ends up browsing museums. Maybe
Speaker 1: she's walking through the louver and looking at the paintings
Speaker 1: that we're you know, we're once housed and revered here.
Speaker 1: And if she were to look over many of the
Speaker 1: famous paintings of of medieval and Renaissance Europe, she might
Speaker 1: arrive at a question that would be weird to us,
Speaker 1: but I think perfectly reasonable to her, And that would
Speaker 1: be why did so many of the people considered wholly
Speaker 1: by these artists where wide brimmed gold hats or gold
Speaker 1: wires around their heads. Now, of course, with enough cultural context,
Speaker 1: we ourselves know that these are not hats in the
Speaker 1: paintings there, you know, they're not even supposed to represent
Speaker 1: real physical objects. This, of course, is the artistic convention
Speaker 1: known today as the halo. But I think it's interesting
Speaker 1: that in a lot of these paintings there might not
Speaker 1: be anything in the painting that would tell you that
Speaker 1: in isolation, it just looks like people have something that's
Speaker 1: yellow or gold, often circular, sometimes square shaped, or just
Speaker 1: like a cloud or a kind of glow or radiance
Speaker 1: around their head. Yeah, it is well discuss it. It
Speaker 1: ranges from something that is very subtle to to sometimes
Speaker 1: things that are very unavoidable, even where it goes beyond
Speaker 1: the halo and becomes this all encompassing nimbus. But that
Speaker 1: you know, you mentioned earlier how the alien might look
Speaker 1: and say why why are these people considered holy? Why
Speaker 1: do they have the halo? But I think it would
Speaker 1: go even beyond that, like why did these other organisms
Speaker 1: that are represented in these works of art, why do
Speaker 1: they have like they wouldn't know they're they're they're holy.
Speaker 1: Not necessarily you know, they're true, they're the subject of
Speaker 1: a painting. But otherwise, you know, what might even be
Speaker 1: able to piece together what this signifies, what it means?
Speaker 1: Why is it there? You know, why was it that
Speaker 1: some of these humans but not others appear to have bioluminescence?
Speaker 1: Like why does their hair emit light? You know, did
Speaker 1: they have a do they have like chemo luminescence in
Speaker 1: the keratin of their hair cells or something? And then
Speaker 1: I think the exo archaeologists might notice something that a
Speaker 1: lot of us don't tend to notice when we grow
Speaker 1: up looking at images of like Jesus and saints and
Speaker 1: stuff with halos, and that would be the similarity of
Speaker 1: the iconography here the glow or the or the gold
Speaker 1: circle or disk around the heads of saints and and
Speaker 1: God's in a Christian context, the similarity of that to
Speaker 1: depictions of God's from other religions, religions that still exist
Speaker 1: in the world today or the religions of ages past. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: you can easily start looking at these halos and things
Speaker 1: like halos, and you could just go crazy with a
Speaker 1: conspiracy theory connection board, right, um, I mean, it's it's
Speaker 1: easy to do. Even if you're not owned to conspiracy thinking.
Speaker 1: You could think like, oh, well, well, clearly they're all
Speaker 1: describing the same thing, either the same mysterious light source
Speaker 1: that it is forbidden to represent an art that is
Speaker 1: always positioned directly behind a person, or this the same
Speaker 1: like alien disks that we're interacting with ancient people's or
Speaker 1: you know, you could also go and and use it
Speaker 1: to prop up various theories such as say that, you know,
Speaker 1: the bicameral mind hypothesis, things like that, you know, which
Speaker 1: I think actually will probably uh come to people's minds
Speaker 1: a lot as we roll through this episode in particular,
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, there will be some very specific and interesting
Speaker 1: connections there. But anyway, so to come back to the
Speaker 1: idea of you know, what we do know about the Halo,
Speaker 1: the fact that it's an artistic convention. This is one
Speaker 1: of these subjects that I really love because it's something
Speaker 1: that I've seen and just taken for granted my entire
Speaker 1: life without ever stopping to wonder where it comes from,
Speaker 1: what it means, and how it connects to history and
Speaker 1: religion and science. So for the next couple of episodes,
Speaker 1: we wanted to take a look at the Halo from
Speaker 1: a bunch of different angles and see what kind of
Speaker 1: sense we can make of it. Now that opening question
Speaker 1: I asked of imagining an alien archaeologist looking at these
Speaker 1: depictions in art that weren't supposed to be physical golden
Speaker 1: hats but could have been mistaken for such. Uh. This
Speaker 1: actually connects to an episode of the Artifacts that I
Speaker 1: did back in January about ancient Egyptian head cones. If
Speaker 1: you want to get the full story, you can go
Speaker 1: and listen to that episode, But the short and simplified
Speaker 1: version goes like this, A lot of ancient Egyptian art
Speaker 1: shows people with these weird white cones on top of
Speaker 1: their heads. You know, maybe about the size of a
Speaker 1: soft ball, but cone shaped, And there has long been
Speaker 1: a debate about what these cones were supposed to represent.
Speaker 1: One popular theory is that this is a depiction of
Speaker 1: a real thing from ancient Egypt, which would have been
Speaker 1: lumps of unguent or perfumed animal fat which would melt
Speaker 1: into the scalp and then perform a kind of ritual
Speaker 1: purification as as the oils came down over your head.
Speaker 1: It would be somewhat analogous to the to the kind
Speaker 1: of anointing with oil rituals that we see in other
Speaker 1: ancient Near Eastern traditions that you can even find in
Speaker 1: the Bible. But because until recently these cones had only
Speaker 1: been seen in art and never explicitly given physical grounding,
Speaker 1: there was always some reason to wonder, well, were these
Speaker 1: cones maybe not physical objects at all, but symbolic artistic
Speaker 1: conventions like halos. Well, a few years back, some physical
Speaker 1: examples of head cones were actually found in some graves
Speaker 1: in Egypt, so we now know that at least some
Speaker 1: of them were physical objects, though a lot of questions
Speaker 1: still remain about about these head cones, But the analogy
Speaker 1: to Halo's really got the gears turning in my brain
Speaker 1: and got me wondering about halos themselves. Yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: ultimately a fascinating subject. Again, I'm in the same boat,
Speaker 1: like I grew up seeing all these dages of Halos,
Speaker 1: to the point where Halo's didn't even feel suitably weird
Speaker 1: or even majestic. And I think part of that is
Speaker 1: the part of that comes from uh angel costumes and
Speaker 1: cartoon depictions of angel costumes, where even someone like Tom
Speaker 1: and Jerry will have some sort of a halo above
Speaker 1: their head made out of maybe like foiled cardboard, and
Speaker 1: it is visibly held in place by some sort of
Speaker 1: wire that goes down to the back of their neck.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm talking about, Oh, exactly. Yeah, the
Speaker 1: domestication of this imagery really kind of takes the all
Speaker 1: inspiring element out of it. Yeah, it ends up making
Speaker 1: it look kind of stupid, you know, um and um
Speaker 1: and And I think you also see some of that
Speaker 1: in the actual tradition of the Halo, with a sort
Speaker 1: of eventually falling out of favor, except in places where
Speaker 1: it was really firmly established. Um. But but of course,
Speaker 1: like we said already, you'll see so many different versions
Speaker 1: of the halo, even in um, you know, Western art
Speaker 1: depicting Christian saints an important holy individual rules. Uh. The
Speaker 1: one that I ran across that I really liked was
Speaker 1: Caravaggio's The Madonna di Loretto, or more at least a
Speaker 1: detail from that. Um. And it's such a faint halo
Speaker 1: you could easily you could easily miss it, perhaps, but
Speaker 1: it but it also really stands out at you because
Speaker 1: it that the lines in it run counter to the
Speaker 1: vertical lines behind her. Yeah. And I like that in
Speaker 1: Carvaccio's art because the it suggests that in a way,
Speaker 1: holiness is something that is subtle to the human imagination.
Speaker 1: Maybe it would be obvious to the heavens, but you know,
Speaker 1: here on earth, it's just the faintest glimmer of a circle. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you have to look for it. Yeah. Um. You know
Speaker 1: our Scott Baker and some of his fantasy books that
Speaker 1: they're particularly magical individuals who occasionally developed halos around the
Speaker 1: palms of their hands. And it's not visible all the time,
Speaker 1: but just at certain moments by certain people and I
Speaker 1: feel like that kind of captured some of the energy
Speaker 1: that you see in an illustrations such as this. Um.
Speaker 1: But but other times you see realizations of the halo
Speaker 1: and art that are just they look very much like
Speaker 1: some sort of a physical ring or a physical disc,
Speaker 1: like they have one of the Golden records that we
Speaker 1: sent into space situated either right above their head or
Speaker 1: directly behind it. Yeah. I've read that this, I think
Speaker 1: was especially common among like Florentine artists of the Renaissance,
Speaker 1: who would start depicting the halo almost as if it
Speaker 1: was a disc in three dimensional space that was balanced
Speaker 1: on the back of the head. Yeah. One of my
Speaker 1: favorite saints from art was the subject of some paintings
Speaker 1: that I saw at the Louve. It's this guy named
Speaker 1: Peter of Verona, who is usually shown with the machete
Speaker 1: sticking out of his head. He here is with blood
Speaker 1: and everything. Yeah, blood, And I feel like these paintings
Speaker 1: of Peter of Verona should be the new this is
Speaker 1: Fine meme because he really looks like, you know, we're
Speaker 1: making it work. Um. Peter was a thirteenth century inquisitor.
Speaker 1: I think he was some kind of heresy hunter. Think
Speaker 1: he preached against the Cathars, and the story goes that
Speaker 1: the Cathars hired an assassin to kill him, and then
Speaker 1: he got hit in the head with a blade of
Speaker 1: some kind, like this guy brained him with an axe,
Speaker 1: and then the I think, according to the story, he
Speaker 1: wrote out the Apostles creed or part of the Apostles
Speaker 1: creed in his own blood as he was dying. He also,
Speaker 1: in both of these has the images that you shared
Speaker 1: with me. He also has a blade piercing his heart. Uh,
Speaker 1: it looks like he was front stabbed in one of
Speaker 1: them and backstabbed in the other depiction. Yeah, so he
Speaker 1: I mean, ultimately, the jump between this and full blown
Speaker 1: Clive Barker Cinobyte is not that far, you know. And yes,
Speaker 1: he's very close to a Cinobyte, the machete head, cinobyte,
Speaker 1: serene face and all. I mean the sign between, I mean,
Speaker 1: there's there's probably a direct line to be made between
Speaker 1: his vision of the Cinobytes and the depictions of saints
Speaker 1: suffering but not not suffering on holy tortures. What's medieval
Speaker 1: Latin for savior tears. It's a waste of good suffering.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't have that one an easy
Speaker 1: recall for it from me. But the funny thing is
Speaker 1: about with Peter and so in both of these he's
Speaker 1: got like a machete or a butcher knife stuck in
Speaker 1: just in his head, like you know, like the lightning
Speaker 1: bolt or the arrow party gag headset, just sticking out
Speaker 1: at the top of his head. And you're you're so
Speaker 1: fixated on the weapon you don't even notice that he's
Speaker 1: got a faint circle around his head or behind it. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: there it is the halo the and and you know
Speaker 1: it's you think it's helpful too to think about, to
Speaker 1: ask yourself, like what could it be? What is this
Speaker 1: thing behind the head? You know, the physical plate a
Speaker 1: glow an aura, but also you see various interpretations where
Speaker 1: you can think of it as the sun itself or
Speaker 1: the moon, some sort of cosmic entity or perhaps a
Speaker 1: window a portal, uh to another realm like all of
Speaker 1: all of these things. Uh, you see a rise at
Speaker 1: different times and interpretations of the halo and things that
Speaker 1: inspired the halo or seemed to have inspired it, or
Speaker 1: just have some just basic connection to it based similar symbology. Yeah,
Speaker 1: since there's so many variations on the halo and the
Speaker 1: related concept of the aureole. I think that it's best
Speaker 1: to think about the halo not as something that has
Speaker 1: like strict criteria for what counts as a halo, but
Speaker 1: more a a collection of family resemblance. Is kind of
Speaker 1: like the definition of a game in the Wittgensteinian sense. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, it's just like there are a lot of
Speaker 1: things that you can tell they're all related in some way,
Speaker 1: but there's no set of criteria that all of them meet.
Speaker 1: But I think we can at least generally say that
Speaker 1: a halo is something like an area of light or
Speaker 1: golden color, or some kind of radiant cloud, usually circular
Speaker 1: but not always surrounding the head of a holy or
Speaker 1: revered figure. It's also sometimes called a nimbus. I think
Speaker 1: we've mentioned that already, But it is related to, and
Speaker 1: with significant overlap on, the concept of an aureole, which
Speaker 1: is a glow or area of brightness that surrounds a
Speaker 1: person a specially their head. So I think there's some
Speaker 1: looseness with the language here, but as best I can tell,
Speaker 1: halo usually refers to the disc or ring or light
Speaker 1: around the heads specifically, and the oriole would include halos,
Speaker 1: but would would also include something like the full body
Speaker 1: being surrounded by a glow or a golden shine or
Speaker 1: or fire. Yeah, and that's a U R e O
Speaker 1: l e ario, not oreo, though in an artistic depiction,
Speaker 1: you could have an oreo ario. Uh, it's entirely possible.
Speaker 1: It's the right shape. Oh, you certainly could. Oh have
Speaker 1: you ever noticed that sometimes products in uh, in TV
Speaker 1: commercials and in advertisements are given a kind of aureole,
Speaker 1: Like a box of cereal will be lit as if
Speaker 1: there's a light bulb right behind it, so there's a
Speaker 1: glow emanating from all the sides. Yeah, yeah, I mean that.
Speaker 1: That's one of the reasons I started thinking about, you
Speaker 1: know what some of these these these paintings we see
Speaker 1: in these images where it looks like there is a
Speaker 1: light behind the head. You know, you can easily imagine
Speaker 1: panning to one side and there is a tripod back
Speaker 1: there and there's the photographer's light, you know, And then
Speaker 1: ultimately that's what we we do to baccole it things today. Um,
Speaker 1: but yeah, you do see you see things that are
Speaker 1: like halos, and sometimes things that are very much like
Speaker 1: halos in modern photography, and a lot of it is
Speaker 1: just by virtue of that sort of positioning. We're talking
Speaker 1: about either a light position behind the individual just by
Speaker 1: happenstance because the light's got to go somewhere, or it's
Speaker 1: some sort of pre existing symbol or decoration. And I
Speaker 1: want to draw a specific example here that I've I've
Speaker 1: been kind of obsessed with the last couple of months.
Speaker 1: UM in BacT, since the since the most recent presidential election. UM,
Speaker 1: you will see photographs of the U S President or
Speaker 1: presidential Canada is president elect, etcetera, in which the presidential
Speaker 1: seal is positioned directly behind the individual's head, sometimes in
Speaker 1: sharper focus, but other times blurred a bit just by
Speaker 1: virtue of being behind them in a way that looks
Speaker 1: a lot like halo iconography. Oh yeah, so I I
Speaker 1: did not know about this before you brought it up,
Speaker 1: But now that you have mentioned it, or or since
Speaker 1: I read that you were writing about this, I I
Speaker 1: was seeing it all over the place. Yeah. So you
Speaker 1: can see George W. Bush with a halo, Barack Obama
Speaker 1: with a halo. It just seems like there's often enough
Speaker 1: a big circular seal behind their head when they're getting photographed,
Speaker 1: that these things just naturally happen. Yeah, yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: it's because you generally have a backdrop back there and
Speaker 1: then that's where the presidential seal is, and the presidential
Speaker 1: seal is circular um, and yeah, it ends up looking
Speaker 1: like halo. And I was thinking about this, I'm like, well,
Speaker 1: this is interesting, but I'm sure some people do not
Speaker 1: like it. Sure enough, sure enough, I found a wonderful
Speaker 1: Associated Press blog post about it from and this was
Speaker 1: from Paul Coo Ford. The APIs former vice president of
Speaker 1: Media Relations, and he points out that the so called
Speaker 1: halo issue has been around for a while and that
Speaker 1: no matter who happens to be president at a given time,
Speaker 1: people complain about it. You know it because they can
Speaker 1: make the charge like, what are you doing. You're taking
Speaker 1: pictures of this president who I don't like, and you're
Speaker 1: making them look like they are anointed by God, Like,
Speaker 1: clearly you have an agenda here in the way that
Speaker 1: the presidential seal is position behind their skull. Well, I
Speaker 1: would say, whether I like the president or not, if somebody,
Speaker 1: if I thought the photographer was doing that on purpose,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't like it. I mean, you know, right right, Yes,
Speaker 1: But knowing a bit about photography and perspective, I can
Speaker 1: actually see why this might be something that's difficult to avoid. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Go for drives home that it's never the intention of
Speaker 1: a photographer to give the president a holy glow. But
Speaker 1: in according to J. David A. K A P. Washington's
Speaker 1: then assistant chief of the Bureau for Photography quote, the
Speaker 1: out of focus presidential seal is simply a tool to celebrate,
Speaker 1: to separate the subject from the background, so he is
Speaker 1: not speaking in a sea of black. And then he
Speaker 1: adds that they try to make it clear that it's
Speaker 1: the seal and it's not some sort of owing blur.
Speaker 1: And they've tried different things. They've tried shooting a lot closer,
Speaker 1: you know, getting like cropping in tighter to the individual's
Speaker 1: face so nothing is seen around the head. But then
Speaker 1: if you do that, well, first of all, you just
Speaker 1: have like a real close tight shot of somebody's face
Speaker 1: and you can give me the president. But then also
Speaker 1: more to the point, you lose any sense of context
Speaker 1: or sense of location. And that's one of the things
Speaker 1: you're supposed to do as a photographer too, is to
Speaker 1: provide that context and sense of location. And then if
Speaker 1: you do the reverse, like you pan out more, uh
Speaker 1: and you know, try and move that seal around in
Speaker 1: the background, well, then you risk creating a photo that's
Speaker 1: not suitable for many uses such as mobile use. You know,
Speaker 1: you don't want to be you know, pull up your
Speaker 1: news app and you're you're flipping through it and then
Speaker 1: you're like, who's that. I don't I don't know. There's
Speaker 1: some some white haired dude there in the background. Oh,
Speaker 1: it's the president. I had to zoom in to see it.
Speaker 1: I think the real solution is that presidents just should
Speaker 1: not have the presidential seal behind them and instead should
Speaker 1: have like a big, like psychedelic tableau, you know, like
Speaker 1: that like the cover of the of the Jimmy Hendrix
Speaker 1: Axis Boldest Love album. Yeah, yeah, maybe so. I mean basically,
Speaker 1: one of the things that comes down to is this
Speaker 1: is a shot. This is a photograph that gets taken
Speaker 1: a lot every time the president gives an address or
Speaker 1: what have you, and the typical background just doesn't really
Speaker 1: give photographers much to work with, and photographers are constantly
Speaker 1: trying to figure out how to frame things up in
Speaker 1: a way that is visually appealing. So at least for now,
Speaker 1: until they shake things up and get that new mural
Speaker 1: background you're talking about, the presidential halo is largely unavoidable.
Speaker 1: Like you can play around with it yourself, and Matt,
Speaker 1: put yourself in the photographer's shoes and try to imagine
Speaker 1: what your options are there. Like, ultimately, the halo kind
Speaker 1: of the best way to go. Well, maybe we can
Speaker 1: help you out with that today, just by helping you,
Speaker 1: as the viewer reframe you're thinking about the halo so
Speaker 1: that it is not only the projection of a Christian saint,
Speaker 1: but in fact is an older and more widespread tradition
Speaker 1: of showing the radiance around the head or body of
Speaker 1: an interesting or important figure throughout world mythology. Yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: but but I will I will say that once you
Speaker 1: start looking for the halo and identifying the halo, you
Speaker 1: will see it more and more places. So certainly, listeners,
Speaker 1: as you encounter photographs of people with unintended halos or
Speaker 1: even intended halos just by virtue of their environment, send
Speaker 1: those to us. Share those with us. Go go to
Speaker 1: the discussion module the Stuff to Blow your Mind discussion
Speaker 1: module that's the Facebook group. Share them there. I think
Speaker 1: it'll be a lot of fun. Yeah, bring them on,
Speaker 1: Thank thank, thank Now. One thing we've already touched on
Speaker 1: is that not all halos or aureoles are circular in nature,
Speaker 1: but an awful lot of them are. There's a reason
Speaker 1: that you couldn't mistake a lot of halos in paintings
Speaker 1: for being you know, disc shaped gold hats. So so
Speaker 1: maybe we should probe the circular element here for a minute. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: The halo, and it's it's most traditional form, is of
Speaker 1: course going to be either a pair of concentra circles.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be or it's gonna be a disc, or
Speaker 1: it's just going to be a circle or a hoop
Speaker 1: of some sort um. And you know, part of this
Speaker 1: is we've always been fascinated by circles because the circle
Speaker 1: is the shape of the sun, it's the shape of
Speaker 1: the moon, it's the shape of the pupil and our eyeballs.
Speaker 1: You know, it's just an irresistible It's it's a line
Speaker 1: that goes on forever. I mean, you can, you can
Speaker 1: go on and on, like the circle is fascinating in
Speaker 1: the same way that the triangle in the square are fascinating.
Speaker 1: Will never stop. Um, you know, finding wonder in these shapes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and the fact that there are no perfect circles in nature,
Speaker 1: but so much of the physical and biological world ends
Speaker 1: up imperfectly approximating circles and spheres. Um. And then and
Speaker 1: then it gets even more mysterious and gets into like
Speaker 1: mathematical mysticism once once you have consciousness of geometry, because
Speaker 1: there you get all kinds of ideas. You know, I think, uh,
Speaker 1: the circle has special mystical allure because of its special
Speaker 1: status among two dimensional shapes like uh, you know, it
Speaker 1: has this relation and ship to the strange mathematical constant
Speaker 1: pie and uh. And the fact that if you try
Speaker 1: to think about it as a polygon, I guess maybe
Speaker 1: it's technically not a polygon, but if you were to
Speaker 1: try to frame it as one, it would have to
Speaker 1: be a polygon with like an infinite number of sides.
Speaker 1: But the sun, I think is is a particular note here,
Speaker 1: not only because of its circular shape and sort of
Speaker 1: it's it's all consuming place and human myth making, but
Speaker 1: also because of of what we call solar halos, And
Speaker 1: that's something we'll get into more in the second episode.
Speaker 1: But they're you know recordings of depictions of solar halos
Speaker 1: dating back to antiquity Uma, in particular, the eruption of
Speaker 1: Mount Etna in one two and forty four b C
Speaker 1: resulted in rainbow like halos that were observed at that time. UM.
Speaker 1: I was reading Ancient Meteorological Optics by Richard Stouther's in
Speaker 1: the Classical Journal from two thousand nine, and he goes
Speaker 1: into this and includes a list of such observations from
Speaker 1: roughly two oh three b C e on up till
Speaker 1: three C in addition to my signs, which is another
Speaker 1: optical phenomenal will discuss in the next episode. UH. And
Speaker 1: and these have been recorded from as far back is
Speaker 1: five b C in Egypt up through Roman observations in
Speaker 1: one So the observation of of light based discs and
Speaker 1: rings in space and in the sky I think could
Speaker 1: naturally UH suggest some associations between those types of shapes
Speaker 1: or figures and holiness because of the long standing religious
Speaker 1: associations with celestial objects, space and the sky. Right and
Speaker 1: then on top of that too, you start thinking about
Speaker 1: just symbol making and UH in the creation of of lines,
Speaker 1: the etching of lines into things. And as you begin
Speaker 1: to juggle different symbols and combining symbols. It's it's inevitable
Speaker 1: that you would combine the human form with the circle,
Speaker 1: with the sun disc, etcetera. All Right, so we've already
Speaker 1: mentioned that the halo is a very common uh piece
Speaker 1: of religious symbolism and Christian art, especially in like the
Speaker 1: Medieval through the Renaissance period. Um. So, so how exactly
Speaker 1: does that happen? How does the halo become a part
Speaker 1: of how Christians depict their their God and their saints.
Speaker 1: So these only pop up in Christian religious art after
Speaker 1: the fifth century see and before that it was used
Speaker 1: to highlight literally highlight right, um, important secular people such
Speaker 1: as kings and emperors. Yeah, there is a long tradition
Speaker 1: going back before Christianity in the Greco Roman world of
Speaker 1: showing like kings and emperors, I think, especially when associated
Speaker 1: with Apollo or Helios, gods that are gods of the
Speaker 1: sun or associated with the sun, to show these figures
Speaker 1: with rays of light emanating from their heads, which are
Speaker 1: very similar to or in some cases basically the same
Speaker 1: as a halo. And so you could get a pagan
Speaker 1: emperor with a halo before any depictions of say Jesus
Speaker 1: with a halo. Yeah, exactly, And as pointed by Derek,
Speaker 1: could see siting um Tavino, Perry, and Romston. I'll discuss
Speaker 1: them in a minute in the impact of the symbolism
Speaker 1: and iconography of the ax Sun disc and wild jet
Speaker 1: Ie on on modern Western society, saints and other religious figures.
Speaker 1: At this time we're just shown as normal humans. Meanwhile, yes,
Speaker 1: the secular rulers, they were the ones with the halos.
Speaker 1: So that's funny. You've got to imagine, like how would
Speaker 1: that be reversed, Like if if Christians and say the
Speaker 1: second century in the Roman Empire, we're seeing depictions of
Speaker 1: the the the perhaps hated Roman Emperor with a halo,
Speaker 1: how would they end up putting that same kind of
Speaker 1: imagery on Jesus. Yeah, exactly. So it's really fascinating to
Speaker 1: turn that on its on its on its head here
Speaker 1: at least for like I say, modern consideration of the past.
Speaker 1: H So that that Tabanor Perry paper, that's j. Tabnaur Perry.
Speaker 1: It was a nineteen oh seven paper titled The Nimbus
Speaker 1: and Eastern Art. And despite being a nineteen o seven publication,
Speaker 1: you can you can pull this up in j store
Speaker 1: and it's a short, very succinct little piece with some
Speaker 1: wonderful illustrations, and you know, this points out and also
Speaker 1: uh cuts the was was commenting on this is that
Speaker 1: while there's certainly an urge to connect halos in the
Speaker 1: Western tradition to the ancient Egyptian use of the sun
Speaker 1: disc um, they conclude that that although the halo came
Speaker 1: from uh, the ancient Near East, it stem seems to
Speaker 1: stem from Mesopotamian and Persian use that had been appropriated
Speaker 1: by the Greeks and then later by the Byzantines. Okay,
Speaker 1: so if if this tracing of the history is correct
Speaker 1: at saying that there are analogies to the halo in
Speaker 1: ancient Egyptian iconography, but it looks like the Christians got
Speaker 1: their use from the Greeks and Romans, who in turn
Speaker 1: got the halo ideas from the ancient cultures that would
Speaker 1: have occupied present day like Iraq and Iran. Right, yeah,
Speaker 1: so the ideas, yeah, the you know, the Roman usage
Speaker 1: of it would have been like, hey, we really like
Speaker 1: this motif, let's use it. Let's use it to signify
Speaker 1: our rulers, and then eventually it passes on to Christian use.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of a story of the of
Speaker 1: just how irresistible a and alarming or or captivating images
Speaker 1: or a combination of symbols happens to be. Now that
Speaker 1: other piece e. H. Ramsden, Uh, this is a much
Speaker 1: longer piece. It's a lengthy notice in the same publication
Speaker 1: Burlington Magazine from nineteen forty one titled the Halo a
Speaker 1: Further Inquiry into its Origin, and this one points to
Speaker 1: the influence of Zoroastrianism on Christianity in general. Which would
Speaker 1: which would bring with it the Cavarna or the Havarna,
Speaker 1: which the author here describes as quote the great Havarn No,
Speaker 1: the main symbol of royal power and age, old motif
Speaker 1: of Iranian art, and so Ramsden draws a connection between
Speaker 1: these artistic motifs and what was to come in both
Speaker 1: Christian and Buddhist traditions. So it's literally a glory or
Speaker 1: splendor indicating a divine force guiding the individual also kind
Speaker 1: of come sometimes seeing a sort of you know, like
Speaker 1: divine goodwill. It's a kind of holy spotlight reserved for
Speaker 1: kings and leaders. And I guess that's something to keep
Speaker 1: in mind too when we're thinking about this, you think
Speaker 1: about the role of the divine king in older traditions,
Speaker 1: you know, it's like that's that's the individual who you know,
Speaker 1: the whole system is describing as being the chosen one
Speaker 1: of God or the Gods, etcetera. Yeah, and so, at
Speaker 1: least for me, it's not hard to see how halo
Speaker 1: imagery would have been more thoroughly integrated into Christian artwork
Speaker 1: in a period after Christianity was made socially acceptable in
Speaker 1: a widespread way in the in the Roman Empires, say
Speaker 1: under Constantine and then eventually became the official religion of
Speaker 1: the Roman Empire. There you would see a unification of
Speaker 1: Christianity with the with the state power in the Roman Empire. Yeah. Um.
Speaker 1: So it's interesting to think about what the halo does,
Speaker 1: and especially in the later art, about how it it
Speaker 1: signifies that the individual you're looking at is indeed holy. Um.
Speaker 1: And it's it's weird when you look at the at
Speaker 1: the quality of the arts, and maybe not the quality
Speaker 1: of the art, but the changing detail of the art,
Speaker 1: the changing lifelike qualities of the art over time, because
Speaker 1: it would it would seem to me as as someone
Speaker 1: who's not an expert in these things that once you
Speaker 1: get into the age of Caravaggio, you know, you don't
Speaker 1: need the halo to show, you know, divine suffering in
Speaker 1: an individual individual. You don't need that halo to realize
Speaker 1: that the individual in the painting is divine. Like they're
Speaker 1: all these other tools, all these other leverage you can pull,
Speaker 1: pull to make it so um and and yet they're
Speaker 1: they're still there. Um that I was reading this, this
Speaker 1: wonderful piece, very well written by Melia Arena's titled Sex,
Speaker 1: Violence and Faith the Art of Caravaggio, and they point
Speaker 1: out that the halo, along with other symbolic inclusions, were
Speaker 1: often the only way to recognize any given individual in
Speaker 1: a painting before car Carravaggio and the traditions before him, uh,
Speaker 1: that this was a particular saint, etcetera. They'd be like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: there's the halo, where there's the you know they're holding, um,
Speaker 1: you know, a particular object or some sort of a
Speaker 1: grizzly uh sign of their passing that sort of thing, right,
Speaker 1: because these saints wouldn't have been somebody, you know, it
Speaker 1: wasn't like they had People magazine where you know what
Speaker 1: the famous figures looked like you know, there were no
Speaker 1: photographs and you probably never would have seen these people,
Speaker 1: so there wasn't like one way that a figure looked.
Speaker 1: You would have to use queues in the painting itself
Speaker 1: to identify who they were or to identify which of
Speaker 1: the figures in the painting was the person right, and
Speaker 1: they ran as rights that in the older tradition. You know,
Speaker 1: a lot of these people with the halos or other symbols,
Speaker 1: they were basically interchangeable looking because they just looked like
Speaker 1: other rich people of the time. And then by the
Speaker 1: time Carravaggio is coming along, he's making them look more
Speaker 1: and more like like actual people. And this is interesting
Speaker 1: too though, because you you know, you you hear about
Speaker 1: the sort of behind the scenes stuff on various famous paintings,
Speaker 1: and you learned that, oh, well, this person that's portraying
Speaker 1: Jesus or whoever, that was just some strapping lad from
Speaker 1: in somewhere around town that came into pose for some paintings.
Speaker 1: Uh So there's still you know, not actual depictions of
Speaker 1: of in order or supposed to you know, be actual
Speaker 1: depictions of the person. You know, it's not a snapshot
Speaker 1: of of an historic Jesus or anything, but it's somebody
Speaker 1: that's put there. And then you add these other things,
Speaker 1: either the symbols that allow you to um to gain
Speaker 1: something from it. And I think that gets too into
Speaker 1: the role the like the long standing role of religious
Speaker 1: art that you see not only in Christianity, but in Hinduism, Buddhism, etcetera.
Speaker 1: And that is the use of the the image to
Speaker 1: convey often complex uh theological ideas that you know that
Speaker 1: that maybe even be difficult to explain with language, things
Speaker 1: such as the transfiguration of Christ and UH, the very
Speaker 1: complex roles and and powers of Hindu deities and UH
Speaker 1: and and also meditative practices in um Tibetan Buddhism. UH.
Speaker 1: You know, these are all things that are often, you know,
Speaker 1: laboriously baked into the the visual image that you're presented with.
Speaker 1: Even if you're an outsider, you don't necessarily pick up
Speaker 1: on all of these things. I think a lot of times,
Speaker 1: one thing that religious painting tends to do is to
Speaker 1: inject a kind of visceral passion into stories that are
Speaker 1: actually told just in pure linguistic terms, in a kind
Speaker 1: of spare way, like reading the text of the Crucifixion
Speaker 1: narrative in the Gospel of Mark is going to ask
Speaker 1: you to sort of do a lot of work of
Speaker 1: like reading, you know, passionate imagery into it. It's actually
Speaker 1: a rather lean narrative, but you can do a painting
Speaker 1: of it that's just full of pathos and anguish and
Speaker 1: uh and and showing the full suffering that the artists
Speaker 1: went to depict. Yeah. Absolutely, Now, I guess it's time
Speaker 1: to get into some interesting examples of other religious and
Speaker 1: artistic traditions around the world that show something that might
Speaker 1: be considered analogous to the Halo or aureole outside of
Speaker 1: the Christian artistic tradition. Um. One of the oldest analogs
Speaker 1: to the image of the Halo, that that I came
Speaker 1: across might be something that is found in ancient Mesopotamian mythology.
Speaker 1: So I want to start off with a specific example
Speaker 1: from the many stories of Gilgamesh. Now, in the Gilgamesh narratives,
Speaker 1: there is a recurring theme where Gilgamesh and his his
Speaker 1: friend or his servant in ky Do have to travel
Speaker 1: to the dreaded Cedar forest to slay a monstrous giant
Speaker 1: called who Wah Wah or Humbaba, who is the terrifying
Speaker 1: guardian of the woods, whose roar is as a flood,
Speaker 1: whose mouth is fire, and whose breath is death itself.
Speaker 1: One version of the story I was looking at included
Speaker 1: a line that was something like Huahwa like a man
Speaker 1: eating lion, he does not wipe the blood from his slaver,
Speaker 1: and some some interpretations this, right, an Keto is kind
Speaker 1: of a beast man himself, right, yes, I think so.
Speaker 1: Now I'm not an expert in this. I think in
Speaker 1: the actual epic of Gilgamesh, which is a later, sort
Speaker 1: of built out version of this recurring motif, he is
Speaker 1: I don't know, wild man at least, if not a
Speaker 1: beast man. Oh yeah, he's on the locusts and honey diet.
Speaker 1: But anyway, there are tons of different versions of this
Speaker 1: story from ancient Mesopotamian poetry and mythology, where Gilgamesh or
Speaker 1: Gilgamesh and ky Do have to go kill this monster
Speaker 1: in the cedar forest, and in many versions of the
Speaker 1: story found in different ancient texts, Huawa or Humbaba is
Speaker 1: said to be surrounded by seven layers of something. Sometimes
Speaker 1: this something is interpreted as more straightforwardly to a type
Speaker 1: of cloak or armor that protects him. So he's got
Speaker 1: seven layers of armor, seven cloaks. Other times it is
Speaker 1: interpreted as whom Baba's seven terrors or even his seven
Speaker 1: auras that inflict a horror supernatural terror on his enemies.
Speaker 1: And in one Sumerian version of the early story Gilgamesh
Speaker 1: and huah Wa, it says that when the warriors neared Huahwa,
Speaker 1: the monsters aura sped towards them like a spear. Oh wow,
Speaker 1: so they're like, it's like he's got seven shield tokens
Speaker 1: that they not only protect him but can be used
Speaker 1: offensively as well. Wait, what are the shield tokens? And
Speaker 1: you know in various board games you would have tokens
Speaker 1: for your shields. He's like seven shields, so like you'd
Speaker 1: have to combat your way through all seven shields before
Speaker 1: you could actually hurt the creature itself. Yes, it's clear
Speaker 1: they have some kind of defensive effect. They also have
Speaker 1: some kind of offensive effect, and it's it's very ambiguous
Speaker 1: exactly what they are. There are a thing that can
Speaker 1: be taken on and off, and they protect him, and
Speaker 1: they are an emanation of supernatural power that is sometimes
Speaker 1: represented as a kind of light or glow. And in
Speaker 1: many versions of the story, what happens is Gilgamesh entices
Speaker 1: Huahwa to take off and hand over his seven terrors
Speaker 1: or his seven auras, one at a time by offering
Speaker 1: gifts and flattery and return. So Gilgamesh will come up
Speaker 1: to him, and he will go to Huahwa and say,
Speaker 1: no one knows where you live in the mountains. I
Speaker 1: want to be like you. I want to be one
Speaker 1: of your kinsmen. Here is a gift of lapis Lazuli.
Speaker 1: Hand over your fifth aura. And so then Huahwa hands
Speaker 1: over his, you know, each of one of his seven
Speaker 1: auras in succession. At some point Gilgamesh offers one of
Speaker 1: his sisters to Huahwa is a concubine. At some point
Speaker 1: he offers him I think, uh, some kind of special
Speaker 1: flower grain. But eventually, once all of the auras or
Speaker 1: terrors are removed, Gilgamesh can suddenly beat the monster up,
Speaker 1: like in some version that says, immediately Gilgamesh punches him
Speaker 1: in the face. And I was reading about there's one
Speaker 1: specific version of this story, uh, that involves a great
Speaker 1: debate about whether to chase after the auras. It seems
Speaker 1: like the auras like fly off on their own. I
Speaker 1: was reading about this in the Epic of Gilgamesh, the
Speaker 1: Babylonian Epic Poem and other texts in Acadian and Sumerian
Speaker 1: by Andrew George from Penguin in two thousand two. And
Speaker 1: this example is in what's known as the East Kali Tablet.
Speaker 1: It's a tablet that contains one version of the story
Speaker 1: supposedly dated to the eighteenth century b c. E. And
Speaker 1: uh So, in this version of the story, in ky
Speaker 1: Do and Gilgamesh, after Huahwa is is defeated, uh inky
Speaker 1: Do says to Gilgamesh, hey, don't or your foe. But
Speaker 1: Gilgamesh wants to go hunt down huawas auras like they've
Speaker 1: they've somehow gotten away. Uh And the text here describes
Speaker 1: them as radiant, numinous powers that Huahwa wears his protection,
Speaker 1: and Gilgamesh is like, no, we gotta go get him,
Speaker 1: and in ky Do suggests that they can easily do
Speaker 1: that later. Instead, we've got to stay here and kill
Speaker 1: hu wah Wah. And then after we kill Huahwa, we
Speaker 1: can go find the auras. And to quote from the
Speaker 1: tablet in translation, said in ky Do to him, to Kilgamesh,
Speaker 1: smite huahwa the ogre, who your God's abhor? Why, my friend,
Speaker 1: do you show him mercy? Said Gilgamesh to him, two
Speaker 1: in ky do, Now, my friend, we must impose our victory.
Speaker 1: The auras slip away in the thicket. The auras slip away,
Speaker 1: their radiance grows, dim said in Kid to him, to Gilgamesh,
Speaker 1: my friend, catch a bird and where go it's chicks.
Speaker 1: Let us look for the aura's later as the chicks
Speaker 1: run here and there in the thicket. Yeah, I love that.
Speaker 1: I mean, it almost takes on a comical um uh
Speaker 1: air for sure, But it also reminds me just thinking
Speaker 1: about I mean, I love the idea of thinking about
Speaker 1: these is sort of is haunted arrows that surround him
Speaker 1: in energy fields, etcetera. But of course, I'm I'm going
Speaker 1: back to our episode. I think it was the horned
Speaker 1: helm episode that we talked about the invention of a
Speaker 1: little bit about the inventions of armor and helmets, and
Speaker 1: we talked about how the cloak uh itself is an
Speaker 1: important piece of armor in many older traditions. You know,
Speaker 1: it was a basic way to protect your body and combat.
Speaker 1: Um So perhaps these are just like many different living,
Speaker 1: animate cloaks that he wore. Uh. And isn't it interesting
Speaker 1: that even today we have imagined beings with animate cloaks
Speaker 1: like I know, for example, I think uh, I think
Speaker 1: Dr Strange has a living cloak that has a mind
Speaker 1: of its own. And I want to say that Spawn
Speaker 1: does as well. I'm not an expert on Spawn, but
Speaker 1: I think there's something about his cloak being alive as well.
Speaker 1: Oh that's great, Yes, Spawn. Spawns got a cape or something.
Speaker 1: It's like a big in the movie. It's this giant
Speaker 1: c g I cape that does magic stuff. But so
Speaker 1: here I guess the idea is that this monster had
Speaker 1: the seven whatever these are the auras, the terrors, the
Speaker 1: seven sort of defensive, magical, glowing, full body halo type things,
Speaker 1: and that he can take them off and put them
Speaker 1: back on. And when he takes them off after he's defeated,
Speaker 1: they all scatter all over the place and you have
Speaker 1: to go catch them if you want to. I don't know,
Speaker 1: if you want to, I guess domesticate his halos and
Speaker 1: put them to your own uses. So I was reading
Speaker 1: further about this concept of these ancient Mesopotamian auras or
Speaker 1: halo type things in a book called God's Demons and
Speaker 1: Symbols by Jeremy Black and Anthony green from the University
Speaker 1: of Texas Press in n and uh and so that
Speaker 1: they're also talking about the story of Huaha or Humbabah,
Speaker 1: and they translate the word for the seven layers as
Speaker 1: terrifying radiance, and they they relate this to a broader entry.
Speaker 1: They've got on a couple of concepts from ancient Mesopotamian
Speaker 1: religion called melam and knee uh. These are both Sumerian words.
Speaker 1: Melam's a caddy and equivalent is milamu, and melam refers
Speaker 1: to a specific type of divine power, while knee seems
Speaker 1: to refer to the effect that melam has upon humans.
Speaker 1: So if you are walking through the cedar forest and
Speaker 1: you hear a rustling in the bushes, and then Huawa
Speaker 1: pops out and you witness his melom, you will probably
Speaker 1: be stricken with knee. And No, I do not know
Speaker 1: if there is any connection to the monty python thing,
Speaker 1: but I can't wonder. Yeah, but Black and Greenwright quote
Speaker 1: the exact connotation of melam is difficult to grasp. It
Speaker 1: is a brilliant visible glamour which is exuded by God's heroes,
Speaker 1: sometimes by kings, and all so by temples of great holiness,
Speaker 1: and by God's symbols and emblems. While it is in
Speaker 1: some ways a phenomenon of light, melom is at the
Speaker 1: same time terrifying, awe inspiring. Knee can be experienced as
Speaker 1: a physical creeping of the flesh. And they say that
Speaker 1: both Sumerian and a Cadian are rich in words to
Speaker 1: describe this phenomenon and its effects. So, in keeping with
Speaker 1: the story we were looking at a minute ago, they
Speaker 1: say that gods are sometimes said to wear their melom
Speaker 1: like a garment or like a crown, And they say
Speaker 1: that like a garment or a crown, the melom can
Speaker 1: be taken off, you can shed it, and if you
Speaker 1: kill a god, it's melom will vanish or run away.
Speaker 1: They also stressed that while the melom is apparently always supernatural,
Speaker 1: it is not inherently good. Both revered gods and monstrous
Speaker 1: demons where the melom alike, it seems to be a
Speaker 1: visual representation of overwhelming supernatur tural power, that is, that
Speaker 1: is imagined as some kind of emanation of light or glow,
Speaker 1: fascinating so holy or unholy aura. Yeah, and this is
Speaker 1: one of those things that I just feel like, oh
Speaker 1: I wish I could know, like where does this concept
Speaker 1: come from? Like does this have some kind of basis
Speaker 1: in the natural world or is this pure imagination or
Speaker 1: does it have some basis in I don't know, quirks
Speaker 1: of human psychology. I mean, I guess we'll get more
Speaker 1: into sort of natural phenomena and psychology in the second episode.
Speaker 1: But but man, yeah, this, this this gets the years going.
Speaker 1: Like I said earlier, Yeah, yeah, absolutely, I mean I
Speaker 1: love that even you know, with I guess the mystery
Speaker 1: even makes the these tales resonate even even more so,
Speaker 1: Like if it were if it were more clear that
Speaker 1: we were just talking about a bunch of cloaks, you know,
Speaker 1: or just basic cloak metaphors, then uh, it wouldn't be
Speaker 1: as magical than now. Uh. Well, from here, let's let's
Speaker 1: travel over to ancient Egypt, because we mentioned earlier the
Speaker 1: idea of sun discs and um. There are several directions
Speaker 1: to go in when considering the sun disc in ancient Egypt,
Speaker 1: but the one that probably comes to mind most readily,
Speaker 1: of course, is the state worship of the Sun Disc
Speaker 1: often under Menno tap the Fourth. This was as basically
Speaker 1: he he was, he decreed that, Okay, we're gonna put
Speaker 1: the pantheon more or less aside. We're gonna we're gonna
Speaker 1: instead of focusing on on the pantheon ors or certain
Speaker 1: individuals in the pantheon of gods, we're just going to
Speaker 1: worship this glorious sun Disc often. And um, we could
Speaker 1: do a whole episode on this because it's such a
Speaker 1: fascinating story. But basically, this was an unpopular move that
Speaker 1: was reversed after his death. You know, it's it's it's
Speaker 1: tough to introduce a new god and a new twist
Speaker 1: on religion and expect everyone else to just stay with
Speaker 1: that change. Uh. Now, I know there are some people
Speaker 1: who claim here that that Amenhotep is in some ways
Speaker 1: like the inventor of monotheism. I think that might be
Speaker 1: a little bit oversimplifying the issue. It seems from what
Speaker 1: I recall, I haven't studied this deeply in a while,
Speaker 1: but it seems like from what I recall, the the
Speaker 1: attend Sun Disc that he was revering was sort of
Speaker 1: like already a figure in Egyptian religion. But now he
Speaker 1: said like, well, this is now just the only god
Speaker 1: that we're going to worship, and the other ones are
Speaker 1: all subordinate to that god. Yeah, yeah, this is this
Speaker 1: is this is basically my understanding as well. Yeah, there's
Speaker 1: there's If you're saying that he converted the Egyptians to monotheism,
Speaker 1: that's yeah, that's that's exaggerating a bit. But certainly the
Speaker 1: sun disc in general pops up in various places throughout
Speaker 1: Egyptian iconography and oftentimes looks similar to what we might
Speaker 1: think of as a halo today. So just to run
Speaker 1: through a few key examples that I think illustrate this. Well,
Speaker 1: first of all, there's there's not the sky goddess, who
Speaker 1: sometimes rendered as a giant nude woman arched above the earth. Um,
Speaker 1: you can look up images of this. It's where you know,
Speaker 1: it's like she has she's kind of in uh cat cow,
Speaker 1: I guess yoga wise, Uh, but she is the vaulted sky.
Speaker 1: But don't I don't know that yoga pose. Tell me, Oh,
Speaker 1: it's you know, you're on all fours and you're kind
Speaker 1: of like you're either like a cat or you like
Speaker 1: a cow. Okay, you should try it. It's great for
Speaker 1: the spun. But but yeah, she's kind of in that
Speaker 1: position and her arched body is the cosmos. Like you,
Speaker 1: you're looking up at her belly when you're looking up
Speaker 1: at the stars. But sometimes she's seen as she's represented
Speaker 1: as a giant cow with star markings and a sun
Speaker 1: disc positioned between the cow's horns. Again, she's associated with
Speaker 1: the sky she uh uh, and this also signify according
Speaker 1: to Geraldine Pinch in Egyptian mythology, this signifies her as
Speaker 1: the sky god lifting up the sun god ray or
Speaker 1: or Um hur Rah, and she mentions that this quote
Speaker 1: becomes the insignia of several goddesses, so Ray or Rob
Speaker 1: the sun god himself is depicted in various ways as well,
Speaker 1: including a sun disk with a scarebon it or in it.
Speaker 1: But you also see him depicted as you know, in
Speaker 1: his hybrid form, with the sun disc above his head
Speaker 1: or on top of his head. Now to be clear,
Speaker 1: you see this with other deities and characters in the
Speaker 1: Egyptian pampion as well. The symbol of their role or
Speaker 1: identity is simply stacked atop their head like a hat
Speaker 1: like they made like a scorpion is up on your
Speaker 1: head to signify, uh, you know that you're scorpion like qualities, etcetera. Um,
Speaker 1: So again, think about the necessity of delivering information through symbols.
Speaker 1: There are only so many ways to present the idea
Speaker 1: of man plus son equal Sun God, right, and it's
Speaker 1: just here's a man, or here's a hybrid of a man,
Speaker 1: and then here's the sun and they are the Sun God.
Speaker 1: When you were talking about the goddess Newt with the
Speaker 1: representation as the cow with the sun disc about the head,
Speaker 1: I was trying to think, is this the same as
Speaker 1: the imagery I've already seen? Or is there another ancient
Speaker 1: Egyptian deity or figure often depicted as a bo vine
Speaker 1: with a with a halo or sun disc over its head.
Speaker 1: And I think the thing I was thinking about was
Speaker 1: the oppicue bull, which is I think somewhat different. So
Speaker 1: there's another one. Apparently ancient Egyptian religion has multiple bulls
Speaker 1: with halos I mean, in the loose sense of halo,
Speaker 1: a bull with the sun disc between its horns. Well, um,
Speaker 1: that I actually have the answer to that, and that
Speaker 1: is because APIs Uh is the offspring of said to
Speaker 1: be the offspring of another Egyptian goddess, and that is Hathor,
Speaker 1: and she's the golden goddess of childbirth um and she's
Speaker 1: often depicted as a beautiful woman with a red solar
Speaker 1: disc positioned above her head between a pair of cow horns,
Speaker 1: and she's associated with raw and ray as well. I
Speaker 1: think it's kind of complex and like it varies, like
Speaker 1: sometimes she's more like the offspring and other times she's
Speaker 1: more like a consort um. It's or it seemed a
Speaker 1: little ambiguous when I was reading about it, but but yeah,
Speaker 1: so the the appiss bowl is the offspring of hath Or.
Speaker 1: Hath Or is tied to the Sun god, so it's
Speaker 1: it's like the sun disc is there to show that
Speaker 1: they are aligned or descended from him. Now, if the
Speaker 1: scholars that you were looking at earlier, if their theory
Speaker 1: about the history of the halo iconography that led to
Speaker 1: Christian religion is true, even though it would sort of
Speaker 1: make sense to look at the Oppice bowl or any
Speaker 1: of these gods you've been talking about with the sun
Speaker 1: disc over their head and say, ah, that inspired the
Speaker 1: the Christian halo symbol, it seems like at least they
Speaker 1: were arguing that's not the case, which if they're correct
Speaker 1: about that, that would just make it seem like almost
Speaker 1: a case of cultural convergent evolution, right, something that just
Speaker 1: so naturally comes to mind, that multiple different cultures have
Speaker 1: produced very similar imagery. Yeah. Now, I mean, part of
Speaker 1: it could be I just haven't come across and read
Speaker 1: an argument to the contrary, But yeah, it seems like
Speaker 1: it's just a situation of different people's playing with some
Speaker 1: of the same symbols and doing the obvious things with
Speaker 1: those symbols. Because while it might seem like this would
Speaker 1: be a great connection, Like it seems like you could
Speaker 1: put Um hath Or on your conspiracy board and then
Speaker 1: put Um the archangel Michael on your on your conspiracy
Speaker 1: board and just draw a line between the two, it
Speaker 1: does not seem as if there's actually a line to
Speaker 1: be drawn there, you know, in the actual spread of
Speaker 1: symbolism and you know, artistic motifs, it might actually go
Speaker 1: back more to Humbaba or HuaHua, right, but the or
Speaker 1: just generally the Mesopotamian concept. But I've got another one,
Speaker 1: another one from the pre Christian ancient world with some
Speaker 1: interesting uh similarities to Halo iconography and this would be
Speaker 1: the Achaian halo. Could you believe that there is something
Speaker 1: like a halo in the Iliad? This this got me
Speaker 1: by surprise as well. Yeah, yeah, I guess a lot
Speaker 1: of people have read this and not necessarily noticed the similarities. Again,
Speaker 1: and you know, they're always going to be some differences,
Speaker 1: but the similarities are interesting. Um. So, there's one passage
Speaker 1: in book eighteen of the Iliad that that strikes me
Speaker 1: as very very pretty darn HALOI ish. So it comes
Speaker 1: in book eighteen of the Iliad. The context is that
Speaker 1: the great Achaian warrior Achilles he learns that his beloved
Speaker 1: companion Patroclus has been killed in battle by the Trojan
Speaker 1: hero Hector, and the exact relationship between Achilles and Patroclus
Speaker 1: has been the subject of enormous debate over the centuries.
Speaker 1: At the very least, they are supposed to be the
Speaker 1: closest of friends, you know, their brothers in arms, their confidants.
Speaker 1: Some scholars also believe there's an implication that their lovers
Speaker 1: that's not stated explicitly, but some really think it's sort
Speaker 1: of there subtly in the text. Whatever the exact nature
Speaker 1: of their relationship, they care very deeply for one another,
Speaker 1: and Patroclus is killed in battle, and when Achilles learns
Speaker 1: that patrick LUs has died, he almost literally goes insane
Speaker 1: with grief, and then that grief turns into rage and
Speaker 1: a thirst for vengeance. And the Trojans and the Achaeans
Speaker 1: are in the middle of fighting to claim patrick Lus's
Speaker 1: body from the battlefield. So the goddess Athena intervenes and
Speaker 1: she pours her godpower into Achilles so that he can
Speaker 1: become so frightening that the Trojans will flee in terror,
Speaker 1: and patrick Lus's body can be brought back behind the
Speaker 1: Achaean lines. And the way this is visually depicted is
Speaker 1: very interesting. So I want to read from actually from
Speaker 1: the recent translation of the Iliad by Caroline Alexander, which
Speaker 1: is very good. Rachel and I started reading this. We
Speaker 1: we haven't made it all the way through yet, but
Speaker 1: we we started reading this and I really like it.
Speaker 1: So if you're looking to read the Iliad for the
Speaker 1: first time or the fiftieth, I recommend this one. Um
Speaker 1: but the passage here goes like this, Achille's beloved of
Speaker 1: Zeus arose and Athena cast the tasseled aegis about his
Speaker 1: mighty shoulders, she shining among goddesses, encircled round his head
Speaker 1: a cloud of gold, and from it blazed bright, shining fire.
Speaker 1: And as when smoke rising from a city reaches the
Speaker 1: clear high air from a distant land which enemy men
Speaker 1: fight round, and they the whole day long are pitted
Speaker 1: in hateful warfare around their city walls. But with the
Speaker 1: sun setting, the beacon fires blaze torch upon torch, and
Speaker 1: flaring upward, the glare becomes visible to those who live around,
Speaker 1: in the hope that they might come with ships as
Speaker 1: allies against destruction. So from achilles head the radiance reached
Speaker 1: the clear high air, and going away from the wall,
Speaker 1: he stood at the ditch. Nor did he mix with
Speaker 1: the Achaeans, for he observed his mother's knowing command, and
Speaker 1: standing there he shouted, and from the distance Pallace Athena
Speaker 1: cried out to unspeakable. Was the uproar he incided in
Speaker 1: the Trojans, as when a clarion voice is heard when
Speaker 1: chries the trumpet of life, destroying enemies who surround a city.
Speaker 1: Such then was the clarion voice of eacities, And when
Speaker 1: they heard the brazen voice of eacities. The spirit in
Speaker 1: each man was thrown in turmoil. The horses, with their
Speaker 1: fine manes, wheeled their chariots back, for in their hearts
Speaker 1: they forebode distress to come. And the charioteers were struck
Speaker 1: from their senses when they saw the weariless, terrible fire
Speaker 1: above the head of Peleus's great hearted son blazing. And
Speaker 1: this the gleaming eyed goddess Athena caused to blaze. That's wonderful.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's the that's the spotlight of the gods
Speaker 1: right there. That's the light of Athena shining through Achilles,
Speaker 1: through Achilles his brain and through his rage. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's it's amazing. So there's some things in common with
Speaker 1: the melam or milamu. Uh, some things in common with
Speaker 1: what could later be seen in Christian halos. You could
Speaker 1: say that the radiance here is a phenomenon of light.
Speaker 1: It's described as blazing like fire, like a beacon of light. Uh.
Speaker 1: It surrounds the head. It is a godpower. It's conferred supernaturally,
Speaker 1: and it strikes terror in the heart of those who
Speaker 1: behold it. Wow. Yeah, I I absolutely love that. And
Speaker 1: of course this this especially is one of those examples
Speaker 1: that you can easily tie into ideas concerning the bicameral mind.
Speaker 1: You know, the idea that especially in this moment, that
Speaker 1: Achilles is you know, completely overcome by this uh you
Speaker 1: know this this inspired rage. Um. But but it's but
Speaker 1: one interesting thing here is you would never, no matter
Speaker 1: how you're looking at Achilles here, you probably would not
Speaker 1: make the argument that Achilles is in an enlightened state,
Speaker 1: that he has no it is experiencing enlightenment. Um. And
Speaker 1: yet that is another way you see halo or halo
Speaker 1: like um symbols used in other artistic traditions, particularly in
Speaker 1: Buddhist traditions. Oh yeah, because there's a whole class of
Speaker 1: of halo or aureole type glows that can be found
Speaker 1: throughout Hindu and Buddhist art. Yeah. And in Tibetan art,
Speaker 1: for example, you're a form of a halo is often
Speaker 1: used to signify enlightenment and or divinity. You'll see it
Speaker 1: on the Buddha himself, but also on important monks. And
Speaker 1: I was reading a description of a twelfth century Buddha
Speaker 1: from Kurt Batterans Tibetan, India. Buddhist traditions and Transformations two
Speaker 1: thousand fourteen. From the mat quote, He's this is just
Speaker 1: his description of this particular work. Quote. He sits on
Speaker 1: a lotus, conveying ideas of purity and perhaps suggesting his
Speaker 1: radiance in a cosmic realm, and his head is encircled
Speaker 1: by a flaming halo. So Burnt also describes a Buddhist
Speaker 1: statue that, in its original form seems to have possessed
Speaker 1: a halo that was surrounded by branches, in reference to
Speaker 1: the Bodhi tree under which the Buddha first attained enlightenment. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I feel like I'm not certain, but I feel
Speaker 1: like I've seen depictions of the Buddha surrounded by fire. Yeah.
Speaker 1: We see this kind of flaming nimbus in Chinese and
Speaker 1: also in Islamic traditions as well. Uh. There's also a
Speaker 1: really neat when in Japanese traditions that's referred to as
Speaker 1: the Carra flame. Carea is essentially like a Japanese garuda,
Speaker 1: you know, the sub bird like magical holy creature. Um.
Speaker 1: But the Carrera flame here is often represented as a
Speaker 1: kind of traditional halo behind the head, this kind of
Speaker 1: hoop design, but with portions at least portions of it
Speaker 1: on fire. Um and I included an image of you
Speaker 1: here image of it here for you Joe described as
Speaker 1: the carra inco. Yeah, it's almost like it's like a
Speaker 1: hoop with a bonfire at each of the cardinal directions
Speaker 1: on it. Now, if we broaden our definition from halo
Speaker 1: to also things that are more like you know, the
Speaker 1: areolas and even uh mandola, which is a kind of
Speaker 1: halo that emanates from or behind the entire body, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of kind of in keeping with those those various
Speaker 1: auras of of the monster we described earlier, of whom
Speaker 1: baba there. There are plenty more examples as well. We
Speaker 1: certainly see this in Christian traditions, but it's also widespread
Speaker 1: throughout the iconography of India, particularly Buddhist images and in Hinduism.
Speaker 1: Statues are often depicted with a uh prahamandola placed above
Speaker 1: the statue and particularly the head to indicate hallowed status.
Speaker 1: And these are often very ornate with animals and decorative
Speaker 1: designs in them. Uh sometimes you know, they're often crafted
Speaker 1: of shining metal with red paint, and they're signifying the
Speaker 1: object or being here as as something that should be
Speaker 1: venerated now and looking at images of the problem Mandala.
Speaker 1: One thing I really like about the especially compared to
Speaker 1: a lot of the Christian iconography of the halo, which
Speaker 1: is often very smooth it's just kind of a radiance
Speaker 1: or it's a smooth looking almost gold metal type disc.
Speaker 1: The problem mandala is very textured, it's very busy. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff happening in it. You you almost
Speaker 1: get more of the sense of the complexity and the
Speaker 1: almost like uh, I don't know, like teeming ant like
Speaker 1: radiance of of the complexity of the real world. Now.
Speaker 1: Another very I think a pretty famous rendition of the
Speaker 1: Probab Mandala that a lot of you've probably seen is
Speaker 1: when you see statues of the dance of Shiva, there's
Speaker 1: kind of this, uh, this flaming hoop that is around Shiva.
Speaker 1: Uh and it is um it's it's less it's less
Speaker 1: intricate as this, like it's not a big solid thing.
Speaker 1: It is more of a hoop. But that's probably one
Speaker 1: that a lot of you've seen before. And I believe
Speaker 1: this is typically referred to as a as a nataraja. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like a big hoop halo surrounding the entire body with
Speaker 1: the flames all around. It's almost like, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: um coming back in the other sense. So we've talked
Speaker 1: about the way that objects in the natural world like
Speaker 1: the sun might cause you to want to frame an
Speaker 1: image of a god as something that's emanating light or
Speaker 1: has its head surrounded by a glowing or gleaming disk.
Speaker 1: But it just occurred to me also, I mean, I
Speaker 1: wonder in what ways could you could you talk about
Speaker 1: just the practical necessities of framing the subjects of art
Speaker 1: as having an influence on on these various traditions of
Speaker 1: halos and orioles and and problem mandalas and things like that,
Speaker 1: because often these things do serve as a frame there,
Speaker 1: like a visual focusing tool. Yeah, certainly they It tells
Speaker 1: you where to look at, what to focus on. I'm
Speaker 1: looking at a dance of Shiva within the not not
Speaker 1: a raja that uh it's got a bunch of snakes. Yeah. Yeah, Again,
Speaker 1: it's just so interesting to look at how even within
Speaker 1: a particular religion or um or you know, regional tradition,
Speaker 1: over time you'll see so many different takes on it.
Speaker 1: Like artists have just always had to uh, you know,
Speaker 1: sort of reinvent in this case, the halo or something
Speaker 1: like a halo. You know, what can I do that
Speaker 1: that sets it apart, That makes it exciting again, that
Speaker 1: makes it uh uh, you know, convey the power, the majesty,
Speaker 1: the you know, the rage or whatever it is, the
Speaker 1: the the enlightenment, whatever you're trying to convey through the imagery.
Speaker 1: How to keep that present? That's well put um, which
Speaker 1: which leads me to Mortal Kombat. Um, there's a just
Speaker 1: in passing we mentioned fictional characters earlier. There in the
Speaker 1: latest rendition, there is a goddess character named Centrion, and
Speaker 1: you get to change the way your characters look, and
Speaker 1: one of the things you can do is you change
Speaker 1: the various halo like things emanating around her head. Um,
Speaker 1: And uh, yeah, it's it's actually quite interesting, like it
Speaker 1: is it gonna be rocks, Is it gonna be jewels?
Speaker 1: Is it gonna be something you know, nature like stick
Speaker 1: like at all? But uh, you know, ultimately they managed
Speaker 1: to work a lot of a lot of what we're
Speaker 1: talking about into that particular character design. Now, in any
Speaker 1: of those uh like WWE Builder Wrestler games, can you
Speaker 1: build a wrestler with a halo. I bet you could.
Speaker 1: I don't remember it specifically, but I bet there was
Speaker 1: some sort of hokey looking halo that you could put
Speaker 1: on a character. There's probably been somebody who's wrestled in
Speaker 1: a uh, you know, a goofy angel costume. Now I'm
Speaker 1: what you know now that I say that, though, I
Speaker 1: bet there's a luchador that has a halo. There are
Speaker 1: a lot of luchadors that have uh you know, Catholic
Speaker 1: imagery tied up in their masks. Doesn't have a halo,
Speaker 1: does he? Well, not Santo, but there are others, Like
Speaker 1: you know, there are other Catholic themed luchadors, And I
Speaker 1: bet there's one that I'm just not thinking of that
Speaker 1: maybe Mystico or somebody has some sort of halo iconography
Speaker 1: wrapped up in their design. That's homework for next time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: to come back and report. Yeah, so, Luca fans out there,
Speaker 1: let me know who I'm forgetting. Okay, Well, I think
Speaker 1: that's got to wrap it up for part one. Yeah. Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: this has been fun and it lays the groundwork for
Speaker 1: the next episode, where we'll I think will inevitably touch
Speaker 1: touch on some more you know, cultural examples and cultural
Speaker 1: ideas of halos. But we'll also get into some of
Speaker 1: the optics that we tease briefly in this episode, and
Speaker 1: of course, in the meantime, we'd love to hear from everybody.
Speaker 1: You know, what are your favorite examples of halo likenography
Speaker 1: from art, history, from archaeological fines, etcetera. From fiction you know,
Speaker 1: or they're they're particularly particularly interesting renditions of of halo
Speaker 1: imagery that you like. I was always partial to uh um,
Speaker 1: what's his name, Michael William Kaluda's angel drawings. He would do.
Speaker 1: He had some very bizarre looking angel drawings that he
Speaker 1: created with like flaming halos and halos of eyes and
Speaker 1: the like. So I'm sure there's some other great examples
Speaker 1: out there, so cendem our away in the meantime as well.
Speaker 1: If you would like to listen to other episodes of
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind, you can find the Stuff
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Speaker 1: Uh there you will find core episodes Science and Culture
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Speaker 1: form Artifact episodes and Friday It's Weird House Cinema. That's right,
Speaker 1: you gotta catch your mall uh so huge, Thanks as
Speaker 1: always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If
Speaker 1: you would like to get in touch with us with
Speaker 1: feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest a
Speaker 1: topic for the future, just to say hello, you can
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