Symbolic system of wild boar

This article milked with the Symbolique conveyed by the Sanglier . The wild boar is for the Celte S a crowned animal. It is possible that it represents initially the intelligence and the trick, it is thus associated with the knowledge; but it is also related to the other world, the Sidh. It is thus naturally the animal emblematic of the sacerdotal class, the Druide S whose word means: “the very erudite ones” and which has the load of the relation with the other world, crowned and gods. It seems that certain were made call " sanglier" , in Gallic " torcos" , where one recognizes the root of the word " Torque " who indicates the collar which carry the divinized gods or dignitaries. One can see there a relationship with the worship of the head of the Celts. Moreover, the head of wild boar, rare case for the animals, bears a specific name: the head (which could have the same root as Aurochs). It is represented on the shields, on the pommels of swords and it very frequently forms the house of the Carnyx, these horns of war perhaps intended to impress the enemy and to give courage to the combatants by their horrible “cries” but which have doubtless a function symbolic system, ritual, even magic, at least at the origin.

One found in 2004 five carnyx close to Tulle in the Limousin. Four are boar's heads, the open large mouth. The fifth is a snake. The wild boars are represented in particular on the Chaudron of Gundestrup, discovered in Denmark, and which is one of the most invaluable object of the Celtic world for its language symbolic. The Scot had carnyx, and it is not improbable that the Cornemuse S replaced them. They accompany they also the soldiers with the combat.

The force of wild boar, a symbol inherited the paleolithic hunters?

The symbol of wild boar seems common to the world Indo-European, with similar characteristics which indicate the wild world, the rough force. It is present in the Greek myths. It is a wild boar, a horrible animal, which Aphrodite sends to destroy the kingdom of Calydon, killing the cattle and terrifying the inhabitants. In the same way, it is a wild boar which Aries, jealous, sends to kill Adonis, the lover of Aphrodite.

But it is also present in India where it is one of the will avatâra of Vishnu at the sides of Rowed and of Krishna and saved the Earth hidden at the ocean floor by a demon (the Déluge?). It is also, under the heading “Power of wild boar” one of the Seven-Mothers, one of the seven vowels which form the base of the language and knowledge.

Why such “a worship”? Can't one see in this animal one of the last “savages” at the time Neolithic? Of the three principal species which ensure the “new” man (Neolithic) its subsistence, the Cochon is to be domesticated last. The Cochon is resulting from wild boar but underwent material changes and lost 2 Chromosomes. The vindicatory character of wild wild boar is known and there remains regarded as dangerous still today. Moreover, it does bad housework with the cultures and was to already annoy the Neolithic farmers.

However, the savage could not be completely eliminated. Perhaps for religious reasons which connect to us at old times? It is known that the men introduced wild animals into some islands of the Mediterranean, the stag in particular, and that they drove out them. However they had come with the goat's milk cheeses and the sheep, for a long time domesticated. Was this to perpetuate an old ritual related to hunting?

Certain prehistorians, in the light of the Shamanism, think today the report/ratio of the animal differently (Jean Clottes, Jean Guilaine). One could regard wild boar of the Celts as an animal totemic, a Totem: it seems emblem and is seen invested of a magic capacity (see magic).

Hunting could be well ritual in the companies Paléolithique S of Chasseurs-cueilleurs. In particular hunting for the large undoubtedly venerated animals, perhaps totems, in any case certainly feared. One does not find representations paleolithic of plants or small animals. On the other hand, Bison S, Aurochs, Mammoth S, Félins… is painted or engraved on the walls of the caves. And if hunting, as it Catherine Claude thinks, were a ritual of transgression of the interdict to kill these large animals totemic, prohibited which was transmitted until in “you will not kill” Christian?

Hunting for wild boar, among Celts, seems to perpetuate this ritual. A form of hunting for wild boar, practiced with horse and with lances, was maintained until today in India. Can one go so far as to do it parallel? And then would the culture of the Indo-European people have kept this pool of beliefs of the paleolithic hunters in their relationship with the dangerous savage and animal?

In Spanish, wild boar says “ jabali ” and one finds the same root there as the word “javelin”, the weapon of jet used to drive out it, perhaps since prehistory…

The magic pig

Already with the Neolithic era, which remained to us the “trophy” of this hunting, the tooth of wild boar, is invested of a magic capacity, which appears in connection with resurrection. One found skeletons Neolithic of the two sexes buried with like only ornament a made bracelet of two wild boar defenses to their wrist (Lingolsheim, Alsace, France).

One also found the wild boar defenses, associated with human remainders, close to the baptistry of Limoges, dated from the surroundings of IIIe century after J. - C. This “worship” of wild boar thus perdurait in the rites of incipient Christendom, in a way official or semi-official… in any case one undoubtedly continued to allot to him a magic capacity in connection with beyond.

One finds still today wild boar legs nailed on the doors of the barns of the Limousin or Auvergne. Undoubtedly they have, like the tooth a protective magic capacity, for the cattle or food.

In Celtic mythology, the magic pig is as the cauldron an instrument of resurrection which powerful the Dagda (Teutates as a Gaulle) has, the god owner of the Druide S who reigns on the life and death. One can nourish oneself with the cauldron without never which it does not dry up and deaths, jetés inside, find a new life. In the same way the pig can be eaten one day and become again intact the following day and mangeable again.

It is easy to establish a parallel with the Taureau of which the myth is undoubtedly first and who perduré in the Eastern religions (worship of Mithra…). The Indo-European bull is indeed at the same time the destroying power and the source of the life and eternity. The symbolism of the Horn of plenty which is dependant for him undoubtedly finds in the lunar crescent of the Islam itself which is not other than a horn or rather a pair of horns. The Growing, whereas it can be closed again, like death on the man, opens a door on eternity. The bracelet of the two wild boar teeth, with the wrist of the late Neolithic eras, is their passport for eternity, the shape of the tooth is that of the crescent and the two associated teeth form a Cercle, like the Cycle of the life.

The wild boar is him as as much associated with the force and the war as with abundance, food and health. The god Roman Mars seems to have begun again this same duality. He is indeed at the same time the god of the war and the god of abundance, harvests and the troupeaux.
Is this the same duality as that of the lightning which is able to kill but which gave fire to the men? The mythology attached to the lightning seems well to confirm it (at the German ones with Thor, but also at the Greeks with Zeus which punishes Prométhée for its treason).

One could see in wild boar a Conjonction of opposite the reinforcing the power of the strong symbol of this double antagonistic value. Perhaps the question of the color plays a part. The wild boar, naturally Black, is Blanc when it is the mythical wild boar which the King Arthur continues. Nevertheless, it is possible that this vision is distorted: one thinks that the war had a major religious character among Celts and their report/ratio with death was certainly quite different from ours today, at least in our strongly desacralized companies.

The importance of the cyclic symbols, the Triskell representing the diurnal race of the sun, or the horns of God Stag Cernunnos for the succession of the seasons, let think that death was to be entirely accepted like forming part it also cycle of the life. It is perhaps why, under the emblem of wild boar, the Celtic warriors were described if impavides vis-a-vis death.

Myths first and questions of today

Do we Somme there with the roots of the good and evil, narrowly bound, so close…? The thin layer, the female of wild boar, is never as offensive as when it is suitée, when it defends its small. It applies the warlike precept: best defense is the attack.

Is the wild boar the symbol of a kind of “natural” morals which would have remained by taking various forms to speak to us about life and death? The “bloody tooth” of wild boar is despite everything a “defense”…

The war undoubtedly takes its origin in the protection of food against the enemy who wants to seize some. And the protection of food it is the protection of the life which without it dies out and cannot reappear. The force is with the service of the protection of the life. Then with which returns the attack? Who is the attacker? That which misses? When does it become easier or more trying, or even quite simply possible, to take with the other rather than to produce oneself its own food? Some will say that the cause is abundance, accumulation and the inequality. One could establish the link with the property, that of the food, which starts with the domestication of the animals, the property of the cattle. Then that of the ground which can be related to the sedentarisation. Collective ownership undoubtedly, of the group, the clan, the village, more probably than personal property initially. But of that there there is only one step… And then it suffices for déclancher the desire, the war, between the clans, the villages…

Thus abundance has this same duality, to be at the same time the life and death… “Plenty is no plague”… distorts good morals… like reassuring itself… Unless true abundance is not the “plethora”… in which case nothing would prevent the division, if possible equitable… but what “equitable”? The large one has more appetite than the small one… and then? If there is for all… Shortage, scarcity, abundance, plethora… Perhaps this is what made the history of humanity and continues to make it today… The Horn of plenty remains our symbol of the life. It was the leitmotiv of the rural and agricultural Sociétés. It remains the leitmotiv of the post-industrial Sociétés. When we succeeded in ensuring our “Food safety” by the means of agricultural modernizations, to satisfy our stomachs so much so that, on the matter, more would be the enemy of the good, and than we wonder about “eating well” much more than on “eating enough”, we invented other shortages, other desires to satisfy: those of the very last thing objects, at once wished, at once thrown… and we approach the victory, that of knowing that our desires will be never satisfied, that this hunger there is properly insatiable. It is the “Toujours more” of François de Closets… and no philosophy seems to be able to keep us.

And if we thus carry out the Mythe of Dagda-Teutates, the Celtic god with the superhuman appetite?

the myth of the indefinite growth, it is the myth of wild boar, the magic pig which grow bigger eternally, and that which one eats and who is recreated each night.

Beliefs of the modern Western companies: perhaps to believe that the Natural resources are inexhaustible, to believe that the growth is the remedy for all the evils… plunge to the sources of the Indo-European beliefs.

The Neolithic man, Farmer, discover that it can produce his own food and does not have to fear the lack any more. But he discovers at the same time his insatiable appetite. That frightens it because that means that it will be condemned to produce still and to always more try to satisfy itself and this, it of with the intuition, without never arriving there.

And then, like known as Camus, “it is necessary to imagine Sisyphus happy”…

But this condemned man cannot prevent himself from being turned over. He looks at behind towards this lost paradise, that or he could be satisfied little, essence perhaps, of what returns, despite everything, happy Sisyphus.

The Wild boar emblem of the sacerdotal caste

All the aspects of the traditional symbolic system of wild boar are exposed in an article of Rene Guénon, entitled the Wild boar and Ourse included in the fundamental Symboles of Crowned Science . He symbolizes the sacerdotal caste in opposition to the Bear which is to him the emblem of the warlike caste. The Bear is thus in a relation of subordination (female) compared to Wild boar while this last is necessarily male. Except when in consequence of an inversion of the normal reports/ratios of the two higher castes (revolt of Kshatriyas - warriors in Sanskrit) one witnesses a true inversion. Thus one could see appearing the institution of a female form of priesthood (druidess) in laison with the worship of a Large Goddess.

Notes and references of the article

Random links: